AI API Relay Scams and Pitfalls: 5 Red Flags + 4 Green Flags
The relay market is a mixed bag, and picking one on gut feel is an easy way to get burned. This checklist turns "how do I choose" into a list of signals you can check off one by one — a single red flag is reason enough to be cautious, and the more green flags a provider has, the more trustworthy it tends to be.
🚩 5 red flags: one is enough to be cautious
Prices that don't add up, and no explanation for why
A price well below the rest of the market, from a provider that can't or won't explain what channel it's actually running, is usually a sign it's quietly running a cheaper model or an unstable reverse-engineered channel.
A strange minimum top-up
A minimum deposit at or below $0.14 makes disappearing with your money essentially free for the operator; a minimum at or above $14 locks up more of your funds in one place and makes it harder to switch providers later. Either extreme is worth a second look.
No identifiable operator
No findable company name, no registered jurisdiction, no verifiable contact info — if something goes wrong, you won't even know who to chase.
Nothing's been updated in months
If the announcements, pricing table, and supported model list haven't changed in half a year, the provider is likely unmaintained and could stop operating at any time.
No refunds, or brutally restrictive refund terms
A provider that pushes all financial risk onto the user by design is itself a warning sign.
✅ 4 green flags: the more, the better
Publishes its channel types and pricing openly
Clearly telling you whether you're on official pass-through or a cheaper channel like Kiro or reverse-engineered, without hiding the cost structure, means the provider actually understands what it's selling.
Pricing sits in the middle of the market
Not the cheapest on the internet (which usually means something's been cut to hit that price) and not obviously overpriced either — pricing in the middle tends to be the most honest.
Welcomes third-party verification and doesn't block it
Letting users verify model authenticity with fixed test questions or version-number checks signals the provider is confident in what it's actually serving.
Been running for six months or more, and still actively updated
A provider that's survived six months and is still keeping its pricing table and model list current has passed an initial filter that time itself applies.
How to self-test whether the model is genuine
If you suspect a provider quietly swapped in a cheaper model, try these: ask the same math question with a verifiable answer to both the official API and the relay and compare results; ask the model to state its own version number and see if the answer is vague or evasive; and compare response style and length on the same prompt — a noticeable mismatch from how the official Claude typically writes is worth flagging. None of these methods guarantee a definitive answer on their own, but combined they'll catch most obvious problems.