What actually drives the cost
Three things. The hours you need covered, how complex the intake is, and how predictable the volume is.
A firm wanting evening and weekend cover for a straightforward intake script is priced very differently from one wanting round the clock cover across several practice areas with different escalation rules for each.
Why per-seat pricing rarely suits a small firm
Most outsourcing is priced by the seat, which assumes enough volume to keep a person busy. Legal intake usually does not work like that. Calls arrive in bursts, often outside office hours, and the value sits in a small number of them.
Paying for a full seat to catch a handful of high-value calls is the wrong shape. Ask any provider how they price when the volume does not fill a seat, and the answer will tell you whether they have worked with firms your size.
The number you should compare against
Not a salary. Your fully loaded cost of answering the phone: recruitment, the training you repeat each time someone leaves, supervisor time, holiday and sickness cover, and the calls currently going unanswered.
Most firms have never added up the last item, and it is usually the one that decides the comparison. If you are weighing this against a hire, we have set out outsourcing against hiring a receptionist.
What the calls you miss are worth
We are not going to put a number on this, because it depends entirely on your practice area and what a matter is worth to you. You already know roughly what a signed case is worth, and you know roughly how many calls go to voicemail after six.
Multiply your own two numbers rather than ours. If the answer is small, do not outsource.
What is included
The agreed hours, the agents assigned to your firm, building the intake script with you, training on it, the escalation rules, the record format and the reporting. For what that buys on a single call, see what happens on a legal intake call.
What is not included
Legal advice of any kind, marketing, following up leads on your behalf, or anything that would put an agent in the position of speaking for your firm beyond taking the intake.
Why we will not quote before understanding the volume
A quote given before anyone has looked at when your calls arrive and what they involve is a guess, and it will be revised once the reality appears. We would rather spend twenty minutes on the pattern of your calls first.
Talk to us
Tell us when your calls come in and what you want captured, and we will tell you what it would cost, or that it is not worth doing. Talk to us about your volume.
