The AI that answers when you can't
A third of calls to UK law firms go unanswered — and after hours, nearly all of them. Most callers won't leave a voicemail; they ring the next firm on the list. DutyClerk's receptionist, Emma, answers every call, takes a proper attendance note, and books the first consultation before they do.
She always tells callers she's an AI, and the recording notice is built in.
Harrington & Vale is a fictional firm. Your version of Emma is trained on your practice areas, your diary, your greeting.
The evidence
Not our claims — the industry's own numbers, cited so you can check them.
of calls to UK law firms go unanswered during business hours — the second-worst rate of any sector.
Legal Navigator study, 2026of firms admit they have lost business to calls nobody picked up.
Moneypenny legal sector researchof firms use any kind of virtual reception at all. The gap between the problem and the fix is the opportunity — yours or your competitors'.
Legal intake industry survey, 2026The arithmetic
Three numbers you already know. Move the sliders.
£199 a month plus £499 set-up, no per-minute surprises. If Emma doesn't recover two matters a year, cancel — it's monthly.
The mechanics
No new numbers, no porting, no software for your staff to learn.
After half five, calls at most firms go to voicemail. The clerk's shift never ends.
Ring three times as normal. If reception is busy, closed, or it's 6:40 on a Friday, the call goes to Emma instead of voicemail.
Your greeting, your practice areas. She screens for conflicts-sensitive detail, never gives advice, flags anything urgent, and books consultations straight into your diary.
Every call becomes an attendance note — caller, number, matter, action — with the recording attached. A summary of the night's calls waits for you each morning.
While you slept
Three calls after half five — answered, booked, filed. The summary is in your inbox before the kettle's boiled.
For a regulated profession
These aren't options we can switch on. They're the defaults, in writing.
Every call opens with a plain disclosure. No caller is ever left believing they spoke to a member of staff.
The PECR notification is in the greeting itself — callers are informed before a word of the matter is spoken.
Emma is hard-limited: she cannot opine on merits, quote beyond your published terms, or improvise about your firm. Anything outside her remit becomes a message for a human.
Recordings and transcripts are kept to an agreed schedule — then deleted. A written data-processing agreement comes as standard.
Fair questions
She never guesses. Anything outside her brief — legal questions, fee negotiations, complaints — becomes a message for a named human with the caller's details and a promised callback. On urgent matters she can transfer live to a number you choose.
She's built for a regulated audience: she tells every caller she's an AI, gives the recording notice before the matter is discussed, is hard-blocked from giving legal advice or quoting beyond your published terms, and works to a written retention schedule with a data-processing agreement as standard. Your compliance partner gets the paperwork, not promises.
Recordings and transcripts are held with our infrastructure providers under UK GDPR, kept only for the agreed retention period, then deleted. Nothing is used to train anyone's models. The attendance note lands in your inbox; the data schedule is in the agreement.
Your firm's greeting, in a natural British voice, with your practice areas and your diary. Try it now — the demo above answers exactly as a client would be answered, and we build your firm's version before you pay anything.
Keep them — Emma takes what they can't: the second simultaneous call, lunchtime, evenings, weekends, sick days. Most firms run her as overflow and after-hours only, which is exactly where the missed calls live.
Live within the week. We build and test her on your practice areas, greeting and diary — you forward your number on no-answer and change nothing else.
Pricing
Answering services bill by the minute — £1.75 a minute and up. That's a meter running on every anxious client. We don't do that.