Online robot lawyer helps make claims for delayed flights and PPI mis-selling

A student has created the UK’s first robot lawyer for consumers wanting to claims compensation for delayed flights and PPI mis-selling.

Last year Joshua Browder, who studies computer science, launched the website donotpay.co.uk, to help motorists to challenge parking fines issued by Camden council in London. Since launching it however, he has been inundated with questions from people looking to make claims in a variety of areas, such as PPI and travel delays.

Browder told The Daily Telegraph that the best way to help these people was to create a computer program that can talk to users generate appeals and answer questions like a human. “I decided to create the UK’s first robot lawyer for consumers,” he said.

“DoNotPay Robot looks like Facebook Messenger or a text message conversation,” he told the newspaper.

“However, instead of talking to a human, users are actually talking to a robot with human emotions powered by artificial intelligence. The robot not only saves time – it is available 24/7 and responds in less than a second – but is also completely free and charges no commission.”

Browder added that the robot was improving its skills as it talked to more people, and that he hoped that it would mean people would not have to “pay expensive legal fees” when making a claim.

Mark Dugdale