FAQ

plastics.ai is an AI-powered platform that combines a powerful large language model with content from Hanser specialist books on plastics technology, based only on high-quality expert knowledge.

plastics.ai targets professionals in the plastics industry and the academic/educational sector who need fast, reliable access to expert knowledge. It serves both industrial users across design, materials, and processing, as well as educators, students, and researchers in universities, colleges, and training institutions. As well as experienced plastics engineers, beginners and non-specialists such as marketing as sales professionals will benefit greatly from the fast answers that plastics.ai provides to support their daily work.

In contrast to chatbots like ChatGPT, plastics.ai only uses quality-assured Hanser specialist book content. This means its answers to prompts on plastics technology are typically more relevant, concise and reliable. Furthermore, the sources are not just more trustworthy, they are also provided, for direct comparison with the chatbot answer in a split-screen layout.

Please contact us by email at plasticsai@hanser.de.

Yes, plastics.ai can generally be used with all common browsers. If you have any issues with using plastics.ai with your browser please contact us at plasticsai@hanser.de.

In the current version of plastics.ai chats will not be saved but this feature will be added in the near future. If you click on the button “New Chat” or close the chat window, you do not have access to your last chat.

For a good answer, it is helpful to formulate your prompt completely and clearly. Please use complete sentences instead of individual keywords, avoid abbreviations if possible - and if in doubt, start a new chat to avoid misunderstandings.

There might be various reasons for this. For example, your prompt may be complicated, such as involving math calculations, and plastics.ai needs time to generate the right answer. It could also be because your chat history is quite long (over five prompts). It is helpful to start a new chat if you are addressing a new topic or if the new prompt is not related to the previous ones.

The numbers at the end of a text section refer to the sources used. To call up a source, click on the number. The respective text excerpt appears and shows the corresponding position in the source.

This is currently not possible. The chat only works via text entries. Images or documents cannot be uploaded or created.

Some source books are in English and some are in German. The selected sources of the chatbot depend on their assessed suitability for answering your prompt, which is based on the topic, as well as the language of your prompt and of any previous prompts in your chat. All books are considered in the generation of each answer.

plastics.ai is a brand new and innovative product. The AI technology behind the system may occasionally produce unexpected and wrong answers. So please double-check all information you get from the system. During a chat session you can rate the answers directly via the like and dislike function and give additional feedback. Your feedback helps us to improve the quality of answers.

If you face technical problems, like account-related issues, website downtimes or bugs, please contact us via email at plasticsai@hanser.de.

The Single-User subscription offers you unlimited prompts and access to all sources.

Registration for the plastics.ai chatbot can be completed via the Hanser Customer Center.

The Hanser Customer Center is the central online service for customers of Hanser Verlag for managing subscriptions, purchasing and using specialist information and digital services. If you already have a Hanser Customer Center account, you can simply login by accepting the terms and conditions.

In order to use the five free prompts, it is necessary to create a free user account. If you want to subscribe to “Single-User” (unlimited numbers of prompts), your account is necessary to manage your payment options, upgrade your subscription, enter an online ID or cancel your subscription.

Please go to “Forgot password” in the login process and change your password there.

Please contact our customer service at plasticsai@hanser.de.

For Single-Users, payment is made via our payment service provider Stripe. Supported are: credit cards, Google Pay (GPay) and Apple Pay.

As a Single-User subscriber, you will receive the invoice by email after placing your order. You can also access your invoice history in the customer portal of our payment partner Stripe via your user account. For your Multi-User license, your invoices cannot be accessed via plastics.ai. You will receive your invoice directly from our sales team. If you have any questions about your Multi-User license invoice, please contact our customer support.

Yes, you can access the customer portal of our payment partner Stripe via your user account and update your contact information there. Updates will only take effect for future invoices. If you require an invoice correction for an invoice that has already been created, please contact our customer support.

Yes, in your user account you will find the option to change your subscription to annual. Follow the link and switch to the subscription with annual payment in the customer portal of our payment partner Stripe. The unused time of your monthly subscription will be credited to your account and charged automatically. You can find the details on your invoice.

If you already have a Single-User subscription (monthly or annual) and would like to switch to a Multi-User license, you must first cancel your existing subscription. After your subscription has expired, you will have the option to activate your multi-user license with your online ID in your user account. If you have any questions concerning switching your subcription plan, please contact customer service at plasticsai@hanser.de.

Please contact customer service at plasticsai@hanser.de.