How to Run a Conflict Check at a Law Firm

11 minutes learn

Up to date Nov 5, 2025

What’s a battle test at a regulation agency?

At its core, a battle test helps make sure you don’t symbolize a consumer whose pursuits battle with your personal, or with these of a present or former consumer. Whereas the idea sounds easy, the American Bar Affiliation (ABA) Mannequin Guidelines define a number of detailed provisions that govern conflicts of curiosity. These guidelines exist to guard shoppers, uphold skilled integrity, and assist legal professionals keep away from moral missteps that would jeopardize a case or their status.

Why battle checks matter

Some legal professionals say that the worst factor to occur if you happen to botch a battle of curiosity test is that you simply discover out too late. At that time, both another person takes over the case, otherwise you persuade the affected shoppers to signal waivers. That’s most likely true most often. In others, the delay in swapping out counsel or chasing battle waivers can hurt your consumer (think about a consumer ready on a payoff in an harm case or with an upcoming statute of limitations deadline).

In addition to, there’s the looks of impropriety. Lately, that’s sufficient to get your identify plastered everywhere in the web by an indignant former consumer bitter about you representing his ex-spouse in a brand new matter. You don’t wish to cope with that. An legal professional battle test software program will assist you spot the difficulty and put together earlier than you’re shocked with bar complaints and web evaluations.

By proactively working a battle test, particularly by means of an automatic, centralized system like Clio, you’ll be able to determine potential points earlier than they escalate and reveal your agency’s dedication to moral follow.

What counts as a regulation agency battle of curiosity?

There are lots of forms of lawyer misconduct, they usually’ve occurred at such a frequency that formal guidelines have been created. Right here’s an inventory of potential conflicts of curiosity a lawyer could encounter:

Representing two shoppers whose pursuits oppose one another (e.g. Co-defendants in a prison case who would possibly wish to snitch on one another).
Taking over a consumer the place your skills to lawyer are restricted as a consequence of obligations to a present, former, or third particular person (private curiosity of the lawyer).
When you symbolize the opposing social gathering in the identical matter after dropping a consumer.
Representing a celebration when your former agency represented the opposite aspect and also you had been uncovered to details about the case.
Getting into right into a enterprise transaction with a consumer or possession/pecuniary place reverse to the pursuits of your consumer.
Utilizing data gained when representing a consumer to hurt that consumer.
Soliciting a present—together with a testamentary reward—from a consumer, except the lawyer is intently associated to the consumer.
Securing the film or literary rights to the consumer’s story, a minimum of till the case is completed.
Offering monetary help to a consumer in reference to the pending litigation, with restricted exceptions for advancing prices (reimbursement contingent on case final result) or masking prices for indigent shoppers.
Letting a third-party pay the invoice, except the consumer provides consent, the lawyer’s judgment isn’t swayed, and consumer privateness is maintained.
Negotiating aggregated civil settlements or prison pleas for a number of shoppers.
Making an settlement prospectively limiting malpractice legal responsibility.
Settling a malpractice declare with an unrepresented social gathering except that particular person is given the chance and written recommendation to hunt counsel.

All the above applies to each legal professional in your regulation agency.

That’s quite a bit to contemplate, proper? And I simplified the foundations for the sake of this text. There’s much more, plus notes, in ABA Mannequin Guidelines 1.7, 1.8 and 1.9.

There are lots of methods to run into battle along with your consumer, and as you’ll word from the above checklist, many could be noticed on the outset of a case. That is the purpose of a regulation agency battle test. It’s to identify and cope with these points earlier than signing a consumer and probably working into hassle.

What’s the treatment to those conflicts of curiosity? For almost all of them, knowledgeable consent suffices. Finest follow, if you happen to should take the case, is to present them the chance, in writing, to retain counsel relating to the potential battle. Each the previous consumer and present consumer should consent.

A greater treatment, assuming the consumer has different choices for counsel, is to not take the case on in any respect. Write a non-engagement letter clearly explaining that you’re not taking up the case, and that the potential consumer must look elsewhere. If you already know a couple of statute of limitations or different urgent challenge, together with a warning to that impact is an efficient follow as effectively.

Widespread errors with regulation agency battle checks

The most typical mistake with a regulation agency battle test is just not doing it. Numerous attorneys depend on reminiscence. That is clearly a foul concept. Names change, recollections fade, and if you happen to do any quantity work in any respect, you’ll lose monitor of the folks you talked to final week, not to mention from years’ prior.

One other frequent misstep is to keep up insufficient data. Many attorneys keep a easy checklist of their very own former shoppers. Nonetheless, normally not of related events, opposing events, or the contacts of fellow attorneys of their present and former locations of employment. 

At present, companies now not have to depend on spreadsheets or guide recordkeeping. Clio’s Battle Verify centralizes and automates this course of, permitting customers to run or re-run searches throughout all of Clio Handle and Clio Develop, assessment flagged outcomes, and retailer PDF experiences for compliance documentation.

Creating an ​​legal professional battle test process at your regulation agency

The start line for a regulation agency battle test is to keep up a database of all related contacts. This implies former shoppers, opposing events, and many others. 

Right here’s an inventory of issues you must monitor for correct battle checking:

Full authorized identify;
Maiden and married names;
Nickname(s);
Date of delivery;
Handle;
Cellphone;

For companies, you’ll wish to embody:

Enterprise identify;
Officers and administrators;
Companions;
Commerce names;
Place of incorporation

Not all of this data will change over time. When you come throughout an in depth match, a minimum of you’ll be able to cross-reference delivery dates, maiden names, and many others. that require additional investigation.

When ought to a battle of curiosity test occur?

A battle test ought to at all times occur earlier than a session is scheduled. In case your agency handles a excessive quantity of telephone or on-line inquiries, the group member managing consumption ought to shortly run a seek for potential conflicts utilizing your database—or higher but, Clio’s Battle Verify.

You’ll wish to test the potential consumer and opposing social gathering for shut matches, misspellings (John, Jon, Johnathan, Jonathan), and former names. As soon as the test is full, report the outcomes of the test, together with the date and time the test was performed.

If a battle is flagged, and even suspected, the particular person answering the telephone can schedule a follow-up name with the legal professional to debate the matter. Point out that the agency has time to research (and to guage whether or not the case is value coping with battle waivers).

The time it takes to correctly conduct a radical battle test varies relying on quite a lot of elements such because the complexity and comprehensiveness of your regulation agency’s database and the precise conflict-checking system you employ. Utilizing a guide course of, a battle test might take hours. With the assistance of instruments and know-how, nonetheless, battle checks could be accomplished in minutes and even seconds (extra on this later).

Battle checks are simple with Clio

With Clio, this data doesn’t dwell in a number of programs, it’s multi function place. Battle Verify searches throughout your complete Clio account, together with issues, contacts, paperwork, and notes, to uncover potential overlaps. You may even customise your search depth, run a number of checks directly, and report outcomes robotically on your audit path.

Battle test software program and know-how for regulation companies

Within the previous days, of us would inform younger legal professionals to get away three binders, or three stacks of notecards, and monitor shoppers, opposing events, and related contacts within the three respective locations. That sounds a bit like sending a telegraph, or tapping out a 30-page memo on a typewriter.

Lately, you’ll most likely use know-how to assist keep a database of contacts and conduct an legal professional battle test. Listed below are a number of instruments that may assist with the battle checking course of.

Follow administration options

Battle checking is now seamless throughout your agency’s complete workflow. With Clio’s built-in Battle Verify in each Clio Handle and Clio Develop, you’ll be able to search your agency’s full consumer journey, from consumption to lively issues, in a single step.

Whether or not your consumption group is screening new leads in Clio Develop or your attorneys are opening new issues in Clio Handle, Battle Verify robotically scans throughout contacts, issues, calendar occasions, notes, and paperwork to uncover potential points.

You may also run a number of checks directly, re-run them at any stage of the matter lifecycle, and generate detailed PDF experiences that doc your assessment for compliance functions.

By uniting consumption and follow administration knowledge, Clio provides your agency full visibility and confidence in each consumer relationship—serving to you keep compliant with out slowing down your onboarding course of.

The video beneath walks you thru each method to run battle checks in Clio—with ease.

With Battle Verify, your agency can:

Search each platforms in a single unified scan
Determine conflicts throughout shoppers, contacts, calendar occasions, notes, and paperwork
Run as much as ten battle checks concurrently
Re-run searches at any stage of the matter lifecycle
Generate PDF experiences for compliance monitoring

This offers your agency a transparent, defensible report of each test—serving to you keep compliant with out slowing down consumer consumption.

Fairly cool proper? E-book your demo in the present day to see the way it all works.

Authorized battle test software program

Authorized battle test software program automates the method of cross-referencing shoppers and matter particulars towards your agency’s database to determine potential conflicts of curiosity. By caring for this time-consuming step robotically, it quickens the method whereas lowering the possibility of human error.

For companies utilizing Clio Handle and Clio Develop, Clio’s new Battle Verify characteristic makes this course of even simpler by scanning throughout each platforms to uncover potential conflicts in contacts, issues, notes, paperwork, and calendar occasions—all in a single search.

Alternatively, integrations like Sooner Suite for Clio Handle provide one other method to streamline battle checks. With the clicking of a button and some search phrases, Sooner Suite’s built-in Battle Verify instrument searches your Clio knowledge—equivalent to contacts, issues, matter notes, and billing data—and generates a complete report. It’s a quick, simple possibility that many companies depend on to doc their battle assessment course of.

Whichever strategy you select, the hot button is consistency. Utilizing know-how that centralizes your agency’s knowledge and automates searches helps guarantee each potential battle is caught early, and that your agency stays compliant with minimal effort.

Lawyer battle test spreadsheet

Many companies nonetheless depend on an Excel spreadsheet to trace potential conflicts, itemizing consumer names, addresses, birthdates, and associated contacts, then utilizing “CTRL+F” or “CMD+F” to seek for matches or variations. It’s a well-recognized course of, however it’s additionally sluggish, error-prone, and tough to scale as your consumer checklist grows.

Spreadsheets can simply freeze or return incomplete outcomes, particularly when your agency has a whole lot (or hundreds) of entries. Extra importantly, guide searches go away room for oversight, and a single missed report can expose your agency to moral danger.

With in the present day’s know-how, there’s a sooner, extra dependable method. Battle-check instruments inside Clio Handle and Clio Develop robotically search throughout all of your agency’s knowledge—contacts, issues, notes, paperwork, and calendar occasions—so nothing slips by means of the cracks. 

By changing guide spreadsheets with an built-in system, your agency can keep compliant, assured, and targeted on shoppers, not cells.

Choose a regulation agency battle checking system (and really use it)

It isn’t information to legal professionals that they should have a battle test system in place. You hear it in regulation faculty, throughout bar prep, and at numerous CLEs. Nonetheless, extra legal professionals are switching companies all through their careers. Protecting a meticulous report of who you’ve represented and every other related contacts is extra important than ever.

Legislation agency battle checking comes down to at least one factor

On the coronary heart of it, regulation agency battle checking is about consistency. Whether or not you employ a devoted instrument, spreadsheet, and even binders, be sure to replace your database often. Be thorough along with your searches, and hold a report of any battle checking you do for every case. Your follow, and your shoppers, will thanks.

With Clio’s Battle Verify, you’ll be able to automate that consistency. By scanning each nook of your agency’s knowledge and preserving a whole report of every search, you’ll be able to keep compliant, environment friendly, and targeted on what issues most—serving your shoppers.