jackwener/OpenCLI · error · CommandExecutionError

Mercury is already showing a submit/review surface; refusing

Error message

Mercury is already showing a submit/review surface; refusing to click a possible final Submit expense button

What it means

This is an intentional safety stop in clickCreateExpenseButton(). The injected script detects when the only 'Submit expense'-matching button lives inside a dialog/form/review context — i.e. Mercury is already showing a final Submit expense (review) surface. Clicking again could resubmit or create a duplicate expense, so the library refuses and throws instead of clicking.

Source

Thrown at clis/mercury/utils.js:197

        const dangerous = candidates.find((node) => {
          const container = node.closest('[role="dialog"], dialog, form, [aria-modal="true"]');
          const context = String(container?.innerText || container?.textContent || '').replace(/\\s+/g, ' ').trim();
          return Boolean(container) || /Review|receipt|amount|merchant|category|notes|expense date/i.test(context);
        });
        if (dangerous) {
          return { clicked: false, blocked: true, text: dangerous.innerText || dangerous.textContent || '' };
        }
        const el = candidates[0];
        if (!el) return { clicked: false, blocked: false };
        el.click();
        return { clicked: true, blocked: false, text: el.innerText || el.textContent || '' };
    })()`);
    const payload = assertObject(result, 'create expense click result');
    if (typeof payload.clicked !== 'boolean' || typeof payload.blocked !== 'boolean') {
        throw new CommandExecutionError('Mercury returned malformed create expense click result');
    }
    if (payload.blocked) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError('Mercury is already showing a submit/review surface; refusing to click a possible final Submit expense button');
    }
    return payload;
}

export async function assertCreateExpenseSurface(page) {
    const state = await page.evaluate(`(() => {
        const text = document.body?.innerText || '';
        return {
            url: location.href,
            title: document.title,
            hasFinalSubmit: /Submit expense/i.test(text) && /Review|receipt|amount|merchant|category|notes/i.test(text),
            hasForm: /receipt|amount|merchant|category|notes|expense date/i.test(text),
            bodyPreview: text.replace(/\\s+/g, ' ').trim().slice(0, 600)
        };
    })()`);
    const payload = assertBooleanFields(assertMercuryState(state, 'expense form state'), 'expense form state', ['hasFinalSubmit', 'hasForm']);
    if (payload.hasFinalSubmit && !payload.hasForm) {
        throw new CommandExecutionError('Mercury is showing a submit button without a recognizable expense form; refusing to click');

View on GitHub (pinned to 49907e53dc)

Solutions

Do not retry the click; treat the expense as already at the review stage and assert the surface with assertCreateExpenseSurface().
Navigate back to the expenses list (inspectMercury / MERCURY_EXPENSES_URL) before attempting to open the create-expense form again.
Guard the caller (`opened`) so clickCreateExpenseButton only runs once per session, e.g. a `createSurface` state flag.
If a duplicate flow is needed, start a fresh page/session.

Example fix

// before
await clickCreateExpenseButton(page); // may throw if review surface already open
// after
const state = await assertCreateExpenseSurface(page);
if (!state.hasFinalSubmit) {
  await clickCreateExpenseButton(page);
}

Defensive patterns

Strategy: validation

Validate before calling

const state = await assertCreateExpenseSurface(page);
if (!state.hasFinalSubmit) {
  await clickCreateExpenseButton(page);
}

Try / catch

try {
  await clickCreateExpenseButton(page);
} catch (err) {
  if (err instanceof CommandExecutionError && /refusing to click a possible final Submit/.test(err.message)) {
    // expense surface already open — skip instead of retrying
    return { skipped: true };
  }
  throw err;
}

Prevention

Track flow state (a `createSurface` flag) so the button is clicked at most once per session.
Never blindly retry after this error — the guard exists to prevent duplicate expenses.
Re-run inspectMercury/assertCreateExpenseSurface after any navigation before clicking.
Treat the error as informational: the expense form is already open or submitted.

When it happens

Trigger: clickCreateExpenseButton() is called while the page already shows a submit/review dialog: the injected script's `dangerous` check finds a matching button inside [role="dialog"], dialog, form, or [aria-modal="true"], or the container text matches /Review|receipt|amount|merchant|category|notes|expense date/i, setting blocked=true.

Common situations: Calling the create-expense flow twice in one session after the expense form was already submitted; retry logic re-invoking clickCreateExpenseButton after a timeout while the review screen is open; resuming an automation run mid-flow.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of jackwener/OpenCLI@49907e53dc (2026-08-29). Data as JSON: /api/errors/365064ca066ae7e3. Report an issue: GitHub.