Playbook, law firm
The first appointment at a law firm, explained in advance
People are more nervous about a first appointment with a solicitor than the profession tends to remember. They do not know whether it costs anything, whether they are committing to something by turning up, what to bring, or whether they can bring somebody with them. Every one of those has a fixed answer that varies by department and by nothing else, which makes this the most reliably automatable question on a law firm site.
Why this is not the general answer
The handling pattern for first visit questions holds across every trade. What follows is the part that does not.
- This trade's first appointment has a gate in front of it that other professions do not have: identity checks and, on transactional work, source of funds evidence, and neither can be deferred to be helpful.
- Whether the first meeting is free, chargeable, or chargeable but credited against later work usually differs by department in the same firm, so a single site wide answer is wrong somewhere.
- Visitors want to know whether attending commits them to instructing the firm, and the reassuring answer is a genuine one, which makes it worth saying rather than leaving implied.
- The material has to describe what the meeting covers without describing what the firm would advise, and that distinction is invisible to whoever writes the page unless it is pointed out.
How it arrives
- what should i bring to my first appointment
- is the first meeting free
- what id do you need to see
- how long does the first appointment last
- can i bring my sister with me
- do i have to decide to instruct you on the day
What has to be indexed for this to work
| Initial consultation terms, written per department | Free or charged, how long, whether a fee is credited against later work, and what will and will not be covered. Firms answer this differently across family, conveyancing, employment and private client, so one line for the whole firm will be wrong in at least one department. |
|---|---|
| Identification and source of funds requirements | The documents you accept, whether originals are needed, what proof of address qualifies, and on transactional work what evidence of the source of funds you require. Presenting these as a step rather than a formality is what stops a first appointment being wasted. |
| What to bring for each type of matter | Correspondence, contracts, a tenancy agreement, payslips, a will, court papers, a chronology. A visitor who arrives with the right paperwork gets a useful hour, and this list is the single most valuable thing the assistant hands over before a meeting. |
| Who attends and what happens afterwards | Whether a solicitor or a paralegal takes the first meeting, whether a companion may attend, whether it is in person or remote, and what the client receives afterwards: a letter of engagement, an estimate, a next step. This is the part nobody publishes and everybody wonders about. |
The reply
The first appointment in our family department runs for around an hour and is charged at the published initial consultation fee, which we credit against your bill if you go on to instruct us. Bring photographic identification and a recent proof of address, since we cannot open a file without them, plus any correspondence or court papers you already have. You are welcome to bring someone with you, and you are not committing to instruct us by coming in.
It answers four separate anxieties in one reply, which is how they actually arrive. Naming the department matters because the terms differ across the firm, and the assistant should reproduce that rather than flatten it. The last sentence exists because the unspoken question at a first appointment is whether attending traps them, and answering it directly is what gets the booking.
Where it stops
The trigger. The visitor moves from what happens at the appointment to what they should say or do about their situation, or asks whether it is worth coming in given the facts they then set out.
I can tell you how the appointment works and what to bring, but whether your situation is worth pursuing is a question for the solicitor you would be seeing. Leave your name, email and the type of matter and we will arrange a time.
It stops answering before it guesses, says who will pick it up, and asks for the one thing that makes a reply possible. Nothing about it reads as a dead end.
Never say this here
Out of bounds
- Never say identification can be brought later so the meeting can go ahead first.
- Never describe the consultation terms of one department as though they applied across the firm.
- Never tell somebody what to say or not say at the appointment.
- Never suggest the first meeting will produce an answer to their problem.
Questions
- Can it book the appointment as well?
- It does not write into a diary. What it does is remove the reasons somebody does not ring, then take a name, an email and a short note when they ask for a person, which arrives with your team as an enquiry.
- Our departments have different consultation terms. Is that a problem?
- Only if the material flattens them. Keep a short consultation page per department, each naming the department in its own text, and the citations on the reply will show you immediately if the assistant has answered from the wrong one.
- How much detail should the identification requirements go into?
- As much as your onboarding team actually needs, including whether originals or certified copies are required and what you accept as proof of address. This is the material that decides whether the first meeting produces a file or a second appointment.
Keep reading
- Everything for a law firmFee structures, consultation terms and onboarding checks are answerable. Anything applied to a caller's own facts is legal advice.
- Handling first visit questions in generalWhat to wear, where to park, how long it takes, whether they can bring somebody. Cheap to answer and disproportionately valuable.
- Routing a complaint into the firm's own procedure, quicklyA published complaints route, the response period attached to it and the ombudsman step, handed over without the assistant defending the firm.
- The line where a legal enquiry stops being a conversationPrivilege does not attach to a widget and a wrong steer can cost a claim. The trigger is anybody describing their own legal situation.
- A client is looking at our bill and wants to know whyTime units, the narrative, disbursements sitting apart from the fee, and why none of it can be checked against a live matter.
Try it on your own material
Upload a document or point it at your site, paste one line of HTML, then ask it something only your business could answer.