With the competitive job markets, having a criminal record can easily reduce your chances of enjoying lucrative job opportunities. A criminal conviction on your record can also deprive you of other important prospects, including obtaining student loans and even renting apartments within certain neighborhoods. This is why the phones of expungement lawyers are always ringing with people trying to vacate or expunge their criminal records.

Most states’ laws allow certain offenses to be erased or hidden from sight within 2 to 10 years after a conviction. While some clients understand their rights and the eligibility criteria in place, others have thousands of questions to ask before committing to a service. If your expungement practice is losing business because it receives more calls than it can handle in-house, you can get reliable solutions by enlisting an answering service.

Compelling Reasons to Enlist an Answering Service for Your Expungement Practice

Attorneys who specialize in expungement practice are busy all year round. With so many client cases to handle each day, it is nearly impossible for you to answer all client calls and provide top-quality customer care. Answering services have skilled agents who can take the phone-answering task off your hands. Some of the services to expect from leading agents include:

  • Phone answering services 24/7/365
  • Overflow & after-hour answering
  • Outbound call-backs
  • Appointment scheduling
  • Bilingual answering
  • Spam blocking
  • Lead capture etc.

Let’s take an in-depth look into the key reasons to invest in professional legal answering services for your expungement practice:

Expand Your Availability‍

Legal issues can take a toll on just about every aspect of the life of an individual. Typically, clients want urgent help and legal assistance whenever they try contacting an expungement lawyer. While you can’t be available all day, every day, the least you can do is ensure prospective clients talk to a real person when they call your firm.

Answering agents are available to talk to your clients even when you are busy, or your firm is closed after business hours or during the holiday and weekends. The professionals are trained to provide basic legal advice and even help clients book appointments or leave messages.

Grow Your Expungement Practice Through Increased Lead Captured

Missed calls are equivalent to missed job opportunities. Every new client that calls your expungement firm offers you a chance to grow your practice and increase its profitability. Because answering services are available all day, every day, they ensure you don’t miss out on potential leads because you are too busy to answer the phone.

Improve Your Client Satisfaction Rate

A poor customer satisfaction rate can hurt the reputation of your practice. Missed calls and even calls you pick up in a hurry because you are busy can hurt the customer experience you offer. Answering services have virtual receptionists with all-rounded training in hospitality and customer service. These experts know the best practices to represent your firm well and deliver an exceptional customer experience.

Save Money

Hiring an in-house receptionist is not a cheap affair. Then again, one receptionist may not be enough to answer all your calls 24/7/365. A legal answering service will only cost a fraction of the price of hiring a receptionist, and your expungement firm will benefit from a whole array of services. Usually, the level of service you need will dictate how much you will save yearly.

Remain Up-To-Date With New Leads and Existing Clients

Answering service companies offer much more than just phone answering assistance. You can also get help managing your live chats, text messages, and social media platforms. Again, a team of trained and skilled agents will provide detailed summaries of client engagements. This will make it easy-peasy for you to remain well-informed about your new leads and even keep in touch with existing clients.

How to Make the Most Out Of an Answering Service for Expungement Practice

An answering service can help you dodge the negative repercussions of providing substandard customer service. A reliable company will see that communications between your clients and your expungement practice firm are as smooth as possible 24/7/365. Once you have found the right partner, the next step is to ensure you make the most out of a service’s features.

Here is how your expungement practice firm can take full advantage of an answering service:

Intensify Your Marketing Campaigns

Even expungement practices must invest in some level of marketing to keep their yearly growth rate reasonable. If you have little to show for past campaigns because your in-house receptionist could not capture all the new leads, all is not lost. The best time to increase your marketing spend is right after you have enlisted an answering service.

In this case, the professional answering team will be in your corner to provide after-hour services and even handle call overflows. This will allow you to profit from all calls created by your marketing efforts.

It’s best to understand that clients are today more demanding than ever, and they will not hesitate to contact your competition the instant they are directed to your voicemail. They all want to speak to someone even if they call after hours or during the holidays. Take advantage of your answering service and let the professional virtual receptionists help you capitalize on new lead opportunities.

Don’t Forget To Utilize the Bilingual Phone Answering Team

Expungement law firms receive clients from all walks of life. While most of them can communicate in English effectively, others will prefer to communicate in Spanish, French, or other languages.

Well-established answering service companies offer bilingual receptionist services. This will open your practice to a substantial amount of new clients. When clients speak to a receptionist who is fluent in their language of choice, they tend to feel more at home and are likely to sign up for legal services.

Avoid Scheduling Disasters with Calendar Management Services

Attorneys often experience calendar management disasters, and those in the expungement practice are not an exception. When you have to pick calls, meet new and existing clients for consultation and still show up in court ready to represent your clients, it’s easy to find certain details of your schedule slipping through the cracks.

Answering services can offer the best calendar management solutions. With the right help, problems that arise from forgotten appointments and double bookings can be a thing of the past. The answering agents can lend a hand with organizing your schedule, and you can always access your calendar to make changes when necessary.

Calendar management services are often offered as part of the standard package. The extra assistance will not cost you a dime, yet it could save time and money. Legal answering services have a range of calendaring software, and you merely need to find one that works best for your law firm.

The virtual receptionist will access your calendar and book client meetings and appointments on your behalf. Even prospective clients can schedule for consultation when they make that first call. Generally, calendar management will also ensure you have a full to-do list each day for maximum productivity.

Take Advantage of Intelligent Call Transfer

Legal answering services for expungement practice can also enhance call screening and transfer efficiency. The professionals can direct certain calls to specific legal staff within your firm. If an urgent call comes through and a client does not wish to leave a message or schedule an appointment, you can ensure that this doesn’t turn into a missed opportunity by having the call directed to an available legal representative within your firm.

Keep Your Law Firm Operational Even As You Nap

Even lawyers need a break from the ordinary occasionally. If you need time to refresh and take a vacation, rest for a few days or just switch from your typical routines, an answering service can provide just the assistance you need. Again, the experts will ensure your existing clients and prospective clients are happy during your absence. They will not even notice that you’re unavailable.

How Much Will An Answering Service For Expungement Practice Help You Save?

The cost of hiring an in-house receptionist can be tough on the wallet. This is more so the case if you are a startup. On average, an in-house receptionist for an expungement practice takes home $37,000 yearly. Some of the benefits that are not included in this figure may include:

  • Comprehensive medical insurance, roughly $11,000 annually
  • Pension and retirement plans, about 2,000 annually
  • Transport allowance, approximately $5,000 annually
  • Paid leave, holidays, about $5,500 annually
  • Company team building & retreats, roughly $4,000 annually
  • Bonuses, about $2,000 annually

The above merely mentions the most common benefits that an employee would expect. This added to the salary per year could easily leave a big hole in your law firm’s yearly profits.

A virtual receptionist works under the answering service company you hire. This means you merely have to pay for the services you receive, and the company in question will take care of the rest. You don’t even have to worry about the costs incurred when a staff member leaves, time off, or even pension plans of the virtual receptionists on your team.

Telltale Signs That You Should Switch To a Different Expungement Practice Answering Service

If your office phone is always ringing and the calls are too much for your in-house receptionist to handle, this is a sign that your legal services are in high demand. Enlisting legal answering services can help ensure you don’t miss a single client call and keep both new and existing customers happy.

The right legal answering professionals will help your expungement practice pick up the slack and reach out to your firm’s clients when they need you the most. It is reasonable for you to expect the experts to transfer urgent calls to particular lawyers within your firm and even lend a hand with appointment booking and calendar management.

So, how can you tell that you are not using the right answering service? Here are a few red flags to look out for:

New Leads Don’t Yield New Clients

One of the prime benefits of enlisting an answering service is for your firm to take full advantage of all new leads. If the call logs look impressive, yet you are not getting any new business, you have reason to raise an eyebrow. It could be that your current answering agents are not as good as they claim to be when it comes to handling new leads.

Clients seeking legal assistance can be picky. Those seeking assistance with the expungement of criminal records in specific cannot afford to take chances when choosing the lawyer to represent them. Even a small blunder in how calls are handled can send them running for the hills.

To be on the safe side, choose a legal phone answering company with adequate industry experience. Also, make sure that your experts of choice have a thoroughly trained team to handle your calls.

Messages Captured Don’t Make Sense

Trained virtual receptionists can take messages without any trouble. While the recorded messages will be brief, they will also be detailed and easy to understand. You should not feel guilty about switching to a different service if you often get messages with inaccurate, inadequate, or hard to understand information.

Your Callers Can Tell Your Expungement Firm Is Using an Answering Service

A legal answering service should be like an extension of your expungement practice. Callers should feel as though an in-house receptionist picked their calls. If this is not happening, something is certainly not adding up.

Think of it this way, answering agents should accurately represent your firm. This means they should not only be highly professional and courteous on the phone but should also be knowledgeable about what you do. In case callers can tell that they just hit an answering service, it could be that they are not getting the best customer experience.

Your Work Calendar Is a Mess

One of the basic services to expect from attorney answering service experts is the management of your work calendar. There is cause for alarm if time-sensitive matters are not being addressed in real-time and some of your clients feel neglected and forgotten. The whole idea of investing in the service is to provide better customer service and enhance your reputation.

Trained virtual receptionists can identify time-sensitive calls and transfer them. In case you are not available, they will ensure that the calls in question are prioritized on your work calendar. This will go a long way in ensuring your esteemed clients have a positive experience working with your firm.

Working With an Expungement Practice Answering Service

It’s nearly impossible to answer all calls from your clients, irrespective of the time of day and night. Even a regular in-house receptionist can only provide as much assistance during regular business hours. Fortunately, investing in an answering service can ensure that all your clients talk to a real person and get the much-needed assistance when it matters the most.

Skilled experts can provide basic legal guidance, take messages, book consultation appointments for new clients, schedule meetings for existing clients and even help you organize your work calendar. Your investment will enhance customer satisfaction and expand your availability and help you spruce up your expungement practice’s reputation.