Immigration Intake Checklist: from first call to booked consultation

A step-by-step immigration intake checklist: what to collect, when staff take over, how to protect caller privacy, when follow-up stops, and how to track it.

Immigration inquiries are easy to lose and hard to win back. The caller may prefer Spanish, may be calling on a Saturday night, may be afraid to give their name, and may have a hearing or a detained family member that nobody on the intake line hears about until Monday. This checklist covers the parts of intake that decide whether that call becomes a consultation: what to collect, when a person takes over, how to protect the caller's trust, when follow-up stops, and how each inquiry is tracked.

1. What a complete immigration inquiry looks like

An inquiry is complete when the right team member could prepare for the consultation without calling back first. Collect the same short set of facts every time, in the caller's preferred language, whichever channel the inquiry came through.

• Name, phone, and email, plus the best time to reach them and whether it's safe to send texts to that number
• Preferred language, so the consultation is booked with someone who speaks it
• Matter type: family-based, employment-based, asylum, removal defense, naturalization, or not sure yet
• Any upcoming court hearing, interview, or appointment date
• Whether anyone in the family is detained right now
• Where they live, and whether they want to meet in person, by phone, or by video
• Whether anyone has already helped them with forms, so an attorney can review what was filed
• Names needed for your conflict check, collected before anything is scheduled
• How they found the firm: search, social, referral, or a community event

Intake is not the place to collect someone's full immigration history or ask about their status in detail. Ask only what your attorneys have approved for the intake script, and leave everything else for the consultation.

2. When staff take over from automation

Automation is there so nobody waits. People are there for judgment. Write the handoff rules down, have an attorney approve them, and test them, including the after-hours path, before anything answers a live call.

• Anyone detained, or a hearing, interview, or similar date in the next few days, goes to a live person right away, nights and weekends included
• Questions about the caller's status, whether they qualify, or what will happen to them are legal advice, so they go to an attorney and are never answered by automation
• A caller who mentions paying a notario, consultant, or anyone else who isn't a lawyer for immigration help is flagged, so an attorney can review what was filed
• A caller who is hesitant to share information gets a person, not the same question asked again
• A matter outside your practice or your area gets a referral from staff, not a booking link

3. Protect the caller's trust on the first contact

Many immigration callers worry that what they share could be used against them. Intake should say plainly who is collecting the information, that it goes to the firm only, and that they can ask for a person at any time. Ask before sending texts, because some callers share a phone with family or an employer.

Keep the intake questions short. Every extra question on the first call is another reason for a frightened person to hang up and try somewhere else.

4. When follow-up should stop

Many people who inquire are waiting on family, money, or paperwork before they act. Follow up on a fixed schedule, in the language they chose, across calls, texts, and emails for about two weeks, then slow to a monthly check-in. The Convert Engine page shows a full sequence. Just as important is knowing when to stop:

• The person replies on any channel, and a team member who speaks their language takes over
• A consultation is booked, and reminders in their language replace follow-up
• The person texts STOP or unsubscribes
• Staff mark the lead as retained elsewhere, not a fit, or closed

Texts and calls should follow consent and quiet-hours rules. Deadlines in immigration matters vary widely, so follow-up messages should never state or imply a deadline. That conversation belongs to the attorney.

5. How to track consultation status

Every inquiry should move through the same named stages on one record, with the date of each change. Without that, nobody can say how many calls became consultations, how many consultations became clients, or which language and channel produced them.

1. 01New: the inquiry arrived. Record the time, the source, and the preferred language.
2. 02Contacted: the first real two-way contact happened. The gap between New and Contacted is your response time.
3. 03Qualified: the matter type, urgency answers, and location are in, and the matter fits your practice.
4. 04Booked: a consultation is on the calendar of someone who speaks the caller's language.
5. 05Held: the consultation happened. Booked but not held is your no-show rate.
6. 06Retained or Not retained: the outcome, with a reason when it's not retained.

After retention, the matter moves into a pipeline for its own matter type, so status updates on a case that runs for years go out when the stage changes rather than when the client calls to ask. Once these stages exist, you can also see whether Spanish-language SEO or social ads are producing retained clients, not just calls.

The checklist

1. 01Every inquiry gets a reply within minutes, at any hour, in Spanish or English
2. 02Every inquiry collects the same short set of facts, including detention and upcoming dates
3. 03Anyone detained or facing a date in the next few days reaches a live person immediately, and you've tested that they do
4. 04After-hours calls are answered in the caller's language, not sent to voicemail (see how)
5. 05Status and eligibility questions are always routed to an attorney
6. 06Mentions of a notario or non-lawyer preparer are flagged for attorney review
7. 07Callers are told who is collecting their information and asked before you text them
8. 08Follow-up stops on reply, booking, opt-out, or a staff decision
9. 09Every inquiry moves through the same named stages on one record, with source and language attached
10. 10Someone reviews response time, no-show rate, and consultation-to-retained rate by language every month

For how these pieces fit together across marketing, intake, and multi-year matter pipelines, see our page for immigration firms.