The RICS AI Standard is live. Here is what matters most.

The RICS AI Standard is live. Here is what matters most.

TLDR

The RICS AI Standard is live from today. Most firms are using AI and do not realise the extent of it. Materiality is the key concept. If AI changed or influenced the outcome of your work, it is material. Start this week by having an honest conversation about where AI is in your firm, writing down what tools are being used, drafting an acceptable use policy, and updating your terms of engagement.

Today the RICS Professional Standard on the Responsible Use of AI in Surveying Practice takes effect.

If you have been following this newsletter, you are already ahead of most. But ahead does not mean done. And for many surveyors, today is the first time this has felt real.

Where are you actually using AI?

Before we talk about the standard, I want you to answer that question honestly. Because most surveyors I speak to underestimate it.

Are you using Microsoft Copilot? That is AI. It is in your Outlook, your Word, your Teams. If your firm has a Microsoft 365 subscription, there is a good chance AI is already touching your emails, your documents, and your meeting notes.

Are you using Grammarly? That is AI.

Is your surveying software flagging issues, suggesting text, running analysis, or automating parts of your workflow? That is AI. Most modern surveying tools have it baked in now. You may not have pressed a button marked “AI,” but it is there.

Are you using ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini to draft report sections, research comparables, tidy up client letters, or summarise documents? That is AI and it is the most visible form, but it is far from the only one.

Now ask the harder question. Are your employees using any of these tools without the firm knowing about it?

Shadow AI is the risk most firms have not addressed

Here is something most firm directors do not want to hear. Even if your firm has not formally adopted AI, your people are almost certainly using it.

A surveyor drafting part of a report in ChatGPT on their phone. An administrator using Copilot to tidy correspondence. Someone pasting property details into a free tool to speed up research. Someone using a personal subscription because the firm has not provided one.

If it is happening and you do not know about it, you have no governance around it. And from today, you are expected to.

I was at a surveying event last week. The room was asked how many firms had an AI policy in place. The vast majority did not.

No policy. No register of tools. No documented process for how AI is being used in the practice. And these were engaged, senior professionals who care about their firms and their clients. They are not ignoring this. They just have not known where to start.

That is where most of the profession is right now. And there is no shame in it.

So where is everyone actually at?

From the conversations I have every week, I see three broad groups.

The first group has not started. They know AI exists. Some are using it personally. But there is nothing formal in the firm. No policy, no disclosure, no documented thinking. This is the majority.

The second group has started but is unsure. They might have had an internal conversation. Someone may have drafted something. But they are not confident it covers what it needs to, and they do not know how to test it.

The third group thinks they are compliant but has not pressure tested it. They have a document in a folder somewhere. It has not been reviewed against the actual standard. It does not address materiality. It may not reflect what is actually happening day to day.

All three groups need the same thing. Not panic. Clarity.

Materiality is the word that matters most

Now you have answered the first question honestly, where AI is actually touching your work, this is the concept that determines what you need to do about it.

The standard applies where AI has a material impact on the delivery of your surveying services. That sounds narrow. It is not.

Here is a fair benchmark to work with. If AI changed the outcome or influenced the outcome of your work, that is material. If it saved you ten minutes but the outcome would have been exactly the same without it, it is probably not.

So using AI to schedule a site visit is not material. Using AI to draft a section of a report that goes to your client is. Using AI to tidy up the grammar in an email is not material. Using AI to summarise research you then rely on in your professional opinion is.

If your software has AI built into its analysis or recommendations, that is material. If AI is shaping what you investigate or where you focus, that is material. If AI helped produce any part of what your client receives, you need to think carefully about whether it influenced the substance of what you delivered.

Here is a good rule of thumb on top of that. If your client would want to know you used AI for something, you need to tell them. And in the early stages, it is better to over-report than under-report. A simple paragraph in your terms of engagement setting out where AI is and is not involved in your service delivery. That is not onerous. That is transparent.

Materiality is subjective. It will look different for every firm and every type of work. But if you have not thought about it yet, that is the first gap to close.

What this standard is not

This standard was never designed to stop firms using AI. The opposite. It exists because the profession was asking for guardrails. Firms wanted to adopt AI but did not know how to do it safely. They were unsure about disclosure, insurance, data, liability.

The standard gives you a baseline. It is not a ceiling. It does not tell you which tools to use or ban you from experimenting. It asks you to be intentional, to document what you are doing, and to keep the expert in the loop.

Not just the human in the loop. The expert. Your clients are paying for your professional judgement. AI does not carry that. You do.

Where to start this week

If your firm is starting from zero today, here are four things you can do this week.

Have the conversation. Sit down with your team, or if you are a sole trader sit down with yourself, and answer one question honestly. Where is AI touching the work we deliver to clients? Include the tools you had not thought of. Copilot. Grammarly. The AI inside your surveying software.

Write it down. Not a 40-page policy. A simple list of what tools are being used, by whom, and for what. That is the beginning of your AI register.

Draft an acceptable use policy. This does not need to be complicated. It needs to set out what tools are approved, what is not allowed, where client data can and cannot go, and who is responsible for oversight. For a sole trader, this might be half a page. For a larger firm, it will be longer. The point is that it exists, it is written down, and your team knows about it. A verbal understanding is not a policy. If it is not documented, it does not protect you.

Look at your terms of engagement. Do they mention AI at all? If not, that is your next step. A short, honest paragraph telling clients how AI is and is not involved in your service delivery.

You do not need to be fully compliant by the end of the week. But you do need to have started. And starting is simpler than most people think.