No code mandates numbers

Here is the fact that governs everything else in QAQC: no reporting code specifies a numeric insertion rate, acceptance threshold, or pass/fail rule. CIM's actual wording is only that control samples be inserted "frequently enough to provide statistical confidence in the results". NI 43-101, JORC and SK-1300 require disclosure — of procedures, results, pass/fail criteria and corrective actions — never specific numbers.

Every threshold you have ever been told ("±3SD is a fail", "blanks fail at 10× detection", "insert 5% standards") is convention, not law. The conventions are good ones, built on decades of practice — but a competent QP can defensibly choose different ones, and different companies do.

What this means in practice

• When you report QC results, say which convention you applied. "2% failure rate" means nothing without "at 3SD".
• When two geologists disagree about a threshold, neither is "breaking the rules" — there are no numeric rules. Agree on a project convention and write it down.
• Your database should let you configure the thresholds per project, and record what was in force when each batch was judged.

In geoDB

geoDB ships with the common conventions as defaults — standards judged at 2σ (warn) and 3σ (fail) against certified values, duplicates at 20% RPD (10% for pulp/lab duplicates), blanks against per-element warning limits you configure. Projects can override several of these: QC insertion protocols carry your planned insertion rules, per-element duplicate thresholds can be set on the project, and blank warning limits are fully yours to define. Where a default is not yet configurable, treat it as geoDB asserting a convention — a reasonable one, but a convention.