What firms mean by an AI receptionist
The phrase covers two different jobs. One is answering the phone: a service picks up calls, takes a message or books a time, and sends the details to the firm. The other is answering on the website: an assistant greets visitors by chat or voice, answers their first questions, and moves them toward a consultation. Many firms need both. Before comparing products, decide which problem costs you more: missed calls, or website visitors who leave without contacting you.
Whichever you choose, a law firm's receptionist has rules a restaurant's does not. It must not give legal advice. It must not promise outcomes. It must handle people in distress with care. And it should sound like your firm.
What the subscription services cost
The search results for this question are led by AI receptionist and legal intake products, alongside practice management vendors such as Clio and MyCase and phone providers such as RingCentral. Published prices give a sense of the range:
| Option | Typical published price |
|---|---|
| AI receptionist subscription | About $14 to $199 a month |
| Busier office plans | About $300 to $500 a month |
| A human receptionist, for comparison | Quoted at $35,000 to $45,000 a year |
Those figures come from AI receptionist vendors' own pricing pages and guides on the date at the bottom of this page. Subscriptions are quick to start, and for a firm that mainly needs calls answered and messages taken, one may be all you need.
What a custom assistant does differently
A subscription is built to serve every firm. A custom assistant is built around one firm: its practice areas, its intake questions, its own explanations and its own next step. Sky2Screen built one for Men's Legal Center, a family-law firm. The assistant is called Clara.
- It answers from the firm's own material. Clara answers general family-law questions from the firm's video library, so visitors hear the firm's explanations rather than generic text from the internet.
- It knows its limits. Clara gives general educational information only and declines to give legal advice. Sensitive questions, and questions outside family law, go to the right resources.
- It leads to the firm's next step. Clara points people toward a free case review.
- It answers by chat and by voice. Clara works as a chat page and as a voice assistant on every page of the firm's existing WordPress site.
- It is tested before its answers change. On an 80-question test, the share of answers matched to the right firm video rose from 56% to 98.8%, and changes to how Clara answers must keep a 95% score on that test before they go live.
You can try Clara at menslegal.com/clara. Sky2Screen's demo shows the same kind of assistant on a made-up firm, never on a client's data.
How to choose
| If your main problem is | Consider |
|---|---|
| Missed phone calls after hours | A phone answering subscription |
| Visitors who read and leave | A website assistant |
| Answers that must sound like your firm | A custom assistant built on your material |
| Strict rules on what may be said | A custom assistant with a tested question set |
Questions to ask any provider
- Where do the answers come from? Your material, the provider's scripts, or the open internet?
- How does it refuse legal advice, and can you see examples?
- How is it tested before a change goes live?
- What does it do with a person in crisis?
- Where do the conversations go, and who can read them?
- What does it cost each month after the first, including AI usage?
What to gather before you start
Whichever route you take, the work goes faster if the firm prepares a few things first:
- The questions prospective clients ask most, in their own words, from intake notes or the front desk.
- The firm's approved explanations, such as videos, articles or FAQ answers the partners already stand behind.
- The rules, written plainly: what the assistant must never say, which matters it should not discuss, and when it should hand off to a person.
- The next step, such as a consultation request, and where those requests should arrive.
What a build involves at Sky2Screen
A custom assistant starts with the firm's material: videos, articles, intake questions and the rules the partners set. Sky2Screen builds the assistant around that material, writes a test set of real questions with the firm, and adds the assistant to the existing website. AI usage and hosting are quoted in writing with the build, and extra work is billed at $60 an hour and quoted in writing first.
Sky2Screen is based in San Diego and works with firms across the United States. A demo is an online video call with the founder, Elian Gonzalez.
Updated October 6, 2026. Prices of rented tools are the vendors' public list prices on that date and change often; check each vendor's pricing page before deciding.
Sky2Screen is not affiliated with these companies.