Plan intake behavior during an office closure

The operational decision

Explain holiday or unexpected closure handling without promising normal staff response. A reliable intake workflow needs an owner after launch. Staff availability, practice scope and public contact routes change, so the operating record should explain who can update the system and how changes are verified.

Prepare the workflow

Prepare dated closure wording, approved routing exceptions and a restoration task; separate website hours from actual monitored coverage.

Example wording for approval

“The example office is closed during the stated period. Inquiry review follows the firm's published closure instructions; no ordinary response time is implied.”

Worked example

The fictional office closes for a long weekend, but one approved business queue remains monitored. The greeting should not promise ordinary response times, and the routing map should identify the actual monitored path. Test before closing, during closure and after reopening. Do not infer that an attorney is available simply because someone checks a mailbox. The completed closure record includes the restoration task, preventing temporary wording from continuing after normal office operations resume.

Handoff record

Record these task-specific fields: closure dates, approved message, monitored route, restore owner.

Acceptance check

Test a request during the closure and after reopening. Both the greeting and staff destination should follow the applicable dated rule.

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