No client missed.
No confidentiality compromised.
fonea handles first-contact enquiries, qualifies potential mandates, books consultations, and routes existing clients to the responsible lawyer — 24/7 in German, French, Italian, and English. Attorney-client privilege under Art. 13 BGFA remains untouched because fonea provides no legal advice.
What is fonea for law firms?
fonea is an AI phone assistant that qualifies first-contact enquiries at Swiss law firms, routes clients to the responsible lawyer, and books consultations — without providing legal advice. FADP and revFADP compliant, with data hosted in Switzerland and FDPIC-compliant AI disclosure.
The law firm reality
Why traditional phone solutions fail in law firms
First-contact enquiries arrive when nobody can answer
Someone in legal distress calls in the evening, on weekends, or during a hearing. If the call is lost, the potential client moves on to the next firm on Google.
Interruptions destroy file review and pleading preparation
Every call pulls lawyers out of focused legal work. At an hourly rate of CHF 300+, interruptions are expensive — and work quality suffers.
University of California Irvine study
Reception without legal training filters poorly
Without basic legal understanding, urgent matters end up on the follow-up pile and routine information requests reach the partner. Qualified legal assistants are scarce and expensive.
Conflict checks and confidentiality are no topic for call centres
An external phone service does not know your mandate relationships and cannot screen for conflicts of interest. That is untenable for a serious firm.
What changes
How fonea relieves your firm
No more lost first-contact enquiries
Every call is answered immediately — evenings, weekends, during hearings. Enquiries are qualified and handed over to you in structured form.
Clean routing to the responsible lawyer
fonea knows your practice-area split (civil, criminal, family, commercial law) and routes clients to the right dossier owner.
Consultations land in your calendar
fonea sees every lawyer's availability and books first consultations without a callback — including matter summary and opposing party for the conflict check.
Attorney-client privilege preserved
fonea deliberately provides no legal advice — so Art. 13 BGFA remains untouched. Data hosted in Switzerland, encrypted transcripts, configurable retention.
Set up in 30 minutes
How we configure fonea for your firm
Kick-off
We capture your practice areas, lawyer allocation, calendar, and typical first-contact enquiries — with clear separation from legal advice.
Scripting
We write qualifying questions for enquiries, routing rules to responsible lawyers, and answers about fees and quotes in German, French, and Italian.
Integration
Connect to your calendar (Google, Microsoft 365) and your firm's case system (WinJur, Advokat, Dictum, etc.). Call forwarding via Swisscom, Sunrise, or Salt.
Go-live
Test calls with you, fine-tuning of escalation paths, handover. You retain full control over scripts and routing rules.
Typical call scenarios
How fonea handles law firm calls in practice
First-contact enquiry — potential mandate
fonea gathers structured matter information for the conflict check, without giving legal advice, and books the consultation with the specialised lawyer.
Existing client, ongoing matter
fonea recognises existing clients, knows the responsible lawyer per dossier, and offers fitting options — callback, message, or appointment.
Fee quote / rate enquiry
Standard fee information you pre-approve. Clear boundary: no specific cost estimate on the individual case — that belongs in the first consultation.
BGFA, FADP and professional confidentiality
Why fonea is the right partner for Swiss lawyers
Attorney-client privilege (Art. 13 BGFA) stays intact
fonea does not give legal advice — so no attorney-client relationship with the AI arises. Transcripts are firm work-tools, not advice records, and are subject to your internal confidentiality obligations.
Data hosted in Switzerland
All persistent data (call logs, transcripts, client context) is hosted with our Swiss infrastructure partner Supabase. No client data leaves Switzerland persistently.
Transparent subprocessors
Full list of all vendors (Supabase, Telnyx, ElevenLabs, Google, Anthropic, OpenAI) with data residency and DPF status. 30-day advance notice on every change, contractually secured via DPA.
FDPIC-compliant AI disclosure
Every caller is informed at the start of the call that an AI system is in use. This announcement cannot be disabled — it is part of our compliance DNA and shields you from complaints to the cantonal bar association.
Pricing
Transparent pricing
Included
- 120 minutes AI talk time included
- DE, FR, IT, EN, ES + Swiss German
- Calendar integration & appointment booking
- AI answering machine 24/7
- Interactive AI for customer service
- Email & SMS notifications
- Cancel monthly, no commitment
Included
- 500 minutes AI talk time
- 3 concurrent calls
- 3 phone numbers
- Unlimited assistants
- Unlimited users
Features
- Everything in Basic
- Outbound calls
Included
- From 2,000 minutes
- Custom concurrent calls
- Custom phone numbers
- Unlimited assistants
- Unlimited users
Features
- Everything in Professional
- Custom voice
- Zero Data Retention
- Custom SLA
Frequently asked
What lawyers need to know before using fonea
Does fonea breach attorney-client privilege under Art. 13 BGFA?
No. fonea deliberately provides no legal advice. It takes messages, qualifies first-contact enquiries, and routes clients to the responsible lawyer. This means no attorney-client relationship arises with the AI. Transcripts are firm work-tools subject to your internal confidentiality obligations — comparable to emails and file notes. Cantonal bar associations accept digital tools as long as confidentiality is preserved and external processors are contractually bound (DPA).
Is fonea FADP and revFADP compliant for law firms?
Yes. All persistent client data is hosted in Switzerland (Supabase, infrastructure in Geneva). Transient voice processing (speech-to-text, LLM, text-to-speech) runs on European servers in Germany with DPF or SCC safeguards. The revised FADP (effective 1 September 2023) and the GDPR are fully respected. A Data Processing Agreement governs processing. The complete subprocessor list is available at fonea.ch/subprocessors.
How does fonea support the conflict-of-interest check?
For every first-contact enquiry fonea captures the opposing party and the rough matter summary in structured form. This information flows into your case system or via email/Slack into the intake process before an appointment is confirmed. The final conflict check remains with the lawyer — fonea only delivers the structured data.
What happens with complex or urgent matters?
fonea is not designed to give legal advice. As soon as a matter goes beyond standard information (appointment, fees, contact) or is urgent (arrest warrant, deadlines, police interview), fonea captures the situation, flags the call as urgent, and escalates immediately via SMS or push to the on-call lawyer.
Does fonea support multilingual mandates in German, French, and Italian?
Yes. fonea understands Swiss German (all dialects), High German, French, Italian, English, and Spanish. This is critical for many firms — especially in Bern, Fribourg, Valais, Ticino, and Graubünden, where mandates regularly involve two national languages.
Are there cantonal differences fonea takes into account?
Yes. Supervision of lawyers lies with the cantonal bar associations. We configure fonea so that no statements are made which could be considered improper advertising or unauthorised legal information. The specific wording is agreed with you before go-live.
How fast is fonea live for a law firm?
Initial setup takes about 30 minutes. We configure fonea with you: practice areas, lawyer allocation, standard fee information and escalation paths, and connect your calendar and case system. Test calls are run together. After go-live you adjust scripts anytime in the dashboard — or we help with changes.
Can we cancel fonea at any time?
Yes. The contract is monthly and can be cancelled anytime, no minimum term. We also offer a 30-day money-back guarantee if fonea does not meet your expectations.
Further reading
Anwaltskanzlei: Keine Mandatsanfrage verpassen
KI-Telefonassistent für Anwaltskanzleien: Mandatsanfragen qualifizieren, Termine buchen, Anwaltsgeheimnis wahren. Mit ROI-Rechnung und DSG-Compliance.
DSG und KI-Telefonie: Was Sie wissen müssen
Das Schweizer DSG stellt eigene Anforderungen an KI-Telefonie. 6 Pflichten, persönliche Haftungsrisiken und Checkliste für DSG-konforme Anbieter.
EU AI Act 2026: Was Schweizer KMU wissen müssen
EU AI Act ab August 2026: Offenlegungspflicht für KI-Systeme betrifft auch Schweizer KMU. Pflichten, Fristen, DSG-Zusammenspiel und Checkliste.
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