Intake schema by practice area: the fields PI, family, criminal defense, and M&A actually need

A prospective client calls. They were rear-ended in a Walmart parking lot two days ago, they have minor neck pain, the other driver had insurance, and they want to know if they have a case.

The same caller, intaked by a personal-injury schema, captures 11 specific fields. The same caller, intaked by a generic legal-intake schema, captures 5 fields and misses 6. Three of the 6 missed fields are decisive on whether the case goes forward.

This post is the practical schema-by-practice-area reference for AI voice intake. The universal fields every legal-intake call should capture, the practice-area-specific layer that decides whether the matter is worth the consultation slot, and the five common mistakes that turn a strong AI agent into a generic answering service.

The universal layer

Every legal-intake call, regardless of practice area, should capture these six fields:

1. Caller name. Full legal name, with a re-confirmation pass for spelling.
2. Contact information. Phone number (re-confirmed), email address (spelled back), preferred contact method.
3. Jurisdiction. Where the matter occurred or the caller resides (state, county, sometimes city). Statute-of-limitations and forum analysis depends on this.
4. Opposing party. Names of any other parties involved. This is the trigger for conflict checks.
5. How they found the firm. Referral source, marketing channel, search query. Drives marketing attribution.
6. Urgency posture. Are they actively shopping for counsel right now, or exploring options?

The universal layer takes roughly 90 seconds. Anything less is not gathering enough to qualify the matter. Anything more should be practice-area-specific.

Personal-injury schema (auto, premises, product liability)

The PI schema layered on top of the universal six:

1. Date of incident. Statute-of-limitations clock starts here. Most states are 2 to 3 years; some are 1.
2. Type of incident. Auto accident, slip-and-fall, defective product, medical, dog bite, other.
3. Location of incident. Specific enough to determine venue and applicable law.
4. Whether injuries were sustained. Yes/no first, then specifics (visible injuries, ongoing symptoms, hospitalization).
5. Whether emergency or follow-up medical treatment was received. Documents the injury chain. ER visits within 24 hours of the incident are stronger evidence than treatment that begins weeks later.
6. Whether the caller is currently receiving treatment. Ongoing medical equals ongoing damages.
7. Whether the other party has insurance. Critical for case viability. No-insurance cases have dramatically different economics.
8. Whether the caller has been contacted by an insurance adjuster. Statements made to adjusters are evidence. The firm wants to know what was said.
9. Whether the caller has signed any documents. Releases, settlements, or medical authorizations from the other side's adjuster.
10. Whether the caller has spoken with another attorney. Affects engagement readiness.
11. Whether there are witnesses or evidence preserved. Photos, dashcam, surveillance, witness contact info.

11 fields. About 4 minutes of structured intake. The schema reflects how PI firms actually evaluate case viability, not a generic intake form.

Family-law schema (divorce, custody, support)

The family-law schema:

1. Marital status and date of marriage (if relevant). State-specific tolling and equitable-distribution analysis depends on this.
2. Spouse's full legal name. Conflict-check trigger; also captures any prior representation of the spouse.
3. Children's names and ages. Custody and support analysis.
4. Whether parties are currently living together. Affects emergency-relief options and venue.
5. Whether there are any active protective orders or domestic-violence concerns. Triggers emergency processing and changes how the firm captures information.
6. Whether the caller has filed any documents already. Self-filed petitions are common and shape the matter.
7. Whether the caller has consulted with another attorney about this matter. Affects engagement readiness and disclosure obligations.
8. Existence of significant assets or businesses. Relevant for property-division complexity.
9. Whether the caller has key documents. Marriage certificate, prenup, prior court orders, financial records.
10. The caller's specific ask. "I want to file for divorce" vs "I want to know my options" vs "I need a protective order tonight" require very different responses.

10 fields. The protective-order question (#5) deserves its own escalation path: any caller in active danger should be routed immediately, not run through the rest of the intake.

Criminal-defense schema

The criminal-defense schema is the shortest and the most time-sensitive:

1. Has the caller been charged or arrested? Different posture if charges have been filed vs. if the caller is "expecting" charges.
2. The specific charge or alleged offense. Felony vs misdemeanor changes urgency and fee structure entirely.
3. The court and case number (if charged). Drives venue and scheduling.
4. The next court date. If imminent, the call becomes an emergency.
5. Whether the caller is currently in custody. Triggers immediate-attention path.
6. Whether the caller has spoken with police or made any statements. Critical for defense strategy.
7. Whether the caller has retained any other counsel. Conflict and engagement readiness.
8. Co-defendants. Conflict-check critical here; co-defendant conflicts are the most common high-severity conflict miss in criminal defense.

8 fields. The custody question (#5) and next-court-date (#4) trigger the only legitimate "interrupt the schema and escalate" branches in criminal defense intake.

M&A and complex commercial schema

The M&A and complex-commercial schema is the longest because the conflict-check stakes are the highest:

1. The caller's company name and capacity. Buyer, seller, target, advisor, board member.
2. The opposing party or counterparty company. Including all known related entities, parents, subsidiaries, affiliates.
3. The transaction or matter type. Acquisition, merger, financing, dispute, regulatory.
4. The transaction value or matter size. Sets fee expectation and routing.
5. The transaction stage. LOI signed, due diligence, definitive agreements, post-closing dispute.
6. Other professional advisors involved. Bankers, accountants, other counsel.
7. The specific legal issue. "We need M&A counsel" is too generic; "we need counsel for the regulatory-approval workstream" is actionable.
8. Material confidentiality concerns. NDA in place, public-company considerations, deal-leak risk.
9. Caller's authority. Decision-maker or recommending counsel for board approval?
10. Timeline. Closing date or deadline.
11. Industry sector. Sector-specific regulatory concerns shape staffing.
12. Existing counsel relationships. Prior counsel for the company, any preferred firms.

12 fields. The conflict check on this schema must run against the firm's complete corporate-relationship database, not just exact-string matches.

Estate-planning schema

Estate planning is the shortest and lowest-conflict schema:

1. Marital status.
2. Children, ages, and any special-needs considerations.
3. Existence of current estate documents (will, trust, healthcare directive, POA). Updating vs creating is the matter type.
4. Major asset categories. Real estate, retirement accounts, business interests, life insurance.
5. Whether the caller has specific concerns (estate-tax planning, succession, blended-family issues).
6. Domicile state. Estate-planning law is state-specific.
7. Out-of-state property. Triggers ancillary-probate considerations.
8. Caller's age and health posture. Sometimes drives urgency.

8 fields. Conflict checks here are usually low-volume because estate planning rarely generates adverse-party conflicts.

How to design the schema for your firm

A firm with multiple practice areas should not run a single intake schema. The first 90 seconds of every call (the universal layer) is shared. The remaining 2 to 4 minutes branches by practice area.

The branching trigger is usually the caller's answer to "What kind of legal matter is this?" Three patterns work:

• Explicit branching. The agent asks early, branches to the right schema based on the caller's answer.
• Inferred branching. The agent listens to the caller's free-text description, classifies the matter type, and routes accordingly.
• Hybrid. Agent asks for an initial classification, then uses inferred logic to refine.

Hybrid is usually best. Explicit-only feels mechanical. Inferred-only is brittle on edge cases.

The implementation question: does your AI voice vendor support multiple intake schemas with branching logic? Many vendors only support one schema per agent, which means a multi-practice firm has to either deploy multiple agents (expensive) or accept a generic schema (lossy).

Five common mistakes

The five practice-area schema mistakes that surface most often:

1. Capturing too few fields. A 5-field schema is a generic answering service. The data is not useful for case evaluation.
2. Capturing too many fields. A 25-field schema turns intake into interrogation. Callers abandon.
3. Not branching by practice area. A single generic schema treats divorce intake the same as DUI intake. Both call patterns suffer.
4. Asking the right question in the wrong order. "Whose insurance company has contacted you?" is a powerful PI question, but only after the caller has explained the incident. Asking first feels invasive.
5. Not running a conflict check before factual disclosure. Covered in detail in conflict checks at the intake stage. The schema design must include the conflict-check trigger explicitly.

For the regulatory framework that interacts with each schema, see ABA Model Rule 1.18 and AI voice intake. For malpractice considerations on schema completeness, see malpractice exposure on missed conflicts. For the privilege architecture, see attorney-client privilege when AI takes the first call. To see how a multi-practice schema with branching runs in a working demo, book a call.