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VideoMotor Fuels Tax Minute Episode 115: How AI Can Support Motor Fuel Tax Research, Productivity and Coding
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In this episode of Motor Fuels Tax Minute, Leanne Sobel, Kelly Grace and Khalyl Smith discuss practical ways AI can support motor fuel tax and excise tax professionals. They cover how AI can help improve search efficiency, refine search queries and assist with coding and Excel automation while emphasizing the importance of verifying AI-generated responses through independent research. The conversation also highlights common challenges in finding motor fuel tax information online and offers examples of how AI can be used as a tool to enhance, rather than replace, professional judgment.
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Detailed Description of Weaver’s Motor Fuels Tax Minute, Episode 115
00:00:00
Kelly: Welcome to this week’s Motor Fuels Tax Minute, where we talk all things motor fuel. Today, we are being joined by Khalyl Smith, one of our motor fuel tax team members, and we are diving deep into AI.
00:00:13
Kelly: Now, Khalyl, when I started, and this is probably showing my age, I would use Google to find all my solutions. Well, actually, I used Ask Jeeves, full disclosure.
00:00:24
Kelly: But I switched over to Google, and now we’re seeing AI. It’s becoming the new research tool. And I’ll be honest, I still use it like Google, and I’m still trying to learn from that. But I know you have pushed past that a little bit. How do you see AI being used for research?
00:00:40
Khalyl: It’s a good question. I would say a big crutch of using AI is obviously accuracy. If you’re using AI to answer your excise tax questions, we typically say, take what AI said, but do your own research to see if what they said is correct or if they hallucinated it.
00:00:58
Khalyl: I would say you could utilize AI even further to optimize your search terms on your search engines. Because, oftentimes, you have to figure out what you want to ask and how to ask it properly. Because, oftentimes, you look on Google, you type the search term, and it might not find the specific thing you’re looking for.
00:01:19
Khalyl: Asking AI, “How can I optimize this? Can you give me an optimal search term to use and define what I’m looking for so I can do my own research?” and it can expedite your research process.
00:01:29
Kelly: I think that makes a lot of sense, especially with motor fuel tax. I know we’re not always the top search result when we Google. Like if you try to look for the Leaking Underground Storage Tank (LUST) fee and you just put in LUST, all sorts of things pop up, and not usually about the fuel tax.
00:01:46
Kelly: But I know, Khalyl, you are very into the tech side and coding. Where have you seen benefits from AI on that?
00:01:52
Khalyl: Coding-wise, I typically use it to understand the syntax of the language that I’m working on. If it’s something new that I’m working with, something I could translate to what I already know internally and translate it to something I could use.
00:02:08
Khalyl: So, for example, Visual Basic in Excel is an amazing tool for automating your processes in Excel, and it’s something that I was not privy to before joining. It has been an excellent tool for translating what I currently know, like my programming fundamentals, into how I can insert that into Excel. It helps create an easy deliverable for your clients. They don’t have to install anything extra.
They can just plug and play. I find that to be a really great tool to have AI helping with bringing that forward.
00:02:39
Leanne: Well, it’s so interesting what AI can do, and I love that you said that again. One of our other colleagues, Nick, has also said that about making sure that you fact-check that it’s not hallucinating, and that’s really, really cool as well. And just optimizing the search terms, maybe starting with, “I am a motor fuel tax professional,” or “I’m a motor fuel tax newbie,” depending on what it is.
00:03:04
Leanne: Well, Khalyl, thank you so much for giving us just a little overview as to what AI can do, and that was this week’s Motor Fuels Tax Minute.
