robot paralegal

Legal services aren't cheap, nor is it cheap to practice law—consider overhead costs, transportation, that law degree, and paying everyone needed to make the process flow smoothly. Which, ostensibly at least, partially accounts for why the cost of legal services places them out of reach for many consumers.

Many providers lower legal fees by automating components of the workflow, typically those handled by paralegals and assistants. Taking this a step further is Ailira (Artificially Intelligent Legal Information Research Assistant). On Nov. 13, the company announced its “Law Firm Without Lawyers” service, which aims to take legal services directly to the consumer for a lower cost than those typically charged by a service provider.

Ailira leverages “lawyer-free” legal services provisions with AI technology, basically functioning as a sort of chatbot in which users can provide their information, answer a few questions, and be provided with documents relevant to their legal issue. Among the services currently offered by this lawyer-free law firm are will drafting and services, assistance with asset protection, and help with legal documentation for structuring a business.

So where does the lawyer-free law firm operate? Turns out it's at a shopping complex in northern Australia. Here, potential clients can sit at a computer and answer questions for Ailira, which will then generate a will. The Australian Broadcasting Corp. cited one user saying that the service was “really easy,” merely requiring him to enter “basic details” before the bot “does the whole thing for you,.”

Ailira developer Adrian Cartland told LTN that the bot provides “all legal information for free,” but charges fees for documents. For example, the fee for a “simple will, trust deed or company incorporation” is AU$150. Ailira also allows the option of chatting with a human lawyer or having them review documents or provide additional legal advice, but also for a fee.

Cartland is a tax lawyer and practices under his eponymous firm. He and his developers initially created Ailira in 2016 for help with tax law research as well as researching a law firms' private files. That December, the service was provided to law firms for AU$90 a month. That same year, Ailira was granted funding from the Australian government to develop a prototype to help domestic violence victims with legal advice.

The assistance with domestic violence has yet to be released to the public, though it is slated to be added “in due course,” noted a statement from Ailira.

“The consumer chatbot aspect of Ailira is providing legal services to people who would otherwise be priced out of the market. That is, this is an entirely new market,” Cartland said. “As we know from microeconomics, a decrease in price leads to an increase in quantity demanded. Therefore the future of law is a massive expansion of the legal market.”

Ailira isn't the first effort to capitalize on chatbot-based technologies to provide cheaper legal services. DoNotPay, for example, was released this year by Stanford University student Josh Browder to help draft documentation to fight parking tickets, and has since expanded into other practice areas. Meanwhile, students at the University of Cambridge developed Lawbot, which provides preliminary assessments of situations for crime victims in the U.K.

Much of the work these bots, and AI technology in general, do is typical of paralegals and assistants. Cartland noted, however, that Ailira's “Law Firm Without Lawyers” “hired three new law graduates to service a practice that didn't previously exist.”

“This will be replicated by myself and others over the coming years, and so there is a very bright future for the law,” he added.

robot paralegal

Legal services aren't cheap, nor is it cheap to practice law—consider overhead costs, transportation, that law degree, and paying everyone needed to make the process flow smoothly. Which, ostensibly at least, partially accounts for why the cost of legal services places them out of reach for many consumers.

Many providers lower legal fees by automating components of the workflow, typically those handled by paralegals and assistants. Taking this a step further is Ailira (Artificially Intelligent Legal Information Research Assistant). On Nov. 13, the company announced its “Law Firm Without Lawyers” service, which aims to take legal services directly to the consumer for a lower cost than those typically charged by a service provider.

Ailira leverages “lawyer-free” legal services provisions with AI technology, basically functioning as a sort of chatbot in which users can provide their information, answer a few questions, and be provided with documents relevant to their legal issue. Among the services currently offered by this lawyer-free law firm are will drafting and services, assistance with asset protection, and help with legal documentation for structuring a business.

So where does the lawyer-free law firm operate? Turns out it's at a shopping complex in northern Australia. Here, potential clients can sit at a computer and answer questions for Ailira, which will then generate a will. The Australian Broadcasting Corp. cited one user saying that the service was “really easy,” merely requiring him to enter “basic details” before the bot “does the whole thing for you,.”

Ailira developer Adrian Cartland told LTN that the bot provides “all legal information for free,” but charges fees for documents. For example, the fee for a “simple will, trust deed or company incorporation” is AU$150. Ailira also allows the option of chatting with a human lawyer or having them review documents or provide additional legal advice, but also for a fee.

Cartland is a tax lawyer and practices under his eponymous firm. He and his developers initially created Ailira in 2016 for help with tax law research as well as researching a law firms' private files. That December, the service was provided to law firms for AU$90 a month. That same year, Ailira was granted funding from the Australian government to develop a prototype to help domestic violence victims with legal advice.

The assistance with domestic violence has yet to be released to the public, though it is slated to be added “in due course,” noted a statement from Ailira.

“The consumer chatbot aspect of Ailira is providing legal services to people who would otherwise be priced out of the market. That is, this is an entirely new market,” Cartland said. “As we know from microeconomics, a decrease in price leads to an increase in quantity demanded. Therefore the future of law is a massive expansion of the legal market.”

Ailira isn't the first effort to capitalize on chatbot-based technologies to provide cheaper legal services. DoNotPay, for example, was released this year by Stanford University student Josh Browder to help draft documentation to fight parking tickets, and has since expanded into other practice areas. Meanwhile, students at the University of Cambridge developed Lawbot, which provides preliminary assessments of situations for crime victims in the U.K.

Much of the work these bots, and AI technology in general, do is typical of paralegals and assistants. Cartland noted, however, that Ailira's “Law Firm Without Lawyers” “hired three new law graduates to service a practice that didn't previously exist.”

“This will be replicated by myself and others over the coming years, and so there is a very bright future for the law,” he added.