Turn after-hours calls into booked consults with the right legal intake service

A legal intake service answers your firm's calls when staff can't, and a good one books consults rather than taking messages. Ask four things before you sign: conflict check first, nights and weekends, booking and retainers, and recorded calls. Watch Joshua Albanese walk a lawyer through the four questions for legal intake services in a short video.

What does a legal intake service do for a law firm?

A legal intake service handles client intake for you: it answers, takes the facts you ask for, and moves good callers forward. Clio's 2024 secret-shopper test found only 40% of 500 US firms answered the phone, as 2Civility reported. Use one for the hours your staff can't cover.

That 40% was down from 56% in 2019, and only 33% of firms answered email. If word of mouth works for your firm and you want more consistent lead flow, start with who answers the phone.

If you've dropped a vendor before, you know the feeling. "Our rep completely stopped responding, we've called, texted, and emailed with no reply," one owner wrote about a marketing agency. Ask how a new service handles each call before you ask what it costs.

Answering service, virtual receptionist or full intake service

Answering service

Answers the phone and takes a message for your staff to return. It covers overflow, but nobody screens the caller or books a next step.

Virtual receptionist

Answers, asks a few screening questions, books simple appointments, and can transfer a caller to your office during set hours.

Intake service

Works from your intake script. It takes names for the conflict check, asks your qualifying questions, books consults and can send your retainer on approved case types.

Why after-hours coverage matters for law firm intake

Callers who speak with a person are far more likely to recommend a firm than callers who only get a voicemail back. In Clio's 2024 test, callers who spoke with someone by phone were the likeliest to recommend the firm, 2Civility reported. Check what happens when your own line rings after hours.

That was over three times the average across all channels, and nearly eight times the rate after only a voicemail follow-up. The test did not report time of day, so sort your own phone system's call log by hour.

Arrests and crashes don't keep office hours, while a will can usually wait for a morning callback. I explain that crisis vs planned lens in my guide to law firm marketing. Most practices take both kinds of calls, so use it to size night coverage, not to sort every caller.

Question 1: does the intake service run your conflict check first?

A good intake service takes the names of everyone involved first, so you can run a conflict check. ABA Model Rule 1.18 protects what a prospective client tells you, even if you never take the case. Use your written conflict questions as the service's first script lines.

Under Rule 1.18(c), significantly harmful information can bar you from opposing a prospective client in a substantially related matter. Absent the exceptions in paragraph (d), that bar reaches every lawyer in your firm.

Rule 1.18(d) still allows the representation with both clients' written informed consent, or by screening that lawyer and giving prompt written notice. The screening route also requires reasonable measures to avoid learning more than needed, and no fee share for that lawyer. Check your state bar's version.

Question 2: who answers at 11 on a Saturday, and in Spanish?

A live person should answer nights and weekends, and Spanish-speaking callers should reach a Spanish speaker. Clio's 2024 test, reported by 2Civility, found 48% of 500 firms neither answered nor called back. Ask each service who answers after six, on weekends and holidays, and in which languages.

Ask whether Spanish calls go to a Spanish-speaking agent on the line or to a transfer. Then ask how urgent calls reach a lawyer, like an arrest or a court date tomorrow.

Give the service a written list of who gets called, in what order, and for which matters. Ask whether "24/7" means a live person at 3 a.m. or a voicemail box.

Question 3: can the intake service book the consult or send your retainer?

A good service books consults on your calendar and sends your e-sign retainer on case types you approved. Comment 3 to ABA Model Rule 5.3 says a lawyer using outside help should give directions appropriate to the circumstances. Choose in writing which case types they may book or send a retainer for.

A message isn't a next step, because the caller still doesn't know when they'll hear from you. A booked consult gives them a time and a name.

A lawyer should approve the retainer template and the case types before the service sends anything. Check that the signed retainer and the call notes land in your case management system, as well as in an email.

The red flag: intake staff who answer legal questions

If a service says its people answer basic legal questions, treat it as a red flag. "Do I have a case?" is a lawyer's call. Intake staff should take facts, screen against your criteria and book, without judging the merits or predicting an outcome.

ABA Model Rule 5.3 requires partners and supervising lawyers to make reasonable efforts so a nonlawyer's conduct is compatible with the lawyer's obligations. Under Rule 5.3(c), you answer for conduct you order or ratify, or, as a partner or supervisor, know of in time and fail to remedy.

Comment 3 extends that duty to outside services, weighing the provider's experience, the work and the terms protecting client information. Check your state's version of Rule 5.3 and its unauthorized-practice rules.

Question 4: are calls recorded in an account you can log into?

Calls should be recorded and stored where you can log in and listen, with callers told about it. Federal law allows recording with one party's consent under 18 U.S.C. 2511(2)(d), but some states require everyone's consent. Check your state's recording law, and have the service announce the recording at the start.

The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press counts about 11 states that mainly require all-party consent. They include California, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Washington, plus Michigan in some cases. Interstate calls add questions, so check before relying on one-party consent.

Recordings hold what prospective clients told you, which Rule 1.18(b) protects. ABA Model Rule 1.6(c) requires reasonable efforts to prevent unauthorized access to client information. Ask who at the service can hear recordings, how long they keep them, and what happens to them if you leave.

What to ask an AI receptionist before it answers for your law firm

Ask an AI receptionist the same four questions you'd ask a human service. Three in five prospective clients in Clio's 2024 research would use a chatbot only if they could reach a human, 2Civility reported. Call it late one night and ask whether you have a case.

Listen for a handoff to a person or a booked consult, without any opinion on the case. In the same research, 51% of prospective clients called chatbots a helpful starting point, and 7% of firms used one.

Software doesn't change your duties. Rule 1.6(c) still applies, so ask where transcripts and recordings are stored and who can read them.

Contract terms to check before you sign an intake service

Another owner, burned by a marketing vendor's cancellation terms, put it simply: "Be sure to read your contract before signing."

• Keep your own phone number and forward it to the service, so the number stays with you. The FCC says you can keep your number when you change providers in the same area.

• Ask whether they handle web chat, texts, email and Facebook messages too, since a caller may try more than one way to reach you.

• Ask how long the contract runs, how to cancel, and how much notice you must give. Push back on a 12-month contract before you've heard a single recorded call.

• Get in writing what happens on each call: names first, your questions, the booking and the handoff to a lawyer.

• Make sure recordings, call notes and your data come back to you in a usable file if you leave.

• Ask how they price, whether per minute, per call, monthly or per hour, and what counts as a billable call.

• Before agreeing to pay per signed case, check the fee rules below with your state bar.

• Ask for a trial on your own line before any long commitment.

ABA rules to check with any legal intake service

These ABA Model Rules shape what an outside intake team may do for you, and your state bar's version controls.

• Rule 1.18: what a prospective client tells you stays protected even if you never take the case. Significantly harmful information can disqualify the firm unless the consent or screening exception in paragraph (d) applies.

• Rule 5.3: partners and supervisors must make reasonable efforts so nonlawyers, inside or outside the firm, act compatibly with your obligations. You answer for conduct you order, ratify or, knowing in time, fail to remedy.

• Rule 1.6(c): make reasonable efforts to prevent unauthorized disclosure of, or access to, client information, including recordings and transcripts.

• Comment 5 to Rule 7.2 is the closest model guidance on paying for leads. A lead generator may be paid only if it doesn't recommend you, the payment fits Rules 1.5(e) and 5.4, and its messages meet Rule 7.1.

• Your state's unauthorized-practice rules decide who may tell a caller whether they have a case.

• Your state's recording law decides whether one party's consent is enough.

How to test a legal intake service on your own line

1. Ask for a trial on your own number, forwarded after hours, before you sign a long contract.
2. Call late one night as a crisis caller, and time how long it takes to reach a person.
3. Tell your story first and see whether they stop you to take names for the conflict check.
4. Ask, "Do I have a case?" A good answer hands you to a lawyer or a booked time, without an opinion.
5. If you serve Spanish speakers, call in Spanish and check whether a Spanish speaker stays on the line.
6. The next morning, log in, play the recording, and check the summary, the booking and the retainer status.

Measure the intake service by signed cases each month

1. Export the month's calls from your phone carrier's call log and compare the count with the service's report.
2. Sort those calls by hour and day, so you see how many came in nights and weekends.
3. Count consults booked from those calls, using your calendar.
4. Count retainers sent and signed, with a required "how did you hear about us" field in your intake log.
5. Compare signed cases with what the service cost that month, then change one thing at a time.
6. Track the search side with the local SEO metrics that matter.

Help the right callers find your law firm before your intake service answers

Spearleaf doesn't sell intake or answer phones. Our local SEO work helps the right callers find your firm through your Google Business Profile, practice pages, reviews and AI answers.

Talk to Spearleaf about local SEO

• The crisis vs planned lens: law firm marketing.
• Start here: get more calls from your Google Business Profile.
• The numbers to watch: local SEO metrics that matter.