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PARTLY

As of 13 August 2026, AI can only partly recover a commercial debt.

This still needs a person who signs their name to it.

Can you do it?

15 minutesto a draft.

1 hourto something you’d act on.

Cost, all in£0

Skill neededchat-fluent

Who has to check ita professional

What the alternative costsNo priced human alternative is provided in the available tool data.

If this goes wrong: you send an invalid or excessive demand, damage the commercial relationship or miss a step that makes recovery harder.

What to actually do

  1. Hand it to a person

    The route this page recommends

    Someone with a licence or accountable authority has to sign this before it counts.

  2. Use a tool built for this

    Second choice

  3. Do it yourself

    The distant third

    A chat interface, chat-fluent skill, and roughly 1 hour until you can act on the result.

    How to actually do it

    1. Open your contract, purchase orders, invoices, credit notes, payment records and all relevant emails, and remove unrelated personal data.
    2. Create one folder containing the source documents and a plain-text list of the creditor, debtor, contract dates, invoice dates, due dates, amounts, payments, credits and disputed points.
    3. Paste the supplied prompt into an AI chat and attach or paste the folder contents in separate labelled sections, asking it to use only those materials.
    4. Compare the AI's chronology and balance reconciliation line by line with your accounting records and contract, correcting every wrong date, amount or party name.
    5. Ask a UK solicitor to check the cause of action, interest, pre-action requirements, limitation position, insolvency risk and wording before you send a demand or begin proceedings.
    6. Send only the solicitor-approved correspondence through a traceable business channel, record delivery, and update the ledger when the debtor responds or pays.

    Prompt

    I need help recovering a commercial debt in England and Wales. This is not professional advice. Use only the facts and documents I provide, and do not invent terms, dates, amounts, admissions or legal authorities. First identify the documents and facts that are missing. Then produce: (1) a dated chronology, (2) a reconciliation of the principal, interest, VAT and payments, showing every assumption, (3) issues that may affect whether the debt is due or disputed, (4) a practical recovery plan with options and risks, and (5) a firm but proportionate draft payment demand. Do not state that court action, statutory demands, interest, costs or a particular pre-action process is available unless the supplied facts support it. Clearly label anything requiring a UK solicitor's review. Do not send anything, threaten proceedings, contact the debtor or decide whether to settle. Details: creditor [BUSINESS NAME]; debtor [BUSINESS NAME]; contract or order terms [PASTE OR ATTACH]; invoices [PASTE OR ATTACH]; payments and credits [DETAILS]; relevant correspondence [PASTE OR ATTACH]; disputed points [DETAILS]; governing law and jurisdiction if known [DETAILS]; preferred payment deadline [DATE].

    Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.

What it gets wrong

  • AI cannot determine reliably whether the debt is legally due when performance, set-off, defects or disputed terms are involved.
  • AI cannot confirm the debtor's solvency, assets, identity or current address from the documents you paste.
  • AI cannot negotiate a settlement while weighing commercial leverage, relationship damage and the risk of making an admission.
  • AI cannot take responsibility for deadlines, court procedure, enforcement or the consequences of an inaccurate demand.
  • AI cannot replace a solicitor's review where the debt is disputed, substantial, close to limitation or connected to insolvency.

What caps this at PARTLY: legal accountability, judgement under ambiguity and stakes of error.

How we scored this

Five axes, each scored nought to two by hand: ten means AI carries the task cleanly, and the thresholds that turn a total into YES, PARTLY or NO are published in the methodology. Each axis name links to its definition.

AxisScore (0–2)
Output2
Inputs1
Verification1
Liability0
Effort delta1
Total5 / 10

The methodology and its thresholds are published in full.

FAQ

Can ChatGPT write a letter before action for a commercial debt?
It can draft a letter from your contract, invoices and payment history, but the draft may get the legal route, interest or required wording wrong. Have a UK solicitor check it before you send it, especially if the debt is disputed or significant.
Can AI chase an unpaid business invoice?
AI can organise the evidence, calculate a checked balance and draft follow-up messages. It cannot contact the debtor, judge their response or make the recovery legally safe without your review and, where needed, a solicitor.
Can AI take a debtor to court in the UK?
No. AI can help prepare a chronology and draft information for a solicitor, but it cannot take responsibility for selecting the procedure, meeting court requirements or making the claim. A solicitor should handle a disputed or high-stakes claim.
Is it safe to use AI to recover a commercial debt?
It is suitable for sorting documents and preparing a fact-checked draft, not for deciding the legal strategy or sending threats without review. This is not professional advice, and a serious case needs a UK solicitor to check the evidence, deadlines and proposed action.

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Assessed by gpt-5.6-luna (gpt-5.6-luna) on 2026-08-13, second-checked by an independent model. Wrong somewhere? Email [email protected] and it gets re-checked.

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