Employment lawyers have raised the alarm over a growing trend of workers turning to AI tools like ChatGPT to help craft legal claims, resulting in what they describe as a deluge of "inconsistent, lengthy, and often incorrect arguments." The surge in AI-generated litigation is driving up legal fees and overburdening already stretched tribunals, they claim.

Travers Smith employment partner Ailie Murray said that AI-generated submissions are often riddled with inconsistencies and excessive detail, leaving employers no choice but to spend significant sums addressing them.

“In many cases, the AI-generated output is inaccurate, leading to claimants pleading invalid claims or arguments," she said.

"It is not an option for an employer to simply ignore such submissions. This leads to a cycle of continuous and costly correspondence. Such dynamics could overburden already stretched tribunals with unfounded and poorly pleaded claims.”

US law firm Morgan & Morgan recently warned its staff about AI’s tendency to fabricate legal precedent after a judge threatened to sanction two of its lawyers for citing non-existent case law in a lawsuit against Walmart.

Withers employment partner James Hockin said he has seen a “significant increase” in clients using AI to assist with legal claims.

“There is a risk that we see unrepresented individuals pursuing the wrong claims in the UK employment tribunal off the back of a duff result from an AI tool,” he warned.

He cautioned employees against using AI to draft cases with sensitive company data, warning that doing so could violate confidentiality clauses in their contracts.

Charlie Thompson, a partner at law firm Stewarts, likened the trend to the rise of the internet in the 1990s and early 2000s. “Information became available to employees from online searches which previously they could only find in a legal library or from a lawyer,” he said.

The AI boom is  disrupting recruitment, with fears that jobseekers are using AI to mass-apply for jobs and polish applications beyond recognition.

Robert Walters  CEO Toby Fowlston,, warned that AI-generated job applications are making it difficult for employers to distinguish genuine candidates from artificially enhanced ones.

“As a candidate, you can go to bed, put your details into AI and it can punch out 500 applications for you overnight,” he said.

“The flip side is the recipient of that information. It’s hard to know what the truth is. It’s hard to distinguish one candidate from another, as AI will make everyone’s application as good as it can make it.”

A recent survey by the Chartered Management Institute found that AI use has become commonplace in the UK jobs market, with half of managers suspecting AI-assisted applications.

The report warned that employers may not be getting an accurate sense of a candidate’s real abilities, raising concerns over misrepresentation.