I’m not trying to undercut myself or the investigations field but it makes sense for our clients (comprised 95% of lawyers) and for us to have accurate backgrounds of their clients, from the outset. Bringing a matter to our attention because the original intake wasn’t thoroughly conducted or, more likely, the information therein was not verified, can result in settlement talk set-backs, client aggravation and in extreme cases, default judgments.
I’ve reviewed client intakes that have ranged from poorly constructed to containing very detailed and comprehensive information. The latter is always preferable. Below we share a few tips on client intakes that we’ve provided for our clients:
Client Name: Obtain all AKAs and other (maiden, name change, Jr./Sr., etc.) name information.
Client DOB: The continued globalization of the client base may result in cultural or usage misunderstandings. E.g. 4/8/1980 may translate to either April 8th, 1980 or August 4th, 1980 as many international communities use the mm/dd/yyyy display. Ensure that your client is very clear on the correct date of birth. Also, probably a one in 100 shot, but given the rise of multiple births now occurring, ask if s/he is part of a twin (or more) set.
Client D/L, I.D. and SSN card: Take a copy of these documents as any one of these uniquely numbered identifiers can easily be misstated or misread. Remove the mysterious elements that can result in unnecessary expenses as the case proceeds.
Client Address: Send a “Keeping In Contact” postcard quarterly. 1, It’ll engender good will with the client. 2. It will remind the client to update you regarding personal contact information changes, if any* and 3. It’s just good policy to ensure that your client is quickly reachable by you so that when it does become necessary, that ease of contact is in place.
Client Phone Numbers: Obtain at least two pone numbers from your client, (home, cell, Skype, work…) and verify these numbers within a week of sign-up.
Client email: Everyone has one today or one can easily be obtained and for free. (E.g., A Gmail address from Google via one’s local library.)
Client emergency contact: Insist on at least two emergency contacts for your client. Advise your client that this information will be verified within ten days of the retainer date. (Use discretion in reaching out to the emergency contacts. The entire neighborhood doesn’t need to know that your client has retained counsel, which obviously translates to potential future monies. You may want to pitch this task to your investigator. We’ve been known to be creative — and, always conducting ourselves within the parameters of the law.)
*Provide your client with several ”Change of Personal Information” letters and pre-addressed and stamped envelopes. Advise them to immediately remit their new information should it change from the initial contact data. Obviously your firm will want to know if your client has moved, changed his/her phone number, gotten married/divorced… Save yourself the hassle of finding out important information until it becomes critical.
Feel welcome to contact our office if you would like us to review your intake forms. I’m not pitching our services, although I guess we all do when we consistently offer information as we do here on a weekly basis, but there is no charge for a quick review. We prefer a law firm be set with the basics before they hire us to work on unforeseen complications or the regular, necessary trial prep and follow-up.
(We thought we’d start the Monday after this holiday weekend with several good laughs with the above video of 4 brief but hilarious commericals to kick off our two-part marketing series.)
Part I of II/ Marketing Don’ts
Anyone who has been in business for a while has probably learned a few marketing don’ts but it doesn’t hurt to repeat them as we all tend to stray from our original advertising goals. This week we’ll go over these basic marketing don’ts with a follow up next week of proven advertising do’s.
10 Marketing Assumptions That Are Wrong For Your Practice
1. Current and prospective clients know what services I provide; (Generally, clients are aware only of the services that they are seeking. Teach them.)
2. Referral services will send me all of the clients that I need or can service; (No comment necessary to point out the fallacy of this presumption.)
3. My marketing materials don’t need my photograph; (Especially in this technological age, people want to place a face to the professional they will contact.)
4. Clients will remember what I tell them, so I don’t need to send any follow up correspondence; (Wrong. Regardless of the sophistication level, people hear what they want to hear.)
5. Clients will understand legal jargon; (Wrong again. Read above.)
6. Certain marketing methods are obsolete. (All advertising avenues work; it’s your budget and message strength that will determine ROI.)
7. Complicated messages will make clients feel that they need my services more; (KISS – no offense intended.)
8. Graphics are unimportant in visual media placements; generic photos can be used. (Keep it real. Real pics of yourself, your staff, discreet photos of your office…)
9. People expect lawyers to not return phone calls promptly; they know attorneys are busy. (No, they don’t and they don’t care about any other matter other than their own.)
10. Keeping in touch with clients on a reasonable basis is a waste of time. (It’ll also be a waste of money when you have to re-locate your own clients or take an extraordinary block of time to bring them up to speed after months or years of non-contact.)
Basically, it’s your firm, your business and as such, you never stop selling yourself.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has set a compliance date later in the year for an additional rule (the Red Flag Rule) to its already existing FACT Act (FACTA), that will broadly affect all business that maintain personal information on individuals – from banking institutions to nanny hiring services. So what does this mean to you, the lawyer or the firm?
Well, that’s the exact focus of this article. We will dissect how the FACTA Red Flag Rule can potentially affect your business by giving you clear cut definitions of the Act, the new rule, what it means to your business and how to achieve and maintain compliance so that you may ensure the growth of your business by protecting it’s most valuable asset – that of its client and employee information.
Q.1: What is the FACTA? FACTA stands for Fair and Accurate Credit Transaction Act. FACTA is the 2003 law designed to reduce risks of consumer fraud and identity theft opportunities that may be created by improper storage and disposal of client information. This includes any storage method that contains personal information, whether it’s on paper, CDs, DVDs, discs, or hard drives. Client information can be any combination of personal data such as names, dates of birth, addresses, driver licenses and Social Security numbers.
Initially meant to protect consumers, FACTA was extended to provide protection for employees. On June 1, 2005, a new portion of the FACTA law went into effect. It states that you, the employer (even if you have only one employee, and it is your mother-in-law’s cousin by marriage, and you only have his or her personal information so that you can pay social security taxes,) can be fined by federal and state government, and even sued in civil court if any of this information is somehow released and used in an identity theft scam.
So, we’ve arrived at you, the employer, are now legally responsible for maintaining the confidentiality of any and all client and employee information that can be used in any identify theft/fraud situation.
Q. 2 What is the FACTA Red Flag Rule? The Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) review of the FACTA law led to the FTC’s decision to specify the type of suspicious activity that business owners should be aware of, that should send up a “red flag”, alerting them to identity theft attempts by potential clients or employees. This led to the FACTA Red Flag rule that went into effect on January 1, 2008.
Basically, the final Red Flag rules and guidelines implemented call out 5 categories of Red Flags which illustrate the types of activities that need to be identified:
- alerts, notifications or warnings from a Consumer Reporting Agency (such as Equifax, Experian or TransUnion)
- suspicious documents (e.g. photocopies of driver’s licenses instead of the originals)
- suspicious personal identifying information (misspelled names, differing birth dates, p.o. boxes… )
- unusual use of, or suspicious activity related to, the covered account (heavy usage or repeated process denial)
- notice from other clients, victims of identity theft, law enforcement authorities, or other persons regarding possible identity theft in connection with covered accounts held by the financial institution or creditor. (This is the ultimate red flag. If you are contacted by anyone claiming to be a victim of identity theft, immediately contact your local law enforcement department and turn the matter over to them.)
Q. 3 Okay, I understand the new FACTA Red Flag rules. What does that mean to mean to my firm? The new FACTA Red Flag Rules mean you need to make sure your client and employee personal identifying information is a) accurate (to the best of your knowledge) and we will broaden that definition in Q. 4 below) and b) secure (answered in Q.5).
Q. 4 How do I ensure that my client and employee information is as accurate as needed for me to be in compliance with FACTA’s Red Flag rules? (This needs to be prefaced with the advisory that we are not lawyers, nor do we play any on T.V. If you have legal questions regarding this subject matter, please contact a knowledgeable attorney in your area.)
But in an effort to be helpful, we offer some common sense tips. To do so, we’re going to break this answer into two parts – ensuring your employee is who they say they are and then ensuring they understand and enforce the compliance procedure.
Employee Verification: You need to designate trusted employees to obtain and maintain your clients’ personal information. Run a background check on all employees and make sure they have proper identification (such as a government issued photo i.d.) and check references. Always check references. Don’t just call phone numbers that are provided to you on the application form. Check that those businesses actually exist – are they listed in a directory?
New Client Registration: Second, have a policy sheet (it can be a one pager) available to your staff regarding the types of identifications that are required and accepted for new clients. If there is any doubt about the i.d. being presented, err in favor of compliance and diplomatically advise the client that your business can only accept i.d. that complies with government regulations as this is, in essence, a financial transaction.
Q. 5 My employee passed her background check with flying colors and all of my clients have verified identification. How do I secure all of this information? Okay, now that your trusted employee is collecting personal information from your clients, have them follow strict procedures for obtaining and securing the information. Several suggestions:
To secure employee information: - Assign access to personal employee data to specific management members.
- Issue unique user names and passwords to these managers.
- Scan all paper documents and store the paper documents in break-in proof containers/file cabinets or offsite.
- Maintain a secure and separate office area (or at least a large and heavy safe) in the case of a break-in.
To secure client information: 1. Have a separate interview area where a potential client can fill out formsor answer questions in private.
2. When your designated staff member is inputting this data into your business’ database, have the monitors positioned so that they are not viewable by anyone aside from your employee. (Preferably, this should be done in a separate Employees Only area.)
3. Deposit all checks and credit/debit/check card receipts into a safe several times a day if necessary.
4. Limit access to the safe.
5. Apply the same access limits as you do for employee information.
6. Be aware of the length of time you must maintain old employee or client files securely. Beyond that point, shred old information files; delete old pc files. The employee or client may be gone from your establishment but they are probably still around somewhere. You don’t need to inadvertently let others have their information even if it is no longer of any use to your business.
Q. 6 When do the FACTA Red Flag Rules go into effect? And when is the compliance date? FACTA Red Flag rules went into effect January 1, 2008 and compliance must be met by November 1, 2008.
On a final note, establishing written personal information storage policies for employee and client data is the first step in secure data management. Should a personal information breach then occur, it would be recognized that considerable aforethought was given to data security. Then follow through with tightening the physical security of your client and employee information. Identity theft has by far replaced any outright robbery crimes in this nation. Be careful, be alert, be aware. It is, literally, your business.
Kelly Chang, an LA-based family and divorce lawyer, our featured Clip of the Week focus, has figured out how to leverage YouTube to promote her practice. You Tube is free, easy and ultimately, the success of your marketing effort in this venue depends entirely on you – how you portray yourself and your skills and experience. You do not have this level of control utilizing traditional advertising avenues. Aside from the obvious costs involved, print, tv and radio advertising all require an ad designer; almost always not the client. YouTube allows for consumer-control and provides effective distribution with deep market penetration potential.
Quick ground rules for making a YouTube video:
1. Do NOT hire a film crew. Unnecessary. A good handheld digicam will do- especially one that is HD-enhanced. Canon and Sony are good choices.
2. Flesh out a brief script for yourself. Try not to be rigid; but stick to your main selling points – for your practice and even more importantly, your character.
3. Allow for viewer comments. (It’s risky but not as much as looking overly controlling.)
The one thing we would have done differently would have been to insert a scrolling I.D. banner along the bottom of the video. There are tons of video editing apps (such as Video Edit Magic) that you can use: some free; most easy to use. Try cnet.com for well tested suggestions.
Turned into an office and/or family project, advertising your practice on YouTube or similar internet venue, can also be an empowering and loyalty-inspiring group project.
For the trial law and legal community from a NY private investigator's perspective.
The Beacon Bulletin is the weekly newsletter authored and published by our parent company, Beacon Network Investigations, Inc. (BNI) and will shortly be combined with The MainPower Post, of our new company, MainPower Investigations, Inc., (MPI). (BNI will be involved in the development end of investigative and informational services and products. MPI will carry on with traditional private detective services.)
We're a private investigation company. We DON'T dispense legal advice, respond to anonymous queries or black hat your enemies for you. (Internally, however, points are alloted to our favorite subtly phrased compliments.)
We DO hope to inform. That's our business.
