Is using AI for Employment Law advice putting your business at risk in 2026?

Key takeaways:  Tribunal claims are climbing fast: Employment tribunal claims rose 39% year on year, according to GOV.UK’s quarterly tribunal statistics  AI-built disputes are a growing factor: Citation’s Employment Law specialists link part of that rise to employees and employers building cases on AI advice with nobody qualified checking it first.  Grievance letters are getting much longer: AI-generated letters can stretch to fifteen or twenty pages, compared to the couple of pages typical of one an employee writes themselves.  You can’t take back AI-drafted correspondence: Once it’s gone out in your name, it can be used against you at tribunal, even if AI wrote it.  SMEs carry the most risk: SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) are less likely to have in-house legal or HR expertise checking AI output before they act on it.

 

If you’ve used ChatGPT or another popular AI tool to draft a dismissal letter or a response to a workplace complaint, you’re not alone. It’s being called “vibe lawyering”, and it’s part of why employment tribunal claims are climbing across the UK.  

GOV.UK’s Tribunal statistics quarterly: January to March 2026 shows employment tribunal claims have risen 39% year on year. Citation’s own analysis of the claims it’s supported clients with this year found the care sector accounts for 28.5% of them – nearly double any other sector category. Our Employment Law specialists say growing AI use on both sides of workplace disputes is part of the reason. But the risk particularly comes from treating AI’s answer as the final word instead of a first draft, not from using AI in general. 

What is “vibe lawyering”?  

Vibe lawyering means using AI to carry out legal work, for example draft a grievance letter, build a case for compensation, or write a dismissal letter, without a qualified person checking the reasoning or the tone first. The term is a spin-off of “vibe coding” – describing what you want in plain English and letting AI write it – and was popularised in a legal context by The Economist’s report on the rise of vibe lawyering. The danger is treating a confident-sounding AI answer as settled advice instead of a first draft. Employees use it to build a case from their own account of events, while employers use it to draft dismissal letters and responses to complaints. Either way, skipping the expert check is where it can go wrong. 

Why are employment tribunal claims rising in 2026?  

Employment tribunal claims rose 39% year on year, according to GOV.UK’s quarterly statistics. Citation’s Employment Law specialists partly put that down to AI making it faster, cheaper and less intimidating to act on a grievance than it used to be.  

Gill McAteer, Director of Employment Law at Citation, says: “Where AI really shines is speed – summarising a mountain of correspondence or giving someone a sensible starting draft in minutes rather than hours. That’s a real win for time-poor SMEs. But employment law is different because so much of it is underpinned by nuance and the concept of reasonableness, which AI still struggles to grasp.” 

Add ongoing reform under the Employment Rights Act 2025 (ERA), and AI’s grip on recent legal developments gets even shakier, because the rules themselves are still moving.  

Who’s most exposed to AI-driven workplace disputes?  

If you run an SME, you’re carrying the most risk. Larger organisations usually have in-house legal or HR expertise to fall back on – you probably don’t, which is exactly why you’re more likely to reach for a free AI tool when a complex employee issue lands on your desk. Without someone to check the answer against your own situation, it’s hard to spot where the AI’s got it wrong, especially when it sounds so confident.  

How is AI changing the way employees raise grievances?  

If you’ve handled a grievance letter recently, you’ll have noticed they’re getting longer. 

Gill McAteer says: “Whereas grievance letters written by employees tend to be a couple of pages long, AI-generated grievance letters can now stretch to fifteen or twenty pages and are often so repetitive and bogged down in technical terminology that employers “can’t see the wood for the trees.”” 

This means the actual complaint gets buried under pages of AI padding, making it harder to work out what’s being alleged and what you need to do about it.  

Can AI-drafted letters be used against you at tribunal?  

Yes. Once you’ve sent AI-drafted correspondence to an employee, you can’t disown it afterwards by saying AI wrote it because it went out in your business’s name. AI-written letters often read well on the surface but bury damaging wording, ramble past the point you needed to make, or jump ahead of where the process has got to. For example, they might raise dismissal before it’s even been discussed as an option. If that wording later hands the other side legal ammunition, it can be used against you. If you’re already facing a claim, read what to do when an employment tribunal claim is made for the practical next steps. 

What’s the risk with AI and probationary dismissals?  

Citation’s Director of Employment Law, Gill McAteer, cites probationary dismissals as a common blind spot: “AI will readily and accurately walk an employer through a standard dismissal process step by step – that part it does well. What it has no way of flagging is that the same employee raised a safeguarding concern weeks earlier.” 

“If this fact is overlooked by the employer inputting the information, it can quickly turn a routine dismissal into a potential whistleblowing claim worth tens of thousands of pounds in damages,” she adds. 

It’s important to remember that two dismissals that look identical on paper can call for completely different handling and responses, depending on facts that never made it into the original AI prompts. 

What should you do before using AI for workplace issues?  

Do this	Because
Treat AI’s answer as a starting point, not a final position	It doesn’t know your business, your policies or the facts of your case, and it’s shaky on recent changes like the ERA reforms
Get a qualified person to check any AI-drafted letter before you send it	Once it’s gone out in your name, you can’t take it back at tribunal
Question one-sided AI-generated grievances	AI builds a case from one account only, so investigate before you treat anything as settled fact
Remember AI can’t weigh up your case’s specific circumstances	Two similar cases can need very different responses
Use AI for speed on simple, factual work and bring in a person for judgement calls	Decisions have to stay with you, not the AI

Citation: Here to help you prevent and manage tribunal claims  

Gill McAteer, Director of Employment Law at Citation, sums it up: “AI is one of the most exciting and transformative developments since the advent of the internet. Our job is to help business owners harness that power safely – and to provide the human judgement that balances circumstance, the law, and fairness.”  

If you’re not sure where AI fits into your own workplace decisions and where it doesn’t, Citation’s HR and Employment Law consultants can talk you through it.   

The first step is prevention 

• Get 24/7 expert HR and Employment Law advice from qualified advisers. 

• Make sure you’ve got watertight documentation with contracts, policies, and procedures that are up to date with the latest legal updates. 

• Train your managers so they can confidently handle disciplinaries, grievances, and dismissals fairly and consistently. 

Support if you face a claim 

• Support to review claims and draft responses on your behalf. 

• Handle disclosures, bundles, and witness statements so you’re prepared. 

• If it goes to a hearing, our tribunal experts will be by your side to guide, advise, and represent your business. 

Proven results 

• Citation clients are 93% less likely to face a tribunal compared to the national average. 

• Citation has a 99% success rate at tribunal between 2020-2025, with multiple years of 100% success. 

• When claims arise, if you follow our advice, you’ll be backed by our employment advice guarantee.