Can AI help us prepare a schedule of loss?

Yes, for the parts of the job that are gathering and arithmetic. An AI assistant can comb a file for the figures that have been evidenced, set them out under the headings you specify, and total them with the working shown so you can check each step. What it cannot do is decide what belongs in the schedule, what the evidence actually supports, or what number you are prepared to sign your name to.

What the job really consists of

A schedule of loss is three different tasks wearing one name.

The first is extraction. Somewhere in the file there are payslips, invoices, receipts, care records, bank statements, medical appointments and mileage. The figures exist; they are scattered across hundreds of pages, often in inconsistent formats, often duplicated.

The second is arithmetic. Periods, rates, multipliers, interest, deductions, running totals. None of it is difficult, all of it is easy to get wrong at eleven at night, and an error anywhere makes the whole document look unreliable.

The third is judgement. Which heads are claimed, on what basis, with what assumptions, at what level, and what you are willing to put forward as a reasonable figure. That is legal work and it is yours.

AI is genuinely useful on the first two. It should not be making decisions on the third, and a tool that quietly does so is a liability rather than a help.

Where it earns its place

The strongest use is extraction with a source attached to every number. Ask for every figure in the file relating to a particular head, over a particular period, and you want back a list where each entry says which page it came from. That turns a day of page turning into an hour of checking.

It is also good at finding gaps. If you have payslips for nine months of a twelve month period, you want to know that before the schedule goes out, not when the other side points it out. Asking what is missing is often more valuable than asking what is there.

Arithmetic with the working shown is the other real gain. A total is of no use to you if you cannot see how it was reached. A calculation that sets out the period, the rate, the multiplication and the running total lets you check it in seconds and lets you defend it when it is challenged.

Finally, consistency. A schedule has to agree with the witness statement, the medical evidence and the pleadings. Asking whether the figures in the draft match what the statements say is a cheap way to catch the contradictions that cost credibility.

Where the fee earner has to stay in charge

Four things should never be delegated.

1. The heads claimed. What is properly advanced on these facts is a matter of law and strategy. Do not ask a tool to tell you what to claim; tell it what you are claiming and ask it to find the evidence.
2. The assumptions. Rates, periods, start and end dates, what is agreed and what is in dispute. Write these down yourself and state them in the schedule. A figure built on an unstated assumption is a trap.
3. Evidential sufficiency. A number appearing on a page does not mean it is evidenced, recoverable or correctly characterised. That assessment is yours and it is the part the other side will attack.
4. The final figure. You sign it. You explain it at a hearing or in negotiation. You must be able to account for every line without reference to how it was produced.

A workflow that holds up

• Decide the heads and the period first, in writing, before any extraction starts.
• Ask for figures head by head rather than all at once. Narrow questions produce checkable answers.
• Require a page reference for every figure, and check a sample against the originals. If the sample is clean, check more lightly; if it is not, check everything.
• Keep the calculation visible. A schedule that shows period, rate and total on each line is easier to audit, easier to amend and easier to defend.
• Ask explicitly what is missing or inconsistent before you finalise, and record the answer.
• Reconcile the schedule against the statements and the medical evidence as a separate, deliberate step.
• Note on the file how the schedule was produced and who checked it. Six months on, when a figure is queried, you want to know where it came from.

One practical warning. Scanned and photographed documents, which is most of what arrives on this kind of file, vary wildly in quality. A tool that silently skips a page it could not read will produce a schedule that is confidently incomplete. You want to be told which pages were unreadable so you can deal with them yourself.

The honest summary is that AI shortens the mechanical half of the work and makes the arithmetic auditable. It does not shorten the thinking, and the thinking is what the client is paying for.

Where Alesis fits

Alesis answers questions about a matter from the matter's own papers and names the page each answer came from; if the papers do not say, it says so. It counts key dates and figures with the working shown, each step carrying the rule that allows it, and says the firm's diary system still governs. Documents are read page by page, so citations point at pages, and any page it could not read is flagged rather than skipped. It prepares drafts for a qualified person to review and sign off, and it assists qualified professionals rather than replacing them.