Use case · Supported evaluation

Model routing strategy

Croutons can evaluate model routing and provider/fallback strategy so task class, risk, and measured quality drive assignment — not ad hoc overrides.

Problem

Multiple models serve the same workflows without consistent routing rules, causing quality drift, wasted capacity, and opaque fallbacks.

Operational symptoms

• Manual model overrides in production
• Inconsistent answers across similar tasks
• Fallback to frontier models under any error
• No documented provider failover policy

Who experiences it

Platform teams managing model gateways and agent orchestration

What Croutons evaluates

• Task class versus model capability
• Risk tier and approval needs
• Latency and cost targets
• Provider and fallback behavior under failure

Inputs required

• Current routing tables or gateway config
• Model inventory and pricing
• Failure and override logs
• Quality or eval samples by class

Method

Derive routing rules from task class, risk, and measured fit. Document provider/fallback strategy as part of routing — not as an afterthought. Propose pilots before broad cutover.

Deliverables

• Routing policy draft by task class
• Fallback and provider strategy notes
• Override reduction recommendations
• Pilot and measurement plan

Expected outcome

Predictable model assignment with explicit trade-offs and fewer opaque overrides.

Limitations

• Does not replace your gateway product
• Quality labels bound routing confidence
• Provider outages still require operational runbooks

Evidence or claim basis

Approved Croutons inference-diagnosis methodology

No external evidence sources attached. Claims rest on the approved internal methodology above. Repository file paths are content sources, not factual provenance.

Reviewed 2026-07-18 · Croutons product · status: supported