The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) has authorised the first law firm providing regulated legal services through artificial intelligence.
Garfield.Law, which is based in Tunbridge Wells, Kent, offers small and medium sized businesses the use of an AI-powered litigation assistant to help them recover unpaid debts of up to £10,000 through the English small claims court.
SRA chief executive Paul Philip said Garfield.Law’s authorisation was a “landmark” for the profession.
“With so many people and small businesses struggling to access legal services, we cannot afford to pull up the drawbridge on innovations that could have big public benefits,” Philip said. “Responsible use of AI by law firms could improve legal services, while making them easier to access and more affordable.”
Before authorising Garfield.Law, the SRA engaged with the owners to ensure that its rules could be met by an AI service, including reassurance that processes were in place to quality-check work, keep client information confidential and safeguard against conflicts of interest.
It said it had also checked the firm is managing the risk of AI hallucinations – a response generated by AI that contains false or misleading information presented as fact.
“The system will not be able to propose relevant case law, which is a high-risk area for large language model machine learning,” the SRA said.
Garfield.Law also emphasised on its website that it won’t provide legal advice on the merits of a case.
Garfield.Law is not autonomous and will take a step only where the client has approved it, the SRA said. Named regulated solicitors will still ultimately be accountable for the firm meeting professional standards.
“Any new law firm comes with potential risks, but the risks around an AI-driven law firm are novel,” Philip said. “We have worked closely with this firm to make sure it can meet our rules and all the appropriate protections are in place. As this is likely to be the first of many AI-driven law firms, we will be monitoring progress of this new model closely so we can both manage the risks and realise the benefits to consumers.”
Garfield.Law was co-founded by commercial litigation lawyer Philip Young, who co-founded City boutique Cooke Young & Keidan, and quantum physicist Daniel Young.
“UK businesses lose billions each year to unpaid invoices,” Young said. “SMEs are especially hard hit. Garfield fixes this. It gives businesses the tools to get paid fairly and affordably.”
Fees begin at £2 for a ‘polite chaser’ letter, according to the firm’s website, with the assistant intended to guide claimants through each step of the small claims court process for debt claims, through to trial.
“This is an ideal application for the latest advances in AI,” Long added. “It uses AI to read through legal documents and guide users through the many precise steps of the court process – something that’s simple in theory but complicated in practice.”
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