Should we ask the suppliers we outsource work to whether they use AI?

Yes, and the question is worth asking in writing. If you send client papers outside the firm, to a costs draftsman, a transcription service, an agency paralegal, a translator or a document production house, you remain responsible for the confidentiality of that material and for the quality of the work that comes back with your name on it. Whether the supplier types it, dictates it or runs it through an AI tool, the duty sitting on your file does not move.

Why the question matters now

A few years ago you could assume that work sent out was done by people reading and typing. That assumption no longer holds. Small suppliers are under the same cost pressure as small firms, and AI tools are cheap and easy to reach through a browser. Some suppliers have thought carefully about this and have proper arrangements. Others have staff quietly pasting your client's documents into a free consumer tool because it is faster.

Three separate problems follow from not asking.

The first is confidentiality. Client material may be leaving the country, sitting on systems you have never assessed, or being retained by a third party for its own purposes. You cannot tell a client where their papers are if you do not know.

The second is data protection. Where you engage a supplier to process personal data on your instructions, you are expected to know who they are using underneath them and to have written terms covering it. Under UK GDPR, sub-processing is not something a supplier should be doing invisibly. The Information Commissioner's Office expects controllers to exercise real diligence over their processors rather than accepting assurances at face value.

The third is quality. A costs schedule, a transcript or a translation that has been generated rather than prepared can look entirely normal and be wrong in ways that are hard to spot. If it goes out under your firm's name, it is your error.

Who to ask

The list is usually longer than a firm expects. Consider:

• costs draftsmen and costs lawyers
• transcription and dictation services
• agency paralegals, contract lawyers and locums
• translators and interpreters who receive documents in advance
• document scanning, coding and bundling providers
• e-disclosure and hosting providers
• outsourced typing, secretarial and file-opening support
• marketing and business development contractors who see matter information
• your own IT provider, if it has access to your document management system

Counsel and experts sit in a slightly different position, because they are professionals with their own obligations rather than your processors. You can still ask, and many will tell you plainly. If an expert report or an advice has been prepared with AI assistance, you would want to know before you rely on it.

What to ask, and what a good answer sounds like

Keep it to a handful of questions that a supplier can answer in a short email.

1. Do you or your staff use AI tools on client material we send you? If so, which functions: drafting, summarising, transcription, translation, review?
2. Are those tools business accounts with terms that prevent our material being used to train anything, or consumer accounts?
3. Where is our material stored and processed, and by whom?
4. Who at your end reviews AI-assisted output before it comes back to us, and what does that review involve?
5. Do you have a written policy, and can we see it?
6. Will you tell us before you introduce a new tool or change provider?

A good answer is specific and slightly boring: named tools, named responsibilities, a clear statement about training and retention, and a named person who checks the work. A poor answer is vague reassurance, or a claim that the supplier uses no AI at all when its turnaround times suggest otherwise. If a supplier does not know what its staff are using, that is your answer.

What to do with what you learn

Do not treat a yes as disqualifying. A supplier that uses AI openly, under proper terms, with a human checking the output, may be safer than one that does not know what its people are doing.

Then do four things. Put the position in the contract or terms of engagement, including an obligation to notify you of changes. Record the answers somewhere your compliance officer can find them, alongside your other supplier records. Check your own client engagement terms say something honest about outsourcing, so a client who asks how their information is handled gets a consistent answer. And build a proportionate check into your own file work: spot-check returned costs schedules, transcripts and drafts rather than signing them through.

Keeping it proportionate

A firm of ten fee earners cannot audit its supply chain like a bank. It can send one email to each regular supplier, keep the replies, and review them once a year or when a supplier changes. That is a defensible position if anything is ever questioned by a client, an insurer or the Solicitors Regulation Authority. Doing nothing is not.

Where Alesis fits

Alesis is an AI assistant for UK law firms, made by L25 Limited, used through the web browser, with one conversation for a matter. A firm's information is held in the UK and processed only in the UK and the EU, kept apart from every other firm, and never used to train anything for anyone else; inside a firm, people see only the matters they are on, and seniority alone grants no view. Drafts are prepared for a qualified person to review and sign off, and Alesis does not file, serve or email anything. It assists qualified professionals and does not replace them, and it does not provide legal advice.