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Artificial intelligence-based law firm wins in court

AI-based law firm received Solicitors Regulation Authority approval in June last year in a landmark decision

Karl Flinders
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Published: 22 Jun 2026 15:30

An artificial intelligence (AI)-based law firm, which was the first to receive regulatory approval in the UK, has won its first court trial.

About a year after AI litigation assistant Garfield AI was created, it became a legal landmark as the first AI-based law firm to receive regulatory approval.

After attempting to resolve a dispute over paid fees without court action, Tamires Camal Taquidir, a freelancer who had provided HR-related services to a hospitality business, used Garfield AI to help her pursue the case in court.

She was able to generate pre-action correspondence, and then prepare and issue court proceedings.

The AI legal assistant conducted all of the legal work preceding the court trial. The defendant instructed solicitors and brought a counterclaim, which the claimant disputed with the support of Garfield AI.

The claimant continued to trial, including dealing with document production, the preparation witness statements and trial bundles. Garfield then instructed a junior, shortly before the trial began. She won the claim over unpaid fees following a three-hour trial at Wandsworth County Court. The claimant paid around £400 in Garfield AI fees to recover the £7,000 owed, while the defendant instructed both a solicitor and a barrister.

“I was owed money for work I had done, but it felt like the process of recovering it could be too stressful, expensive and time-consuming,” said Camal Taquidir. “Garfield made it possible for me to pursue the claim and keep going. When the counterclaim was brought, it was intended to intimidate me, but I knew I had accessible, cost-effective and competent support. I’m delighted by the result.”

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Garfield AI was founded by a technologist and a lawyer with the initial aim of providing a service for small businesses to claim billions of pounds in unpaid invoices.

It received regulatory approval from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) in May last year. At the time, Paul Philip, CEO at the SRA, described the regulatory approval as a “landmark moment for legal services in this country”.

Following a three-hour trial at Wandsworth County Court on 14 May 2026, in which both sides were represented by barristers, the court found in favour of the claimant, awarding £7,000 and dismissing the counterclaim.

Enforcing rights

Daniel Long, CTO and co-founder of Garfield AI, said the case shows what legal AI can do in the real world. “It is not about gimmicks or replacing lawyers,” he said. “It is about giving people and businesses the tools to enforce their rights when the traditional route would be too slow, too costly or too complex.

“We are still at the beginning of this journey, but the momentum is already clear,” he added. “This trial win is an important proof point: regulated AI-powered legal services can help real people recover real money through the courts.”

The claimant paid around £400 in Garfield AI fees to recover the £7,000 owed, while the defendant instructed both a solicitor and a barrister.

Mark Lewis, lawyer at Stephenson Harwood, said the successful result in court validates Garfield AI and its platform and shows that, “used properly, and integrated into legal systems and court processes, this AI works as it should. So, it’s a valuable use case for the model.

“Though the amount recovered was small, it was important to the claimant,” he said. “That is another feature of the use case: small claims, where legal costs can be, and are, a barrier to justice.

“It will be interesting to see how much legal AI disintermediates higher-end legal work in more complex trials,” said Lewis. “We’ll have to wait and see.”

The business law sector faces huge transformation as startup companies use technologies such as AI to transform a sector based on age-old business models and legacy technology.

Last year, the SRA called for more development of AI-based legal services. “We are encouraging the development of new approaches and models due to the potential consumer benefits,” it said. “AI-driven legal services could deliver better, quicker and more affordable legal services.”

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