Secret shoppers called five hundred law firms: only 40% answered, and one in five missed calls was ever returned 1 — while 79% of clients hire the first firm that responds. 2 Vona answers every call, runs a disciplined intake, and never crosses into legal advice.
You're in court. Phone's off. The rules require it.
Deposition. Client meeting. I-95 between hearings. No other profession has a judge enforcing its unavailability — the miss isn't effort, it's physics and courtroom rules. And the first firm to answer usually signs the client.
"My son was just arrested. He's at the county jail right now."
In-custody calls and family-safety concerns take an immediate path: the attorney is notified the moment the intake is flagged, with a same-night callback promised. Every other matter books the consultation. Voicemail does neither.
Flag: in custody · immediate escalationVona's legal intake is designed around ABA Formal Opinion 506 — the opinion that defines what nonlawyer intake staff may handle — and built with Formal Opinion 512, the ABA's first generative-AI ethics guidance (July 2024), in view: supervision, confidentiality, disclosure. The same rules your front desk is supposed to follow, followed on every call, at 2 AM, without improvising.
Do I have a case?
That's exactly what the consultation is for — I can't evaluate legal questions, but I can get you in front of the attorney who can. And the consultation is free.
The facts are captured in full — a stale accident date gets flagged for the attorney — but the legal conclusion is never spoken.
What will this cost me? Can you do better on the fee?
Fee arrangements are between you and the attorney — but the consultation where you'd discuss that is free.
Your standard fee facts, stated verbatim — and not one word more. No explaining, no negotiating.
Should I talk to the police before I get a lawyer?
I can't advise you on that — that's a decision to make with a lawyer, and it matters enough that I don't want you to take it from a receptionist. The attorney can talk with you before you talk with anyone else. Can I get you connected today?
— note what is absent: not "yes," not "no," not "don't talk to them." Advice in either direction is still advice. It routes instead.
"No puedo aconsejarle sobre eso — esa es una decisión para tomar con un abogado, y es lo bastante importante como para no aceptarla de una recepcionista. ¿Le conecto hoy mismo?"
The caller launches into the full story, three minutes deep, names and confessions included.
Let me stop you there — in the kindest way. Save the full story for the attorney; let me just get the essentials so we can check for conflicts and get you scheduled. It actually protects you that I don't take the whole story down.
Prospective-client rules mean a firm can learn too much from someone it can't represent — and end up conflicted out of a matter it should have kept. In plain English: it protects your firm from learning too much from someone you can't represent.
One thing I'm required to be clear about: the firm hasn't taken your case yet — no attorney-client relationship exists until you and the attorney sign a written agreement. The attorney will review everything, run our conflict check, and call you back.
Say this when you call · (305) 363-7579
Every intake captures the universals — caller, callback, email, opposing parties for the conflict check, prior counsel, how they found you — plus the sheet for the matter at hand.
You bill roughly 36 of a 48-hour week. The phone leaks exactly when you're doing the 36.
Down from 56% in 2019. 48% were unreachable entirely, only 20% of missed calls were ever returned — and more than half of firms never answered a voicemail within 72 hours. 64% of prospects got no follow-up at all.
1 · Clio Legal Trends 2024 secret-shopper study, 500 firmsFour in five legal consumers expect a response inside 24 hours, and leads reached inside 5 minutes are ~21× more likely to qualify than at 30 minutes — while the average firm's phone response runs 8+ hours. The race is won at "hello."
2 · Published legal-consumer research; Hennessey Digital studies, 1,300+ firmsArrests, custody blowups, and accident calls keep legal hours, not office hours. Vona's night is identical to its day — same rails, same capture, same escalation.
3 · Industry audits — directionalPer-minute billing runs $0.75–$1.50 and a thorough intake is a long call — small firms pay $500–$700 a month for answering with no compliance rails. Vona is flat — and 2–4 recaptured hours a week is $2,400–$4,800/month of billable capacity back.
4 · Published answering-service pricing; Clio utilization researchMiss seventy calls a month. Let Vona convert two. That's six thousand dollars of signed matters — against a flat cost in the hundreds.
A firm taking 200 calls/month misses ~70 at industry rates. Average matter values per Clio-published data: injury ≈ $3,334 · family ≈ $3,165 · criminal ≈ $1,482 (2018 figures — conservative today). One contingency case a year pays for the service many times over on its own. Full workings on request.
Vona follows the caller mid-call — English to Spanish and back — and every rail above holds in Spanish with the same warmth: the police-question script, the minimal-intake hold, the no-relationship close. Rails that exist in only one language aren't rails.
Four in five legal professionals already use AI in their practice — up from one in five the year before (Clio, 2024). The question is whether your phone does. The same receptionist already answers for working businesses — each vertical gets its own vocabulary, rails, and rig; the legal rig is live on the demo line above.
No — by design. Vona's legal intake is designed around ABA Formal Opinion 506's boundaries for nonlawyer intake staff, and built with Formal Opinion 512 — the ABA's July 2024 generative-AI ethics guidance on supervision, confidentiality, and disclosure — in view. It gathers matter information, collects conflict-check data, screens practice-area fit, and states your standard fee facts. It never evaluates whether a caller has a case, applies law to facts, explains or negotiates fees, or implies the firm has taken a case. Vona is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice.
Clio's 2024 secret-shopper study of 500 firms: only 40% answered a prospective client's call, 48% were unreachable entirely, and just 20% of missed calls were ever returned — while 79% of legal consumers hire the first firm that responds. Vona answers every call by construction.
Every intake: caller name, callback number, email, the opposing party's name for the conflict check, prior or current counsel, and how they found you — plus the practice-area sheet: accident date and treatment status for injury; children and safety concerns for family; custody status, charges, and agency for criminal defense; matter and parties for estate and business. The structured summary is texted and emailed the moment the call ends.
In-custody calls and family-safety concerns take an immediate path: the intake is flagged urgent, the attorney is notified right away, and a same-night callback is promised. Every other matter books the consultation.
Legal answering services bill $0.75–$1.50 a minute, and thorough intake is a long call — the pricing punishes exactly what good intake requires. Vona is flat: a careful twenty-minute intake costs the same as a wrong number.
Yes — (305) 363-7579 is answered live by Carmen for a fictional Miami firm, Whitmarsh & Rourke, P.A. Calls may be recorded; the firm and every matter are fictional by construction. And when you ask if she's an AI, she says yes — every time.
The demo line is live because it was built to survive an attorney trying to make it practice law — the merit trap, the police question, the fee probe, the 2 AM arrest, in English and Spanish. Call it, set your traps, then ask for the walkthrough.
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