Task guide
Set up intake
Shape how the firm runs enquiries with pipelines and their gates, the reasons an enquiry closes for, the rules that assign a new enquiry, and the response targets.
Everything here is under Settings, Intake settings. Every change is recorded in the audit trail.
Pipelines
A pipeline is the stages an enquiry passes through. The firm has one default pipeline and at most one live pipeline per practice area; a new enquiry goes on its practice area's pipeline, else the default. General, criminal defence and corporate pipelines are shipped and can be changed.
- New pipeline asks for its name, practice area and first stage. Add the other stages on its page.
- Each stage has a target in hours and its gates. Moving to a stage needs every gate of every stage up to it.
- Move up and Move down reorder the stages.
- A stage with open enquiries cannot be removed, and a stage an enquiry ever stood in is retired rather than deleted.
- Make the firm's default moves the default to this pipeline.
- Checklist lists what every prospect on the pipeline is asked for before the matter opens: papers such as proof of identity, and items such as the beneficial owners. Mark an item required when a conversion must not open the matter without it. Retire an item the firm no longer asks for; retired items keep the answers already given.
Outcome reasons
The reasons an enquiry is closed for, under each outcome: declined by the firm, conflict, prospect declined, no response, duplicate, referred elsewhere and disqualified. Retire a reason the firm no longer uses; a reason no enquiry was closed for can be deleted.
Assignment rules
Rules are read in order and the first whose conditions all hold chooses the owner of a new enquiry. Conditions are the practice area, the office, the channel, how the prospect found the firm and whether they are already a client. A rule gives the enquiry to a named person, to the client's relationship lawyer, or round robin over its members, the one assigned longest ago next. A name given when the enquiry is taken in always wins, and an enquiry no rule matches waits for the intake team.
Service levels and letters
How soon a prospect must hear back (60 minutes unless changed), how long after a missed target the owner's supervisor is told (24 hours), and how many days a closed enquiry may be reopened (90). The owner, or everybody who manages enquiries while nobody owns it, is told once when a target is missed. Whether a letter of non-engagement is offered or required when the firm declines the work (offered unless changed): required, closing an enquiry as declined by the firm, conflict, disqualified or referred elsewhere without one is refused.
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- Take in an enquiryRecord a prospect before any matter exists, move the enquiry through its pipeline as each gate is met, clear the conflict check, and close or reopen it.
- From enquiry to matterBook and record consultations, propose the fee, send the engagement letter to sign, work through the checklist, and convert the enquiry into a client and a matter in one step.
- Practice areas, matter types and custom fieldsThe areas the firm practises in, the kinds of matter under each with their defaults, and the extra fields the firm wants recorded.