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Topic: Ask a Lawyer for $10!
How many of you would like to ask questions to immigration lawyers in an online forum, for a nominal fee of $10 per question?
How many of you would like to request a phone consultation with an immigration lawyer for $75 per hour? How about $100 per session (unlimited time)? This is about half the regular price that immigration lawyers typically charge.
We will be launching this feature very soon! You will be able to ask questions to a panel of real immigration law firms.
Here's how it will work:
- You pay $10 and ask a short immigration-related question to a particular law firm.
- Your question will be answered by the law firm in max 2 business days.
- All correspondence between you and lawyers will be in the form of a web-based forum, much like a discussion forum.
- You can request a phone consultation with any law firm on the panel for very reasonable rates that are offered only if you request the consultation from this site!
- You can pay $2 extra and keep your question & answer confidential, i.e. only you and the targeted law firm can see that question and answer.
We will be announcing the feature next week. First 50 users to ask questions get 50% off! that is, $5 per question! The immigration law firms will be real law firms, with name of law firm, lawyer photos, address, etc mentioned on the site. These law firms are willing to give discounted phone consultation rates (up to 50% off) to users on the site.
Comments, thoughts, suggestions? Like it, hate it, doubt it?
-trackitt
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It has value but depends on the lawyer. If she/he is any good..sure.
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I think its a great way to help us would be immigrants finding answers to our questions
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Given our desparate situations, yes, we would definitely use this service!
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The panel will have at most 6 law firms.
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The panel will have at most 6 law firms.
Trackitt,
I think you should consider paid membership with renewals from 3, 6 or 12 months and with ability for a member to see fellow member's questions(unless the fellow member requests confidentiality). This way, we get an oppurtunity to pay for your valuable knowledge as well. I think its worth considering this suggestion. |
I would pay the $10. What about follow-up questions? Sometimes the attorney's answer can add more confusion than resolve the initial request especially if you're not so knowledgeable about immigration issues. Will you be charged $10 for each follow-up question and have a mechanism to close the question thread once a satisfactory response has been received?
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I would pay the $10. What about follow-up questions? Sometimes the attorney's answer can add more confusion than resolve the initial request especially if you're not so knowledgeable about immigration issues. Will you be charged $10 for each follow-up question and have a mechanism to close the question thread once a satisfactory response has been received?
Good point. Yes, you will be able to ask one follow-up question for free. The follow-up should be related to the original question, it should not be a brand new question. |
Trackitt,
I think you should consider paid membership with renewals from 3, 6 or 12 months and with ability for a member to see fellow member's questions(unless the fellow member requests confidentiality). This way, we get an oppurtunity to pay for your valuable knowledge as well. I think its worth considering this suggestion.
Initially, all users will be able to see all public questions. Later, we can think of subscription models. |
I am sure, it will help a lot of it, but I can see that, this site will be doomed after this feature is added , and site will be attributed to making money out of misery. I know my post is very discouraging, but I can feel it. Anyways, I can just say, it;s great work that you guys are doing.
The reason I said all this is because, most of the Trackitters do not have enough information about there own case, the employer will not provide, and the LC/140 is employer owned so not much can be done. USCIS is the other big guy on the spectrum. These lawfirms will always give generic answer, be it spending $10 or $100 or $500, until and unless, they have your absolute document in front of them and have worked on it. There are so many nitty-gritty details about individual case that it is more like a standard answer. It will never make the case go forward and the frustration will start rising and hence this forum will get lot of brickbats....so its the choice that has to be made....you have a huge pool of satisfied users at this time, it may turn into disgruntled users...with no faults from trackitt, but simply frustration until and unless USCIS & Congress changes laws and folks get GC soon.
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gr8 feature bud. I for sure wud use this. Sound legal advice for 10$ is good.
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Here's a good suggestion: make the lawyers compete with each other by adding a rating / thumbs up / thumbs down mechanism. That way we know who are the ones which take matters seriously and which are the ones who have their clueless paralegals answering the questions.
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i totally agree with redwing
and not only that i can ask my lawyer questions for free when ever i want
but !! the USCIS doesn't even know whats going on and rules and laws and regulations change daily
everybody here on this forum or in the progress getting gc or visa knows that you get answers from USCIS employees that are different every 5 minutes you call.
And on a side note.
We are ALL waiting for our gc including me and my family
but it is our own choice to come to the United States so we have to deal and live with the USCIS rules if its fair or not.
Remember why you got here!!! because for most of us it is to improve our lifes.
And for all that are desperate and hate the way the gc progress goes GO BACK to where you came from.
The US is a free country its hard to get in LEGAL but so easy to get out
just my 2 cents
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As long as everyone here continues to post and share experiences the legal advise section can only help.
A QA section with a lawyer can however take away from 'experience sharing'...where traditionally everyone would have replied back with their personal experiences and in that way the poster gets a whole wide range of answers/ possible scenarios etc. But having said that maybe absolute expert advise is what so many need for their problems.
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As long as everyone here continues to post and share experiences the legal advise section can only help.
A QA section with a lawyer can however take away from 'experience sharing'...where traditionally everyone would have replied back with their personal experiences and in that way the poster gets a whole wide range of answers/ possible scenarios etc. But having said that maybe absolute expert advise is what so many need for their problems.
"Ask a Lawyer" feature will be hosted on a separate website so that all immigrants can use it, not just those coming here to track their cases. So people should still continue to share their experiences and knowledge on trackitt.
The "Ask a Lawyer" site is already publicly viewable, we just haven't announced it yet. It's a very simple, clean, user-friendly website. Later we will introduce new features like online chat sessions with lawyers. Currently it's only in the form of an online Q&A forum.
The URL is going to be law......com, fill in the dots. |
trackitt,
Have you considered the legal aspect of it?
If a lawyer gives his/her opinion, the lawyer is expected to be responsible for his/her words, especially that we are going to pay for it. Now what if the lawyer gives a wrong advice to a question. Who do we sue? Trackitt or the attorney?
Not giving you a hard time, but you will see this happening one of these days when the new feature comes online.
Thanks for pointing that out. We have engaged a lawyer to review the site and create the terms of use and disclaimers.
Still, nobody can prevent a user from suing us or the lawyers. However, the chances of that person winning the case are almost zero, because the user would have used the "Ask a Lawyer" site with the full knowledge that he/she is using the site to obtain legal information, not legal advice. There are standard terms of use that every user will have to accept, and the acceptance will be a pre-condition to asking a question. When a user explicitly accepts the terms of use on a site, he is legally bound by it. So suing us or the lawyer will just waste everybody's time.
"Ask a Lawyer" is not a new concept. There are many such sites already existing, and they all have the same terms of use and disclaimers on the site. |
Not a good idea. Sorry for turning you down.I have been here for 10+ years and all the time involved in immigration stuff. my experience is: no matter how proficient lawfirm would you bring, it will be of very minimal help to no help with loss of money on other folks. people may loose interest into all these.
i am not doubting on lawfirm's capabilities, but the thing is: it is so much complicated that unless they have really worked on the cases, they will be able to give only general guidelines, case specific info cant be provided for 10 bucks, its just impractical. and generic info can be obtained with current setup too. lawyers are not going to take any responsibilities for their annswers.
the way uscis is working - there is no pattern to it. people have spent thousands of hours to find out the tracking details to come to some conclusion about how uscis work and still there are many loopholes exceptions to those. also, if you call 10 times for your case on same day to uscis, you may hear 10 different completely wide range of answers to your questions.
survival of the fittest was easier to derive than this.
with very frequently changing rules, random way of working and very poor customer service - i doubt that any lawyer on the earth can tell me the fair time range when my case would be adjudicated. my case is very simple and straightforward - still i am saying this.
this is a very sensitive issue and people will get dis-satisfied, frightened in no time when they spend money on it and still not getting pointed answers to their questions.
What you can do is: set up a pilot program for 3 months. have lawyers gain confidence from people by giving free advise and then based on the public feedback you can think of paid service. mostly lawfirms wont agree with this but still see if lawyers agree with this.
my 2 cents.. good luck..
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with very frequently changing rules, random way of working and very poor customer service - i doubt that any lawyer on the earth can tell me the fair time range when my case would be adjudicated. my case is very simple and straightforward - still i am saying this.
Lawyers will not be answering questions like "When will my application be approved?" Nobody knows the answer to that. Lawyers on the site will not contact USCIS for you.
The type of questions you can expect to be answered on the site are related to employment, switching jobs, AC21, travel, EAD, Advance Parole, re-entry permits, green cards, temporary visas, family-based immigration, visa lotteries, naturalization, etc -- the whole immigration deal. We expect to raise the bar on what type of information people can expect to get online. Information coming from a lawyer carries more weight than information coming from a random user. |
I see no harm if the legal issues are covered as far as you are concerned and everyone remembers that not everything can be resolved by asking in a ten dollar consult. I have used a legal website when I was unsure of what to do for a work related problem and it did help me, sure my issue was complicated and it went beyond just the answer I received from the website but it did help me define a 'course of action'.
Anytime you add a helpline it can only assist. People can take from it what they want....the good thing is that since people will always have this forum to cross check back with the lawyers will really have their work cut out in terms of the quality of answers they will post. Should be very interesting come to think of it !!
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As I understand this, this is 'ask 'a' lawyer', 2 suggestions:
[1] instead it could be modified to 'asklawyers' meaning that one could get a 2nd opinion / multiple opinions on the same question from different law firms. The pricing could be adjusted as $10/initial + $5/additional lawyer, with a free follow-up each. So $20 could get you answers from 3 firms with 1 follow-up each. Since 6 lawyers could have 3 different answers (possibly 7 :-)) to the same question, this might be a useful & cost-effective feature.
Law firms would need to know this that the question has been posed to multiple firms, resulting in a better-than-generic answer. After all, they are interested more than the few $ they'll get on this question - it is the possibility of getting a new customer!!
[2] customer satisfaction after the follow-up question needs to be measured and rolled-up for that law firm for others to see.
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[1] instead it could be modified to 'asklawyers' meaning that one could get a 2nd opinion / multiple opinions on the same question from different law firms. The pricing could be adjusted as $10/initial + $5/additional lawyer, with a free follow-up each. So $20 could get you answers from 3 firms with 1 follow-up each. Since 6 lawyers could have 3 different answers (possibly 7 :-)) to the same question, this might be a useful & cost-effective feature.
Yes we have thought of bundling the services into something like Ask 3 Lawyer for $25! or something like that. But that's phase 2.
[2] customer satisfaction after the follow-up question needs to be measured and rolled-up for that law firm for others to see.
Rating lawyers online is a tricky business. We could base the rating on a user's follow-up phone consultation with a lawyer, not just on the reply he received to his question. However, since the phone consultation transaction doesn't happen on our site (unlike ebay where the trade happens on the site itself), it will be difficult to verify whether the user actually did a phone consultation with the lawyer in question. We need to think about this a little more. |
[1] Yes we have thought of bundling the services into something like Ask 3 Lawyer for $25! or something like that. But that's phase 2.
>> I believe asking 1 lawyer a question really does not give you the peace of mind (especially when one actually wants to engage the law firm further). I am sure you will see more traffic and interest if [1] gets implemented from the get go.
[2] Rating lawyers online is a tricky business. We could base the rating on a user's follow-up phone consultation with a lawyer, not just on the reply he received to his question. However, since the phone consultation transaction doesn't happen on our site (unlike ebay where the trade happens on the site itself), it will be difficult to verify whether the user actually did a phone consultation with the lawyer in question. We need to think about this a little more.
>> This is true. What I can think up is, once the e-transaction is completed, a ConsultationID (random#) could be emailed to the client. The client presents this to the lawyer at the time of follow-up - once the call is completed, the law firm would enter this # back in the system, thereby 'enabling' the 'Rate Me' feature.
Lawyers who are less well-known will like this feature, as it builds up good-will and potential future business for them. The 'well-known' lawyers will of course have little incentive in getting rated!! But the site users need to get some type of feedback especially since this is a paid service. |
I see no harm if the legal issues are covered as far as you are concerned and everyone remembers that not everything can be resolved by asking in a ten dollar consult. I have used a legal website when I was unsure of what to do for a work related problem and it did help me, sure my issue was complicated and it went beyond just the answer I received from the website but it did help me define a 'course of action'.
You said it well. People cannot base decisions in their careers on a $10 online consult. The site will only help the user in getting a second opinion and get a general understanding of what course of action the user might have to take.
Plus, remember that the site is not just about asking questions online. It's also about knowing which lawyer to go to when you want a detailed phone consultation, and the same time, getting discounted rates for phone consultations with the lawyer. Many of my friends, and I myself, have paid $200 per hour to lawyers. Usually, the phone meeting lasts only about 20 minutes, and you cannot rollover the remaining 40 minutes. |
>> I believe asking 1 lawyer a question really does not give you the peace of mind (especially when one actually wants to engage the law firm further). I am sure you will see more traffic and interest if [1] gets implemented from the get go.
You could still ask 3 lawyers, but you will have to ask them separately, and will cost you $30 total. We will look into the bundled service once the site starts to get some traction.
>> This is true. What I can think up is, once the e-transaction is completed, a ConsultationID (random#) could be emailed to the client. The client presents this to the lawyer at the time of follow-up - once the call is completed, the law firm would enter this # back in the system, thereby 'enabling' the 'Rate Me' feature.
Right. It could be as simple as having the lawyer email the user a 'Rate Me' URL after the phone consultation is over. This will also verify that the user providing the feedback actually used the service. The drawback with this feature is that if the phone consultation doesn't go well, the lawyer will not send the 'Rate Me' URL to the user. |
[Right. It could be as simple as having the lawyer email the user a 'Rate Me' URL after the phone consultation is over. This will also verify that the user providing the feedback actually used the service. The drawback with this feature is that if the phone consultation doesn't go well, the lawyer will not send the 'Rate Me' URL to the user.
If the lawyer fails to send the feedback URL, (s)he takes a hit on the rating. If the client fails to rate on the feedback URL, the lawyer does not take a hit on the rating and gets a default 90%-100% of max for that engagement.
The point about getting 2nd/multiple opinions is less of getting a volume discount and more of getting 'better than generic' answers through a healthy competition among the law firms. And the feedback is necessary, else users will not be inclined to use this service. I guess I am looking at it from the user experience point of view, while yours is from the retaining everyone point of view - which tactic is more profitable ultimately in the long run? |
Thanks for your inputs. At this point, the site is well tested and ready to launch. So we're not making changes now. We'll include these new features as soon as we can after the launch.
Changes such as the feedback URL and ratings will need to be run by the lawyers as well, and they may suggest some modifications.
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