Only 40% of law firms answered the phone.
Clio's 2024 secret-shopper study contacted 500 US law firms. Only 40% answered the phone and 48% could not be reached at all. What that means for intake.
Most people call a lawyer on one of the worst days of their year. An arrest, an accident, a divorce, an eviction notice. The first call is also the firm's first impression, and in most firms nobody hears it.
What the study measured
For its 2024 Legal Trends Report, Clio had a third-party research firm contact 500 law firms in the United States, posing as a potential client with questions about cost, process and booking a consultation. The results:
- 40% of firms answered the phone, down from 56% in 2019.
- 33% replied to an email, down from 40% in 2019.
- 48% did neither, which makes them essentially unreachable.
Why it matters more for law firms
The same study asked the shoppers whether they would recommend the firms they contacted. Only 12% said they were likely to. But shoppers who actually spoke with someone on the phone were more than three times more likely than average to recommend the firm.
In other words, the phone call is where a firm wins or loses the client, before anyone has looked at the facts of the case.
Where the calls go
Small and solo firms face the same problem as any small business, with a twist:
- Attorneys are in court or with clients. The person who could take the call can't.
- Intake is a real conversation. It takes time to understand what happened, so one intake call blocks the line.
- Evenings and weekends. Legal problems don't wait for business hours.
What good intake over the phone looks like
A good intake call does four things: it answers quickly, it gathers the right facts, it sets a clear next step, and it never gives legal advice. An AI receptionist can do the first three and be strict about the fourth.
When a law firm sets up AICall, the setup wizard asks the questions that shape that call:
- Which practice areas the firm handles
- Which states or jurisdictions you practice in
- Whether you offer a free consultation, and what it costs after that
- What the agent should capture first during intake
- How soon an attorney follows up after intake
- Your hours, location, and who to hand a caller to when the agent can't help
With that, the agent answers in one ring, takes the intake details, tells the caller when to expect a call from an attorney, and sends the firm a written summary. It can also book the consultation into Google Calendar, Cal.com or GoHighLevel.
What it must not do
An intake agent is not a lawyer. It should never assess a case, predict an outcome, or tell someone what to do legally. When a caller asks something only an attorney can answer, AICall's agent says so, takes a message and makes sure the firm sees it.
Run your own secret-shopper test
You don't need a research firm to find out how your phone performs. This week, from a number the office doesn't recognize, call three times:
- During a busy hour, mid-morning on a weekday.
- After 6 p.m., on a weekday.
- On a Saturday.
Each time, write down four things: whether a person answered, how many rings it took, what the voicemail greeting promised, and how long it took for someone to call you back. If the answer to the first question is "no" more than once, you are part of the 60% in Clio's study.
It is also worth reading your voicemail greeting out loud. If it doesn't tell a new client what happens next and when, it is not doing the job an intake call should.
A note on our own numbers
AICall is pre-launch, so this article does not quote customer results. Every figure comes from the study listed below.
To hear how the agent handles an intake call, request a demo. We set up a live line for a law firm and call you back.