Insight: Could AI transform law firm compliance?

Over the years at OneAdvanced, we’ve had countless conversations with our law firm customers, learning first-hand about the challenges they deal with every day. At OneAdvanced it's our job to look for ways to solve those problems through technology – to free the lawyer up from lower-level administrative tasks so that they can focus on their most valuable work. 

In these conversations, five key challenges often come up time and time again. The first is the need to drive greater efficiencies. The second is access to technology, particularly for firms in the mid-market. The third is digitisation and managing evolving customer needs. The fourth challenge is attracting new and retaining existing talent, especially as employees’ expectations around technology continue to grow. Finally, there’s the ongoing pressure of meeting compliance and regulatory demands with limited resource. 

There is an appetite to tackle these challenges by using technology. Our latest legal trends report found that 60% of law firms are planning to upgrade their digital systems, and 35% have already begun assessing where artificial intelligence implementation (AI) may support them.

But I’m not interested in ‘AI for AI’s sake’. I’m interested in tangible AI use cases that make a real impact on the working life of a lawyer and the bottom line of their firm.

An AI use case: Compliance

There’s a huge cost associated with compliance – in terms of both time and money and we identified two key, firm wide, compliance processes where AI could take on the heavy lifting.  

However, it’s also crucial to ensure you get compliance processes right. I’ve heard customers talk about the massive intake of breath when the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) says they’re coming to do an audit.

We took a step back and asked: what technology would help reduce this administrative burden for lawyers and compliance officers – and how could we help elevate their approach to compliance?

Our two new AI agents, launching in November 2025, make this a reality.

'We want to free up lawyers to spend more time on the areas where they think they can add the most value to the business'

Using AI agents in compliance reviews

It is the responsibility of the law firm to do random file quality reviews to make sure they have been concluded properly. Traditionally, this can be a painstaking and time-consuming process. Selecting files, reviewing them manually, comparing details, and confirming that every step is complete. Then if they are subjected to an SRA audit, those same files are scrutinised.

To support this process, we’ve developed a File Quality agent which is born out of AI. The job of this agent is to select files – whether it be 10, 30, 50 or 100 – on a completely random basis over a set period of time. 

It then reviews each file. It looks at the quality and the timeliness. It includes all the steps of an audit being concluded and produces a report. The report might say, ‘I've reviewed the 50 files at random from across the business. Here is the ranking of those files. Here's the work that needs to be done to put those files in a state of completeness.’

This gives the compliance officer clarity over what they must do to solve the problem, and crucially, insight into problem areas.

Maybe it highlights that you have a team that isn’t great at doing anti-money laundering (AML) checks? Or perhaps they aren’t always good at sending out the client engagement letter and getting it signed. Uncovering these insights quickly helps firms to build targeted training, improve processes, enforce the principles of your file quality, and strengthen the file-closure standards. 

AI agents and ‘always-on’ compliance

We then thought: why should we wait for a file quality review to run these checks? So, we created a Matter Quality agent, that reviews matters’ adherence to compliance in real-time. Imagine a firm has 200 matters open at any given time. The matter quality agents will continuously assess the compliance quality of all those open matters, and present senior leaders with a dashboard showing audit readiness across all departments. 

This will tell you the remediation needed to make each matter compliant – which means you start to build up a picture of compliance before you get to the end of the file. For example, it will tell you that a certain department has 35 matters, 24 are at a particular stage and haven’t had the AML checks yet.

The dashboard shows the problem at the firm level, the department level, and the individual level – and tells you the things that need fixing to ensure 100% compliance.

Improving outcomes

A fundamental ethos for us is that our AI agents can undertake the time-consuming work, but the final say on the status of each case from a compliance standpoint still resides with the lawyer or compliance officer. 

This will continue as the intelligence of the agents increases. The next phase of development could be where the agents go and do the work needed, report back to the lawyer and the compliance officer with evidence of the work completed, and ask, ‘Are you satisfied?’. The digital rubber stamp on the file then demonstrates that the lawyer and compliance officer have signed off on the process.

'It’s important to know which tech providers are genuinely interested in using AI to solve real challenges for firms – and not just interested in AI for AI’s sake'

A shift in mindset

When I first entered the legal sector about 15 years ago, after working in totally different industries like retail and hospitality, I was struck by how differently law approached technology. Where other sectors deemed digital tools as enablers of efficiency, the legal sector was often more cautious, even resistant to technology. I learned very quickly that there was, and often still can be, an expectation for the lawyer to be inputting and controlling the output of many tasks personally, from client onboarding right through to AML checks, rather than automating these processes. This rather traditional mindset is often why many lawyers still find themselves working incredibly long hours, sometimes up to 10 or 12 hours a day. But that approach is no longer sustainable. The regulatory landscape has become more complex, client expectations are higher than ever, and margins are under constant pressure. Law firms can’t simply work harder; they need to work smarter.

Some lawyers will tell me, “Doug, I’d like the same tech set up as I’ve got now but I need it to be faster”. However, my response is that next generation technology should not be about making lawyers press the keyboard faster – it should be to improve the process completely. Fundamentally changing how the legal sector operates, not just speeding up existing tasks. Ultimately it is about elevating the lawyer out of the administration of the technology and allowing them to spend more time with their clients

Ultimately, as I hope I’ve made clear, the adoption of any new technology in law firms must be focused on improving outcomes – be it for lawyers or clients. There is a buzz around AI for many sectors at the moment, but law firms need to be able to cut out the noise and stay focused on what truly matters: investing in the right technology that suits your business needs and helps to reduce friction, improve compliance, and enable professionals to focus on the work that adds real value.

Selecting the right AI approach for your firm

If you're working in a firm at the start of its AI journey, don’t feel daunted. Remember that we all start somewhere. We talk to a lot of firms about how to develop an internal AI policy, understand usage, and understand the importance of your data quality and residency. 

It’s important to know which tech providers are genuinely interested in using AI to solve real challenges for firms – and not just interested in AI for AI’s sake. We want to free up lawyers to spend more time where it matters; building relationships, winning new clients and improving service delivery. 

By using the right technology, you can deliver a very different experience for your employees and a very different experience for your clients. That will start to differentiate you in the market.

A lawyer in a large regional law firm recently asked me, “Doug, will AI replace us?”. My answer is no – but I do believe that law firms that don't embrace relevant and role enhancing AI may well get left behind. 

Doug Hargrove has over 25 years of leadership experience in UK and global software firms. As a respected industry leader, Doug is dedicated to creating industry-leading technology solutions that transform how law firms serve their clients.

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