Lawyers have demanded that the Tribunals Service ‘join the 21st century’ before scammers overwhelm courts with multiple age-discrimination claims.

The scam targets job advertisements containing ageist phrases like ‘newly qualified’. The scammers apply for all such jobs and, if not offered the posts, threaten to take action for discrimination. At present, solicitors have no easy way of checking whether a claimant is making such multiple claims.

Gordon Turner, a partner at London firm Partners Employment Lawyers, said he had to go in person to a tribunal office in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk and read paper-based records to check whether a claimant was making multiple claims. ‘That’s ridiculous, particularly if you work in Cumbria or Cornwall,’ he said. ‘Why doesn’t the Tribunals Service join the 21st century and have an online searchable database?’

A spokeswoman for the Tribunals Service said that consideration has been given to putting information online, but ‘there are no current plans to take this forward’.