Client intake automation takes the answers a prospective client types into a form on the firm's website and uses them to create the case record, notify the firm, generate the engagement documents, send them for signature, and open a client portal. The information is typed once, by the client, and a person at the firm makes the decisions.
We built an intake system for a personal injury practice. A new client fills out a case review on the firm's website and lands in the AZLG Case Hub. From there the firm generates personal injury and civil documents, sends them for signature, and gives the client a portal to follow along.
Without a system like that, intake tends to go like this. A form sends an email. Someone reads the email and types the details into the case system. Someone else types them again into an engagement letter. The client waits, and sometimes calls another firm while waiting.
The software does not make any of the legal decisions. Its job is to make sure the client's answers are typed once and then carried everywhere they are needed.
What is client intake automation?
Client intake automation is software that moves a prospective client's information from the first form to an open file without anyone retyping it. It creates the record, alerts the firm, fills in the documents, collects signatures, and gives the client a place to check progress. People still decide whether to take the case.
The useful way to think about it is as a relay. Each handoff in a manual intake is a place where information is copied, and each copy is a chance for a wrong phone number or a misspelled name. Automation removes the copying. It does not remove the conversation.
How does automated intake work, step by step?
Automated intake works as a chain of steps where each one uses the data from the step before. The client fills in a form, a record is created, the firm is notified, a person reviews it, documents are generated and signed, and the client gets a portal. Here is the flow we recommend.
- The form. The client answers plain questions on the firm's website: who they are, what happened, when, and how to reach them.
- The record. The answers create a matter in the firm's system directly. Nothing is emailed for someone to retype.
- The alert. The right person at the firm is told immediately that a new review has arrived.
- The review. A person reads it, runs the firm's own checks, and decides whether to go forward.
- The documents. Engagement documents are generated from the record, with names, dates, and details already in place.
- The signature. The documents go to the client for electronic signature, and the signed copies attach to the matter.
- The portal. The client gets a place to see where things stand and what is needed from them next.
Steps two, five, and six are where the time is saved. Step four is where it should not be.
What should the intake form ask?
The intake form should ask only what the firm needs to decide whether to have a conversation: contact details, the type of matter, a short description of what happened, and the key dates. Everything else can be collected later, after the firm has decided the case is one it handles.
Long forms lose people. A person who has just been in an accident will answer a few questions on a phone. They are unlikely to finish a long questionnaire. Design the first form for the phone, then gather the rest once there is a relationship, when the client is motivated to supply it.
Write the questions in plain words. "When did this happen" works better than a field labeled with a legal term. And say on the form what happens after they submit, so they know someone will respond.
Which intake steps should stay with a person?
The steps that involve judgment should stay with a person: deciding whether to take the matter, checking for conflicts, explaining the fee, and answering the client's first real questions. Software should prepare those decisions by putting the facts in front of the right person quickly. It should not make them.
This is the same line we draw everywhere we use automation. In the case hub, the software reads medical records and drafts a chronology the attorney can check instead of write. The attorney still checks it. We cover where that line belongs in human in the loop.
Rules on engagement agreements, conflicts, and electronic signatures vary by state, so check your own bar's requirements before automating any of them.
Where do email and website chat fit into intake?
Email and chat are the other two doors a new client comes through, and both can feed the same record. Not every prospective client fills in a form. Some ask a question in the chat window first, and many reply by email with documents attached once the conversation has started.
For chat, we built Ask Tamou. A visitor gets an immediate, careful answer, and when a person at the firm wants to step in, they reply from a messaging app on their phone and the visitor sees it in the same chat window. For someone not yet ready to fill in a form, that conversation is the intake.
For email, we built Firm Mail Intake. It reads the firm's incoming email, files attachments to the right client, and checks any court date mentioned in a message against the calendar. We describe how in email triage automation.
What does intake automation not fix?
Intake automation does not fix a slow response from the people involved. If a new review arrives in the system within seconds and nobody looks at it until the next afternoon, the firm has built a faster way to keep clients waiting. The software shortens the paperwork, not the decision.
It also does not fix unclear process. If the firm has not decided who reviews new matters, or which documents every new client signs, there is nothing consistent to automate. Write the process down first. A page is enough. Then build the software to match it.
For a firm that opens a few matters a month, a good form that emails one person and a set of document templates may be all that is needed. The full chain earns its cost when volume is high enough that retyping has become someone's job.
Frequently asked questions
Can intake automation work with the software a firm already uses?
Often, yes, if the existing system offers a way for other software to create records in it. Ask your vendor whether it has an API. If it does not, the intake system can still produce documents and notify staff.
How is automated intake different from a contact form?
A contact form sends a message that a person must read and re-enter somewhere else. Automated intake creates the case record itself and uses it to produce documents and requests for signature, so the information is entered only once.
Should the intake form be on the firm's own website?
Yes. Keeping the form on the firm's own site means the client never leaves, the page matches the rest of the firm's site, and the firm controls what is asked and where the answers go.
What happens to people the firm decides not to represent?
That is a decision for the firm, made by a person. The system should record the outcome and help staff send a clear, prompt reply.
If intake at your firm still involves retyping a web form, tell us what your process looks like today and we will show you where the copying can stop.