Legal & tax firms
Client intake screening and appointment booking.
Initial inquiries get screened, common questions answered, and consultation slots booked automatically, so lawyers and tax advisors can focus on casework.
- Client intake screening
- Appointment booking
- FAQ handling
- Price
- From €75 a month for 250 phone minutes, €0 setup, €0.18 per additional minute. Chat from €40 for 100 conversations.
- Starting credit
- 30 voice minutes and 30 chat conversations of starting credit, valid for 14 days, no credit card required.
- Data protection
- Hosted at IONOS in Frankfurt and Karlsruhe, GDPR-compliant, the data processing agreement becomes part of the contract at sign-up.
- Integrations
- Outlook, Google Calendar, Cal.com, Calendly, HubSpot, Zapier, Webhooks
- Who it is for
- Law firms and tax advisers, from sole practitioners to partnerships with several offices.
Why clients call the firm
- 01
A new matter
A dismissal letter, a tax assessment in the post, a reminder from the tax office. First-time callers do not need legal advice, they need an appointment, a sense of whether the firm handles the topic at all, and a list of documents to bring.
- 02
Where does my case stand?
Has the tax return gone out, is there a reply from the other side, when will the ruling arrive. Status questions from existing clients that deserve an answer even while the case handler is in a meeting.
- 03
Documents and deadlines
Which receipts are still missing, by when, is a photo enough. The same questions over and over, and they paralyse the phone line in the weeks before filing deadlines. The agent knows the checklist of the firm and tells every client the same thing, however often it is asked.
- 04
Moving or confirming an appointment
The meeting no longer fits, the video call needs a new link, the client is stuck in traffic. Small changes with a big effect on a partner calendar. Every change the agent handles itself saves the office two callbacks.
- 05
Invoices and fees
How is the bill made up, is payment in instalments possible, has the payment been booked. Questions for the office, not for the lawyer. The agent explains the invoice items as instructed and forwards payment questions to accounting.
Common challenges
Time-consuming initial screening
Not every inquiry fits the firm’s casework profile, but that often only becomes clear after a lengthy phone conversation. Lawyers or front-desk staff spend valuable time on initial calls that never turn into an engagement.
Repetitive routine questions
Questions about deadlines, required documents, or how an engagement works get answered the same way over and over, often by lawyers themselves rather than front-desk staff. That ties up time meant for substantive casework.
Scheduling ties up resources
Manually coordinating consultation slots across several lawyers and changing availability costs both front-desk staff and lawyers time. That time is then missing from the actual casework.
How EchoCall helps
Automated client screening
Initial inquiries get captured in a structured way and pre-qualified against criteria you define, before a lawyer ever needs to get involved. That way, only inquiries that actually fit the firm’s casework profile land on someone’s desk.
Direct appointment booking
Consultation slots land automatically in the responsible lawyer’s or tax advisor’s connected calendar. Clients pick their preferred time right in the conversation, with no callback from front-desk staff needed.
Confidential processing
EchoCall runs at IONOS in data centres in Frankfurt and Karlsruhe, and a data processing agreement under Art. 28 GDPR is ready to sign. For especially sensitive matters, a Zero-PII mode is available that works without storing personal data long-term.
What a first contact with a firm sounds like
An example from a tax practice with online appointment booking. The agent checks whether the enquiry fits the services of the firm, collects the key details and books the initial consultation without giving advice itself.
Hello, I have just gone self-employed and I am looking for someone to take over my bookkeeping and tax returns.
Happy to help, that is what we do. So I can match you with the right advisor: what is your legal form, and roughly how many receipts come in per month?
Sole trader, IT consulting, maybe 30 to 40 receipts a month.
Thank you. That fits our package for founders. The first step is a 30-minute introductory meeting, in the office or by video. Ms Berger has time on Tuesday at 10 am and on Wednesday at 3:30 pm.
Wednesday at 3:30 by video, please.
Booked. You will receive a confirmation with the video link and a short list: your business registration, the tax office questionnaire if you have already filled it in, and recent bank statements. One more question: is there a deadline coming up in the next few weeks?
I think the VAT advance return is due soon.
I will flag that for Ms Berger so she clears it first in the meeting. See you on Wednesday.
Numbers from everyday practice
59.1 %
of vacancies at sole-practitioner tax firms in Germany stayed unfilled over the past two years, up from 35.9 percent in 2018.
Source: STAX 2024, special analysis by the German Federal Chamber of Tax Advisers
30.7 %
of sole-practitioner tax firms see better availability for their clients as a key opportunity of digitalisation.
Source: STAX 2024, special analysis by the German Federal Chamber of Tax Advisers
49.5 %
of lawyers in smaller firms spend less than half of their working time on billable work.
63.3 %
of smaller law firms already use AI tools, while 38.9 percent name data protection as the biggest hurdle.
What the agent handles at the firm, and what it does not
The agent takes on
- Take first enquiries, classify the area of law or advisory need and forward them with the key details to the right person
- Book, move and confirm initial consultations and meetings in the firm calendar
- Tell clients which documents are missing and by when they are needed, following the firm guidelines
- Answer calls after closing time and during filing season instead of letting them hit voicemail
Stays with your team
- Legal and tax advice on an individual case stays with the lawyers and tax advisers. The agent does not advise
- The agent does not calculate or confirm deadlines. It marks them urgent and arranges the callback
- Contents of active files are shared only where the firm has explicitly cleared them for that client
Frequently asked questions
EchoCall operates GDPR-compliant, EU-hosted, with an optional Zero-PII mode.
EchoCall can sync bookings with your calendar system. Deadline management stays with your practice management software.
Yes, the setup suits both law firms and tax advisory practices.
Starting credit of 30 voice minutes and 30 chat conversations, valid for 14 days, no credit card required, at hub.echocall.de.
Read on
- AI telephony for tax practices
- Data security and GDPR for AI agents
- AI voice agent: features and pricing
- AI answering machine for calls during client meetings
- Also for insurance and financial advice
Last reviewed on . The figures come from the linked sources. EchoCall prices and features reflect that date.
Ready for EchoCall in Legal & Tax?
Start with 30 voice minutes and 30 chat conversations of starting credit at hub.echocall.de, valid for 14 days, no credit card required.