What Does A Legal Concierge Do?
At its most basic level, a legal concierge is exactly what it sounds like: A concierge service specifically tailored to the needs of legal teams. Confusion about these services is understandable. Like many business services, virtual concierges are increasingly common in a variety of industries but are still relatively new to the legal sector . While traditional legal services focus on guiding clients through challenges as they arise, legal concierge services take a more proactive approach. By managing and minimizing tasks such as case research, trial preparation and organization, and client relations, a legal concierge streamlines your operations so you can focus on what you do best: providing top-quality legal services.
Advantages Of Hiring A Legal Concierge
One of the primary advantages to using a concierge service is that there is no cost to you, the client. We are able to charge an hourly retainer fee or service a third party like a litigation finance company, which gives us access to special legal costs rates.
Flexibility: Legal Concierge services are highly flexible as you are not tied to a legal process and can change directions at any time. Because you only pay for your time, you do not incur "sunk costs" whenever you need to pivot away from a specific test strategy.
Efficiency: Your concierge will continuously liaise with and empower your in-house counsel by providing advice and assistance. This allows for greater efficiency, with less time wasted on figuring out your next steps.
What Services Can A Legal Concierge Provide?
A legal concierge can provide a wide array of services across many practice areas. After a comprehensive conversation with a client about their needs, they will offer their best solutions and recommendations. In some ways, an effective lawyer concierge is your problem-solver-coach-advisor-advocate-all-in-one. Though every engagement is tailored specifically to the individual client, the most common services include document preparation, legal research, supervision of paralegal/research assistants, editing, proofreading, fact-checking, client meetings, discovery, and transcription.
While these may not sound like out-of-the-ordinary tasks and services, a lawyer concierge often has the expertise to do them faster and more efficiently. It also saves time for you to focus on high value work. This makes hiring a legal concierge more efficient on many levels.
Tips For Selecting A Legal Concierge
When it comes to hiring a legal concierge, there are several criteria to take into account. For starters, a legal concierge should always have experience in the specific area of law that you need assistance with. Whether you are searching for legal document support or support with litigation files, a legal concierge should have a strong history of providing clients with such services. Consequently, it is necessary to head to each provider’s website and view their success stories and case studies – this will highlight their team’s areas of expertise.
Secondly, client reviews are an essential part of the research process. When you are searching for a legal concierge, don’t just look at their reviews on their official website, but also take an in-depth approach to research their previous clients. By looking at popular review sites, such as Yell, Yelp, Trustpilot, Google My Business and more, you can assess how they stack up against other leading legal support providers.
Finally, it is essential to compare costs when you are searching for a legal concierge service. You don’t want to end up with a company that is going to charge you a ridiculously low fee if this is not in line with your expectations. That said, you should never directly link high cost with quality.
How Has Technology Affected Legal Concierge Services?
The digital age is not just for the entrepreneurs and law firms using concierge services; it has also managed to seep into the inner workings of the concierge services themselves. Virtual meetings over Skype, Dropbox cloud sharing of documents and online scheduling programs are all examples of how technology has helped the legal concierge to carry out their important tasks more efficiently than ever.
Take for example the use of Dropbox. This file storage service allows not only the concierge but also you as the attorney to upload important documents that will be required during your case. The ability to access case files from a cloud system means you won’t have to wait until the box of evidence from the trial last year shows up before you can get to work on your current case. It’s all right there on your computer (or even your phone) without an extra trip to the office or a midnight visit to retrieve the box. That kind of efficiency can make all the difference to the outcome of a case.
Additionally , virtual meetings via Skype and webinars eliminate long drives and schedules that no longer match up. Technology allows for real-time meetings from anywhere on the planet. This has made it possible for many legal concierges to cover more ground than ever before without missing a beat in their day.
Case Examples: How Legal Concierges Solve Complex Problems
Case Study 1: Ian Gambrell- Walnut Creek, CA
For Ian Gambrell, a Walnut Creek financial analyst, "Legal Concierge" is synonymous with "insurance coverage." He found this out the hard way when his business suffered a loss of $300,000 due to a construction defect during the remodel of a condo he purchased for personal use. The insurance company denied coverage for the discovery of the defect and Ian engaged a law firm to help him recover the damages. After the first engagement ended in a settlement below what Ian thought he owed, he again engaged the same law firm but with only limited success. After the law firm was no longer available to help him resolve the matter, Ian engaged a panel lawyers through Advocate to help finally recover the funds he was owed. The panel lawyers were able to resolve Ian’s claim for the full extent of his damages in about six months.
Case Study 2: Michael Ninn- San Jose, CA
Michael Ninn, a resident of San Jose who owns a business in Santa Clara, began to receive harassing debt collection phone and fax calls on behalf of a university. This continued long after he paid his balances in full and instead of dealing with them himself, Michael decided to turn to legal counsel for assistance. After some time, the debt collection agency demanded reimbursement for attorney’s fees, which Ninn then sought to recover through counsel. After months of no results, he decided to contact Advocate and was connected to an attorney from a firm that specializes B2B matters. Advocate found a lawyer and Michael was able to resolve the matter to his satisfaction in a couple of months.
Emerging Trends in Legal Concierge Services
Emerging trends in legal concierge services indicate that both the demand for and types of services offered are likely to evolve. With the growing sophistication of clients, especially in large organizations with expansive legal and business needs, the predictable demand for concierge services is expected to expand. Given that many organizations handle their judicial, public agency, and legislative matters in-house, it is plausible that concierge services, which in theory could be offered to any type of matter involving any type of business, will see a similar increase in demand.
While concierge services have not yet universalized to the levels of other major law firm product offerings, there is broad belief that with time and a keen ability to address client need, concierge services will become commonplace in law firms. To this end , concierge services as an offering by a law firm have been described as the practice’s "next frontier." In offering concierge services, many law firms are drawing inspiration from their in-house counterparts, who for years have structured internal teams to aggregate their business knowledge with external relationships and guide their business priorities. However, while some law firms, such as Greenberg Traurig, have set themselves apart with dedicated legal concierge services, others have relegated concierge services to an alternative service of other direct services. We anticipate that with the growth of concierge services and the demand for them, competition among firms that currently offer concierge services or are planning to introduce them will intensify.
