What can a virtual paralegal do, and what has to stay with the attorney?
The attorney decides and signs. The paralegal does the work behind it.
A virtual paralegal can do most of the work behind a case under your attorney's supervision: drafting for review, intake and conflict checks, records requests and summaries, discovery organization, staging filings and keeping the calendar. What stays with the attorney is the practice of law: giving legal advice, setting fees, accepting a case, signing filings and appearing in court. Neon Link gives law firms one dedicated, full-time paralegal who works on that side of the line remotely from the Philippines or India on your US business hours, for $2,995 a month, month to month, with no setup fee.
Rates come from our live rate card. Page updated .
See 3 candidate profiles for your role
Tell us the role. Within 48 hours our team emails you 3 anonymized profiles from people who applied for this kind of work with us: their experience, their region and the software they use.
What your Linker handles
- Draft pleadings, motions, letters and forms from your instructions, for your attorney to review and sign
- Run intake and the conflict check, and route every request for legal advice to the attorney
- Request records, then index, Bates number and summarize them for the attorney
- Organize discovery, draft privilege logs and summarize depositions for attorney review
- Stage filings for the attorney to submit, and keep proof of filing and service in the file
- Calendar every deadline the attorney sets and remind them before each one
- Send clients the status updates and document requests the attorney approved
We screen for Clio, MyCase, Filevine, Smokeball, PracticePanther and CASEpeer, Microsoft Word and Adobe Acrobat, and PACER and CM/ECF. If a finalist has not used yours, you'll know before they start.
How the work is measured
What your Linker is measured on. The targets are set with you in the first week, from your volumes and your hours, and written into your statement of work.
- Every request for legal advice routed to the attorney, never answered by the paralegal
- Nothing filed or sent to a client without the attorney's approval
- Every deadline calendared with a reminder before it
- Client files kept inside your systems, never on personal devices
What a team costs
| Team | Month to month | 6-month plan |
|---|---|---|
| 1 Linker | $2,995 | $2,895 |
| 2 Linkers | $5,990 | $5,790 |
| 3 Linkers | $8,985 | $8,685 |
| 4 Linkers | $11,980 | $11,580 |
| 5 Linkers | $14,975 | $14,475 |
| 6 Linkers | $17,970 | $17,370 |
Per month. 40 hours a week per Linker. No setup fee. Prices from our live rate card.
How we vet your Linker
Our recruiting team in the Philippines runs a strict screening and review of every applicant, using a process built by our founder, Dan Betthauser, from twenty years running outsourced operations across the Philippines, Costa Rica and the United States. Every Linker goes through:
- A screen of the application against your role: the work, the software and the experience you need
- A recorded spoken English sample, reviewed by our team
- A practical skills test for your work, scored in our own system
- A live video interview with our recruiting team
- An ID check and a background check: NBI clearance in the Philippines, police clearance in India and Pakistan
- A workspace check before day one: a quiet, private room, wired internet, a backup connection and a plan for power outages
- A signed confidentiality agreement before they see any of your data
- Your own interview with the finalist: nobody starts until you say yes
How it starts
- Step 1Tell us the work: a 15 or 30 minute call with our team, or the sixty second scope on the homepage.
- Step 2Get a written quote at the published rate, held for 30 days.
- Step 3We recruit and screen for your work and your software, and you interview the finalist before they start.
- Step 4Your Linker works your queue on your hours. A Neon Link manager runs the account and answers when you need them.
- Step 5If the fit is wrong in the first 60 days, we swap them at no cost.
A good fit, and not a fit
- Attorneys who want help but want the line between paralegal work and legal advice clear before they start
- Small firms that already supervise in-house staff and want one more person who works your rules remotely
- Giving legal advice or telling a client what to do
- Setting fees, accepting or declining a case, or signing pleadings and filings
- Appearing in court or at a deposition for the client
- Work your state or court bars a nonlawyer from doing. Check your rules
Open roles behind this page
We recruit for this work now. These are the live postings we hire your Linker from:
See 3 candidate profiles for your role
Tell us the role. Within 48 hours our team emails you 3 anonymized profiles from people who applied for this kind of work with us: their experience, their region and the software they use.
Questions owners ask
How much does it cost to outsource paralegal work?
$2,995 a month for one dedicated, full-time person (40 hours a week), month to month, or $2,895 a month on the 6-month plan. There is no setup fee, and pay, equipment and management are inside that one number. For comparison, a US paralegal costs about $7,270 a month fully loaded, using the BLS median wage plus employer costs.
Who is responsible for the paralegal's work?
The supervising attorney. Under the ABA Model Rules, a lawyer has to supervise the nonlawyers who help on a matter and make sure their conduct fits the lawyer's own duties, and ABA Formal Opinion 08-451 applies that to outsourced and overseas help too. That is why your Linker drafts for review, routes advice questions to the attorney and files nothing the attorney has not approved.
Can a paralegal talk to our clients?
Yes, for status updates, document requests and scheduling the attorney approved. When a client asks what they should do, the paralegal writes the question down and gets the attorney involved. That is the line between support and the practice of law.
How is this different from hiring a virtual assistant?
You get one dedicated person who handles your work on your hours, inside your software, and a Neon Link manager runs the account: pay, equipment, replacement if it comes to that, and a phone that gets answered. You never run offshore payroll or manage a freelancer alone. It is not a ticket queue or a 24/7 answering line.
How fast can someone start?
We start recruiting when you say go. You interview the finalist before anyone starts, and the start date is set with you once you pick the person. We would rather take the time to find the right fit than hand you whoever is free.
What if the person is not the right fit?
If the fit is wrong in the first 60 days, we swap them at no cost. After that, if they leave, we recruit the replacement at no charge and manage the handover. Training on your process runs at the normal monthly rate.
Do we have to sign a long contract?
No. Month to month is available on every plan. The 6-month plan trades a longer commitment for a lower monthly rate. A written quote at the published rate is held for 30 days.
Related pages
- Paralegal and Document Support: Intake, document drafting and review, discovery organization, filings and calendaring under your licensed attorney. Never legal advice.
- Virtual paralegal: What a dedicated remote paralegal costs a small law firm a month, and the drafting, intake, records and calendar work they take off your attorneys.
- Clio paralegal for small law firms: Matter intake, drafting, records, deadlines, tasks and time entries inside Clio, MyCase, Filevine or Smokeball, under your attorney's supervision.
1 US paralegal, fully loaded: ~$7,270/mo How we calculate this
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and watch your team draft itself.
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