What questions should a personal injury intake form ask?

These apply regardless of what happened, and they determine everything the form asks next.

• ✓Incident type — motor vehicle, slip and fall, workplace, dog bite, medical, or other
• ✓When it happened — which bears directly on the statute of limitations
• ✓Whether the person was injured — the threshold question for whether there is a claim at all
• ✓Treatment status — whether they sought care, and whether treatment is ongoing

This is where most intake forms fail. A single generic question set asks a dog-bite claimant about police reports and a malpractice claimant about vehicle damage, which signals immediately that the form was not built for their situation.

Motor vehicle accident: role in the accident (driver, passenger, pedestrian, cyclist), whether the other driver was ticketed, whether a police report was filed, whether insurance is already involved, and whether a commercial or rideshare vehicle was involved — the last of which changes the available coverage entirely.

Slip, trip and fall: where it happened, whether the hazard was marked, whether it was reported to the property owner or manager, whether there were witnesses, and whether security footage may exist. Footage matters because it is routinely overwritten within days.

Workplace injury:how the injury occurred, whether it was reported to the employer, whether a workers' compensation claim was filed, whether safety equipment was provided, and whether there were witnesses.

Dog bite or animal attack: where it happened, whether the owner is known, whether it was reported to animal control, whether the animal has a prior bite history, and whether a police report was filed.

After the incident-specific questions, the form should capture what was injured, what treatment has been received, whether treatment is ongoing, and whether the person has missed work. These are the facts that determine both urgency and the scope of any eventual claim, and they are far easier for a person to answer about themselves than to write out unprompted.

Ask which evidence exists: photos or video, witnesses, and a police or incident report. Do not require uploads at the inquiry stage. Knowing that photos exist is enough for a firm to triage; collecting them can wait until someone has decided the matter is worth pursuing.

It should not ask the visitor to assess their own case, and it should not tell them what it is worth. A preliminary dollar figure generated from a handful of form answers sets an expectation the firm may not be able to meet, and merit is an attorney judgment. The form's job is to collect facts accurately and hand them to a person.