A personal injury law practice is one of the busiest businesses, with clients being injured at any time of the day and requiring legal services. Accidents do not have a schedule on when they occur, and when they do, the victim seeks legal representation to facilitate their compensation. As such, calls from current or prospective clients come to your office any time of the day requiring your assistance.
Answering these many calls can be overwhelming to your receptionist, let alone the constant disruption while doing your work. Additionally, many calls can go unanswered. The client feels they are not given the attention they deserve as your receptionist looks at ending the call to attend to another client. This, among many other reasons, will require you to engage an answering service that will manage your calls and messages effectively.
What does an Answering Service do?
An answering service is a professional business designed to offer busy offices assistance in handling their calls, messages, and appointments. As earlier stated, calls in a personal injury law firm come at any time of the day, even during holidays. This service means you have a receptionist not directly employed by you but whose job is to answer calls, pass on messages, and screen your calls leaving you to concentrate on other areas of your practice.
The virtual receptionists receive calls directed to your office and talk to the caller who thinks they are a section of your firm. This service means no call goes unanswered than when you have a receptionist who also has to handle clients to the firm and miss on calls. This service is distinct from an answering machine.
For instance, past business hours, a client can call after being involved in an accident. If you had an in-house receptionist, it is likely they work only during business hours. When the client calls, they will want to talk with someone regarding their reason for calling, and if they fail to have their calls answered, they will look for another law firm. This has made many firms lose business because they are inaccessible or unavailable. However, an answering service allows clients to reach your office and find help any time of the day and the week.
Compared to an answering machine, the service comprises live interaction between the caller and the recipient. On the other hand, an answering machine will only record the call but will not have a conversation with the caller to understand their reason for calling. Often, when a client calls and finds an answering machine, they refuse to leave a message and move to another law firm willing to take their case.
Before a law firm signs a client, it starts with a phone call. If a call to your personal injury law practice is missed, you will likely lose the client and miss an opportunity to make more money and increase your client base. The answering service ensures this does not happen and is available to answer calls to your office, take messages, and forward them to you at any hour.
Why should you use an Answering Service in your Personal Injury Law Firm?
After understanding what this service is all about, the next question would probably benefit hiring the service. Here, we discuss the various reasons why this service is vital to your personal injury law firm to help you with your decision. These benefits include:
Twenty-four Hour Accessibility
As earlier stated, accidents do not have a timeline on when to occur. A person can become sick during the night and go to a hospital where the attendant is negligent, resulting in injuries. The victim, in this case, will need legal help on how to proceed under the circumstances.
Equally, if a person is involved in an accident, they will require a lawyer to represent them and pursue their damages. Their call can come any day and any time, even as you sleep. Fortunately, this call will not go unanswered because of an answering service, and you will not also miss a business opportunity.
Giving your Clients a Personal Touch
Every caller calling your firm needs a personal touch and interaction to assure them that you value their business and them as individuals. If a client calls and the call is unanswered, or an answering machine receives the call, they often hang up because they feel they cannot find assistance from a detached lawyer. However, when the same client calls and finds a kind , friendly, and professional voice to talk to, they believe the firm cares about their clients and are likely to bring their case to you.
A personal touch is critical in your business because it makes the difference between building your client portfolio or losing them to another attorney.
Increased Productivity
A lot of valuable time is wasted answering calls, where some may not be important. The service allows you and your staff to focus on satisfying your clients while they answer your calls and transfer them based on priority. Calls can also be distracting, taking the staff away from their core task.
When an answering service screen calls, you receive a list of the calls to answer back and messages left. This permits you to allocate time to return the calls and respond to the messages efficiently and within the shortest time possible. For instance, you can decide to return calls first thing after arriving in the office, just before lunch, and just before the close of business. This leaves you with enough time to be more productive and generate income for the rest of the time. However, if you are going to receive every call directed to your office, you will be disrupted all through the day and fail to be as productive as you would have been.
Managing your Calendar
Besides handling and filtering your messages and incoming calls, this service also manages your calendar. For instance, if a person is injured in a traffic accident and requires an attorney, the virtual receptionist can schedule an appointment for them to see you even when they call at midnight. All it requires is an answering service to provide the parameters under which to operate, and they will manage your calendar to prevent chaos in the office.
Additionally, the service will remind you and the client of the scheduled appointment to ensure no one is disappointed.
No more Missed Calls
Your receptionist can miss several calls in the day not out of laziness but because of how busy the law practice is. The reception of a personal injury law firm is often full of potential clients requiring legal services, and between attending to them and answering calls, a receptionist can be overwhelmed. However, the trained professionals at an answering service have no other job but to answer incoming calls. This ensures no call to your office goes unanswered, making clients perceive you as professional.
An Answering Service Makes your Law Firm Appear Big
Most clients believe that big and established personal injury law firms offer the best service. While this may not be true, you do not want to lose them all the same. When the attorney answering service answers a victim's or plaintiff's calls, they imagine the firm to be a big one and busy. This gives them more confidence because they believe you understand personal injury law and can navigate the system to obtain for them the best settlement possible.
Hiring this service gives an illusion of a big and busy law firm, gives potential clients confidence in your service, and recommends others.
An Answering Service Helps you Cut your Running Costs while Offering Excellent Client Interaction.
The hiring of staff can be costly. The time put in, salaries and training are some of the expenses your firm has to deal with. An in-house receptionist also misses work, becomes sick, and requires benefits. All these are headaches you can avoid by hiring this service. You will never have to struggle to look for a temporary receptionist when you miss work or are sick, costly.
Additionally, the fee charged by an answering service is somewhat lower than the wages and other benefits you pay a receptionist. Maximizing your profit while providing efficient service to your clients is critical, hence the benefit of hiring this service.
Further, if you want to have a receptionist answer your calls all days of the week and at any time, it means you will have to hire several of them. This is too costly compared to hiring an answering service that will do all that at a minimal cost.
When Plaintiffs Call, they Receive a Customized Service.
A professional answering service does not receive all the calls in the same manner. You may have many law firms seeking their services, and as such, they must offer unparalleled service to each. Fortunately, you can supply them with a script talking about your services that are custom made for your clients. This again exudes professionalism and draws more people to your firm.
Bilingual Services
Your clients will come from different backgrounds and may speak different languages. Understanding their needs in the language they are most comfortable in is an added advantage. Answering services make a point of hiring professionals that can converse Spanish as well as English. This means you will not lose business because you could not understand the language of your potential client.
Increased Income Generation
When you take away the element of answering calls all the time, it enables your staff to focus on finishing your client's cases. When cases are finished on time, new cases are picked, and as a result, the firm's income is increased.
Additionally, your clients will not feel wanted when you are periodically distracted by calls during your meeting. You will not only waste vital time for your client, but you will disappoint them as they will feel they are less critical and your calls are. This can cause them to take their case elsewhere, causing you to lose income from the case and any potential business they would have referred to your firm.
Potential Clients will No Longer Hang up when they Contact your Law Practice.
Studies indicate that about 70% of callers hang up their phone if they find an answering machine and decline, leaving a message. This can easily translate to mean 70% of those that call your office will hang up, and you lose their business if there is no one to answer their calls. Fortunately, you do not have to lose business this way because no matter the time a call comes to your office, there is a real person to receive the call and assure the caller of your service delivery.
When a person wants to give you business, they do not want to be kept waiting. This is even worse with injured victims because they need their compensation immediately to help them with their bills due to the injury. If a caller fails to have their call answered, they will move to the next law firm in their list, which will mean you lose business.
However, with a call center service, your clients will appreciate that you may be dealing with another client, and when given an appointment to come to see you, they relax. It is unlikely the client will move to another firm or hang up because they have found someone to attend to their needs.
Final Thoughts
Lawyers are often busy with their responsibilities ranging from meeting potential clients to following up on existing ones, reviewing cases, writing briefs, and litigation. This leaves them with very little time to answer phones, and hiring a receptionist can also be expensive. Besides this, there are multiple benefits to obtaining an answering service for your personal injury law firm, as earlier discussed. Establishing a service suitable for your business is also critical to avoid damaging your reputation and increase your client base.
With these benefits, hiring this service for your personal injury law firm could be the best investment you make.
