We are left with following problem, upon which TcT provides the certificate YES(?,O(n^2)). Strict Trs: { sum(0()) -> 0() , sum(s(x)) -> +(sum(x), s(x)) , +(x, 0()) -> x , +(x, s(y)) -> s(+(x, y)) } Obligation: innermost runtime complexity Answer: YES(?,O(n^2)) The input was oriented with the instance of 'Small Polynomial Path Order (PS)' as induced by the safe mapping safe(sum) = {}, safe(0) = {}, safe(s) = {1}, safe(+) = {1} and precedence sum > + . Following symbols are considered recursive: {sum, +} The recursion depth is 2. For your convenience, here are the satisfied ordering constraints: sum(0();) > 0() sum(s(; x);) > +(s(; x); sum(x;)) +(0(); x) > x +(s(; y); x) > s(; +(y; x)) Hurray, we answered YES(?,O(n^2))