Letting agents said they were facing a flood of “complex and intricate” complaints written by tenants using AI, often relying on inaccurate information and requiring lengthy responses to resolve. Agents reported a surge in well-written complaints, seemingly assisted by AI, often spanning several pages of text and invoking details of the law, sometimes speciously.

Propertymark, the industry body for letting agents, said the need to assess, respond to and resolve complaints was putting pressure on agents and landlords who required the capacity and legal knowledge to deal with them properly. But Greg Tsuman, managing director of lettings at Martyn Gerrard, said 90 per cent of complaints to the letting agent were now in the form of emails several pages long, many with multiple components and quoted passages of statute, a change that had taken place in the past two to three years.

Ben Stokes, a lettings director at agents JNP, said AI-generated complaints sometimes included elements of previous proposed versions of the Renters’ Rights Act in England that had not found their way into the final legislation. “The biggest thing we are finding is that AI tools are empowering people to complain about things and blow small situations out of proportion.” Tsuman called for changes to the rules on submissions to the Property Ombudsman so that complainants should indicate whether the complaint had been assisted using AI.

Shelter, the housing charity, said its advice teams had seen several instances of generative AI platforms making “false, incomplete or misleading statements about the new changes” under the Act. Shelter recommended that tenants seeking advice refer to fact-checked online sources such as Shelter or Gov.uk.