Legal answering service, answered in Australia.

A new matter rings once. If it goes to voicemail it goes to another firm. Our receptionists answer in your firm's name, collect what your conflict check needs, and put existing clients through to the practitioner acting.

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Stated first

What we will never do.

Intake is the job. Advice is not, and the line is written into your plan.

Hard limits, written into your plan

We are not lawyers and we never act as though we are.

We do not give legal advice, express a view on prospects, estimate fees or hourly rates, or confirm that the firm can act before you have completed a conflict check. Our role is capturing the enquiry accurately, collecting the details your conflict check needs, and routing the call by your rules.

Why legal intake fails on the phone

Three predictable failures.

Competition

Callers ring several firms in one sitting.

Someone with a new matter works down a search results page. The firm that answers with a person, and takes the situation seriously, is usually the one they instruct.

Availability

The people who could take the call bill by the hour.

Court, client conferences, drafting. Protecting billable time and answering the phone are in direct conflict.

Risk

A half-taken enquiry creates conflict risk.

A message reading Sharon, family law, call back tells you nothing about the other party, and you cannot run a conflict check on it.

Coverage

Areas we take intake for.

Intake questions differ by area and so do the urgency triggers. A criminal matter with a caller in custody and a conveyance settling on Friday are not the same call.

Personal and family

Family law, criminal, personal injury and compensation, wills and estates, migration.

Commercial

Commercial and contract, employment, building and construction disputes, insurance disputes.

Property

Conveyancing, property transactions, strata and leasing matters.

Scope

What the service covers.

We handle the phone. Your firm handles the law, and the limits above are written into the plan.

We do

Answer, capture and route

We answer in your firm's name during the hours you set. We take the new matter details in the caller's own words. We collect the parties your conflict check needs. We transfer existing clients to the practitioner acting for them. We book into your diary where your plan allows it.

You keep

Every decision that is legal work

Conflict clearance, costs disclosure, engagement and advice stay inside the firm. We never confirm the firm can act, so engagement stays with you.

You approve

The wording, before anyone answers

You sign off the greeting, the intake questions, the escalation triggers and the hard limits. We answer no call until you approve the plan.

Cover

Overflow, after hours, or the whole phone.

You choose how much of the phone comes to us. Your existing number stays exactly as it is, because the forward sits behind the number you already advertise.

Overflow

Only when the firm cannot pick up

We answer when your line is busy or rings out. Reception keeps answering first, and nothing on the letterhead changes.

After hours

Evenings, weekends and court days

Your firm takes the phone in office hours. We cover everything outside them, plus any block you set for court or mediation. There is no after hours loading and no public holiday surcharge.

Full time

Every call comes to us

Your team stops being interrupted. Instead of a callback list they receive completed intake and booked appointments.

An after hours call runs the same written plan as a Tuesday morning call. A caller in custody, or a deadline inside your urgent window, reaches your duty practitioner. Everything else is taken as intake for the next business day.

Sample script

What a new matter call sounds like.

Your plan sets the wording. This is the shape of a first enquiry, written the way the receptionist reads it.

New matter intake, sample wording

Greeting. "Good afternoon, Hartley and Company, this is Sam speaking."

Route first. "Are you an existing client of the firm, or is this a new matter?" An existing client goes through to the practitioner acting.

Area of law. "What is the matter about, in your own words?" The answer is typed as the caller says it.

Other parties. "So the firm can run its conflict check, who else is involved? Full names, please, including any company."

Urgency. "Is there a court date, a settlement date or another deadline coming up? Is anyone in custody?" A yes triggers your escalation path.

Contact. "Your best number and email, and the best time for the firm to call you back."

Close. "I have sent this straight through to the firm. I am not able to tell you whether we can act, because the firm runs a conflict check first. You will hear back inside the window your plan sets."

The wording changes by practice area. A criminal practice asks about custody first. A conveyancing practice asks for the settlement date and the other side's firm. The two limits at the close stay in every legal plan we write.

Messages

What lands with the firm.

Every call produces a written outcome, by SMS and email within the minute, including on the calls we screen out.

Format

Structured fields

Caller name, contact number, area of law, the summary in their words, every other party named, the urgency answer, and what we did. Your plan sets the field list.

Screening

The filtered calls too

Wrong numbers, silent calls, robocalls and sales calls are logged and never billed. You still see what the phone did.

Routing

Who gets put through, and when.

Transfers and escalations run on your table, never on the receptionist's read of the moment.

Existing clients

Straight to the practitioner acting

Or to their nominated backup, per your routing table. We never discuss an existing matter with anyone except the client.

Urgent new matters

To the duty practitioner

You define urgent. Typical triggers are a caller in custody, a court date inside seven days, a personal safety matter, or a settlement at risk.

Backup

Two names, never one

Every escalation path names a primary and a backup contact. An urgent call never has a single point of failure.

Off plan

Escalated, never guessed

Anything your plan does not cover reaches a person at the firm. Guessing is not one of the options.

Confidentiality and privacy

How caller information is handled.

Conflict clearance and privilege are questions for your firm. Our part is message handling, and these are the controls we apply to it.

Answered in Australia

Caller information stays onshore. Every receptionist works under a written confidentiality agreement covering everything a caller says.

Only the fields your plan lists

We record what the plan specifies and nothing beyond it. We never confirm to a caller that a named person is a client of the firm.

Conflict data captured, never cleared

We collect every other party the caller names so your check can run. We never tell a caller the firm is able to act.

Your firm stays responsible for its own obligations under the Privacy Act 1988 and the Australian Privacy Principles, which the OAIC publishes in full. Set the handling requirements you need and we write them into the plan, then have your risk lead read it against those principles before it goes live. Call recording is set per firm inside the plan, and callers are told at the start wherever it applies. Our own handling is on the privacy page.

The other option

Should a law firm use an AI receptionist?

Automated answering costs less and it never gets busy. It also takes its consistency from being unable to deviate.

Where automation holds up

Repeat callers asking simple things.

Office hours, the address, whether a document arrived. High volume, low stakes, and a mistake annoys somebody rather than costing the firm a client.

Where it breaks

The first enquiry, which is the one that pays.

A distressed caller names three other parties in one sentence and describes a dispute they have no vocabulary for. An automated system keeps what it recognises and drops the rest, and the dropped parts are the ones your conflict check needed.

We sell human answering, so read our comparison of AI against a person knowing that. It still names the cases where automation is the better buy. Clinics weigh the same question against a different risk, on the medical answering service page.

Due diligence

What to ask any answering service.

Put these to every provider you shortlist. The answers separate legal intake from a message pad.

Ask this	Why it matters to a firm	Our answer
Where do the people answering actually sit?	Australian owned is not the same as answered in Australia. Client information may leave the country.	Answered in Australia, by receptionists under written confidentiality agreements.
Can we read the script before it goes live?	If there is no script to show you, there is no script.	You approve the written call plan before we answer a call, and you keep the document either way.
Do you collect the other parties by name?	Without them the firm cannot run a conflict check, so the message is unusable.	Yes. Every other party the caller names is a required field in a legal plan.
What happens on a call that goes off script?	That is the call that costs you the client.	It reaches your named contact and is logged as a gap for the monthly review.
What will you refuse to say for us?	A provider with no stated limits has not thought about your risk.	No advice, no view on prospects, no fee estimate, and no confirmation that the firm can act.
Are we billed for wrong numbers and telemarketers?	Screening is where a per call price quietly inflates.	Wrong numbers, silent calls, robocalls and sales calls are never billable.

Questions

What firms ask.

What is a legal answering service?

A legal answering service answers your firm's phone in your firm's name and works to a written intake plan you approve. We take new matter details, collect the parties your conflict check needs, transfer existing clients to the practitioner acting, and escalate urgent calls to a named person.

How do you protect against conflicts?

We collect the identifying details your conflict check needs, including every other party the caller names, and we never tell a caller the firm can act. The check stays yours to run. Our job is making sure you have what you need to run it before anyone calls back.

Is what a caller tells you privileged?

Privilege is a question for your firm and we would not attempt to advise you on it. We can tell you how we treat the information: as confidential, under written agreement, recorded only in the fields your plan specifies, and never discussed with anyone but your firm.

Can you quote our fees?

Only a fixed figure you have given us in writing, such as a fixed fee conveyance or an initial consultation cost, and only word for word. We never estimate a matter.

Can you take after hours calls only?

Yes. Many firms use us for evenings, weekends and the hours around court, and answer their own phone in between. An after hours call follows the same written plan, so an urgent matter still reaches your duty practitioner.

Do you work with sole practitioners and small firms?

Yes. A sole practitioner in court all morning has no second person to pick up. The plan for a one practitioner firm is shorter, and it leans harder on the escalation rules.

What happens if a caller is distressed or in custody?

Your plan decides. Custody, personal safety and a court date inside seven days are the usual immediate escalation triggers. A receptionist who cannot reach the primary contact goes to the backup rather than taking a message.

What does a law firm answering service cost?

We price per firm after the mapping call, because call volume and how much of each call you want finished vary too much for a flat rate to be honest. Plans run month to month with no lock-in and no setup fee. The pricing page explains what every plan includes.

Should we use an AI receptionist instead?

It depends on the calls. Automation handles repetitive, low value calls cheaply and it never gets busy. A first legal enquiry is the call least likely to follow the expected shape, and an automated system drops what it does not recognise. Our comparison page names where it wins.

Stop losing new matters to voicemail.

Map your intake plan with us, have your risk lead review it, and go live when the firm is satisfied.

Get a call plan See pricing

Before you forward the phone