Fine-tuning job fails after 3 retries during moderation eval refusals_v3 (internal error, gpt-4.1-mini-2025-04-14)

Hi,

I’m encountering an issue where a fine-tuning job completes training successfully but ultimately fails during the moderation evaluation phase after three retry attempts due to an internal error.

Job Information

• Job ID: ftjob-OkPixpS21QjyQWCsIEJflUJb

• Training Method: Supervised

• Base Model: gpt-4.1-mini-2025-04-14

Timeline from Logs(TZ: Asia/Seoul)

15:31:07  Created fine-tuning job
15:31:07  Validating training and validation files
15:31:14  Files validated, moving job to queued state
15:31:17  Fine-tuning job started

16:18:34  Checkpoint created at step 873
16:18:34  Checkpoint created at step 1746
16:18:34  New fine-tuned model created
16:18:34  Evaluating model against our usage policies

16:29:37  Retrying moderation eval refusals_v3 (attempt 2/3) due to an internal error.
16:59:38  Retrying moderation eval refusals_v3 (attempt 3/3) due to an internal error.

After the third retry attempt, the job status becomes failed.

Observations

• The training phase completes successfully.

• A fine-tuned model is created before the moderation evaluation step.

• The failure occurs specifically during the refusals_v3 moderation evaluation.

• The error message indicates an “internal error”, not a policy violation.

Questions

1. Is this a known issue with moderation evaluation on gpt-4.1-mini-2025-04-14?

2. Does this indicate a problem in my training dataset format or content?

3. Is there a way to debug or bypass this moderation evaluation failure?

4. Should I retry the job, or is there a known mitigation?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you!