Blocked

How much caffeine is actually left in this decaf?

ALS-COFFEE-1.0-DECAF-003

This question matters to a buyer and CANNOT be answered from a public product page today. What would be required is stated in full.

Why this cannot be run

Blocked by G-03, G-06.

Assertion

residual_caffeine matches_format a quantity with a stated basis

Applicability

applies when
the product is decaffeinated coffee
signal
undecidable_from_public_data

Accepted evidence

  • product_description — a residual-caffeine figure with its basis stated — a percentage of original caffeine, or a mass on a stated dry-weight or per-serving basis with the dose and volume named

Explicitly insufficient evidence

What does not count, and why. Published because the omission is where a check quietly becomes a claim.

  • "caffeine free" or "naturally caffeine-free"
    Decaffeinated coffee is never caffeine free under any construction, and a mainstream trade body puts the residue in the low milligrams per cup.
  • "99.9% caffeine free" with no basis
    A percentage of what — the original caffeine, the bean mass, the brewed cup — changes the meaning by orders of magnitude, and the number looks well-formed either way.
  • a milligram figure with no dose, water volume or brew method
    Without the inputs the number is not reproducible by the buyer and states nothing checkable.
  • a percentage threshold quoted as a legal requirement
    There is no US standard of identity for decaffeinated roasted coffee and the commonly quoted removal figure originates with a trade association rather than a regulation, so citing it as law is wrong.
  • "meets FDA standards"
    The applicable federal provision caps a solvent residue rather than caffeine content, so the phrase reassures about a different question than the one asked.
  • an EU threshold for coffee extract applied to whole beans
    That limit governs a different product, and applying it to roasted beans is a jurisdiction and product-scope error.

Conflict rules

  • When a percentage and a milligram figure both appear — then record both with their bases; the standard reports the stated figures rather than converting between them

Discrimination

Predicted fail rate: 85-98% (predicted, not yet measured)

Almost no retail decaf page publishes a residual figure with a basis, so this would fail for nearly everyone. It is published as blocked because the question is real and current, not because the assertion would be worth running as written.

For a shopper

Decaf is not caffeine free, and how much remains varies. Any figure without its basis — per what dose, in what volume, measured how — cannot be reproduced or compared, which is why most stated numbers tell you nothing.

For a merchant

If you have a laboratory result, publish the residual caffeine with its basis and the analysis date; otherwise state plainly that decaffeinated coffee retains a small amount rather than implying none.

Grounding

  • National Coffee Association (trade_body)
    that decaffeinated coffee retains a small measurable quantity of caffeine rather than none, which is the fact that makes caffeine-free wording on a decaf page false
  • Independent refuting pass, live search-intent retrieval (internal_measurement)
    that whether decaf is really decaf, whether it is caffeine free, and whether it is safe in pregnancy are all live autocomplete completions, placing residual caffeine inside the verified shopper-driven decaf cluster