AI Speeds Up the Draft. Review Has to Keep Pace.

RICS Modus ran a good piece last month on the ethics of AI in surveying, drawn from the RICS Podcast with Nella Pang FRICS and James Garner FRICS. Both sat on the working group behind the RICS standard on responsible use of AI, which came into force in March. I agree with most of it, and there’s one point I’d take further.

For all the noise around AI, the surveyor’s duty is the one we’ve always had. Whether a figure came from a Google search or an Excel formula someone built three years ago, the chartered surveyor who signs the report owns every number in it. What AI changes is the volume of output landing in front of the person who already carries that responsibility.

James uses a bookend analogy: the surveyor at either end, the AI constrained in the middle and briefed the way you’d brief a graduate. Anyone who has run a QS team knows that arrangement and knows where it fails. A graduate’s first take-off arrives after two days and looks like a first attempt, so it gets checked properly. An AI draft arrives in ten minutes and already looks finished. Plausible work produced at speed needs more senior attention and the firms that get caught out will be the ones that let review shrink to match the drafting time.

One small point while we’re on accountability. The article says a data breach should be reported to the ICO within 48 hours. Under UK GDPR, a notifiable breach has to be reported without undue delay and, where feasible, within 72 hours of the firm becoming aware of it. Worth getting right if it’s going into staff handbooks.

At Axo, we use data every day, and have done since inception. Every report that leaves the office still carries a director’s name and a director’s review. The drafting has got quicker but the review takes as long as it always did.

I’d be interested to hear how other firms are handling review now that drafts land so much faster.

Joe Garner MRICS

Director, Axo Consulting