Gating the write side

You'll finish with: Nothing spends money or contacts a client unapproved.

Writing is where a connector earns its keep and where it can hurt you. The rule is simple: it can prepare anything, it sends nothing.

Prepare versus send

No gate
"Invoice the Henderson job"
Invoice created and emailed. You find out afterwards.
With a gate
"Invoice the Henderson job"
A draft invoice, ready. You check the number and hit send.

Two layers, both needed

The rule goes in your CLAUDE.md — it explains why, so Claude cooperates rather than working around it.

The hook makes it hold when Claude gets confused, which it eventually will.

# Connector rules

Reading: no approval needed. Look at anything.

Writing — always drafts, never final:
- Invoices: create as DRAFT. I send.
- Emails: create as DRAFT. I send.
- CRM: notes and stages are fine. Never delete a record.
- Calendar: propose times. I confirm.

If a tool has no draft state, stop and ask me instead.

"If a tool has no draft state, stop and ask" is the important line. Some connectors only do it live. For those, no automation — you do it by hand.

It is also more common than it sounds. Plenty of connectors are read-only, so there is no draft to make and nothing to gate. Xero is one of them — see the next chapter. Check what each connector can actually change before you design a workflow around it.

Do this now
  1. Add the block above to your CLAUDE.md.
  2. Test it: ask for something that would send. It should produce a draft and stop.
  3. If you did the Gates course, add the sending action to your hook list too.
How to know it worked

Ask for something that would normally go out — an email to a client, say. You get a draft you have to send yourself, or Claude stops and asks. Nothing has left the building.

If anything sent, go to Customize → Connectors and set that connector's write category to Blocked now. Fix the gate before you unblock it. And note that a rule in CLAUDE.md is a request, not a lock — the connector's own permission setting is the thing that actually holds.

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