The operational decision
Let visitors correct a business-intake field without losing context or revealing content in the error message. A law-firm website should help visitors understand the public service scope and choose a clear next step. Marketing copy, buttons and form confirmations all need to match the actual intake and review process.
Prepare the workflow
Tie errors to the relevant field, preserve safe entered values where appropriate and avoid echoing a sensitive free-text message into a banner.
Example wording for approval
“Please check the contact email field. The example request has not been submitted; review the highlighted field before trying again.”
Worked example
A fictional visitor enters a malformed email, submits the request and sees only Something went wrong. They may retry repeatedly or assume the inquiry was delivered. Tie the error to Business email and state that submission has not completed. Avoid echoing the entire message in an error banner. After correction, verify a single successful submission state. The test checks useful feedback and clear status, not merely whether the browser paints the input border a different color.
Handoff record
Record these task-specific fields: field label, error state, submission status, editor.
Acceptance check
Submit a malformed fictional email and then correct it. The user should understand both the field error and whether the inquiry was actually submitted.
Further reading
Legal intake capacity calculator ↗
Try Ava with your business’s public information ↗