What you need to know to use ABA Free Legal Answers

You can use this website IF all of these are true for you:

• Your income is low for a family the size of yours.
• The value of your checking account, savings account, stocks or bonds are low.
• You aren't in jail or prison.
• Your legal problem isn't related to a criminal charge.
• You don’t already have a lawyer to help you with your legal problem.
• You are an adult.

We will ask questions to make sure you meet these rules. You must tell the truth. If you don't meet these rules you can't use this website. If you can’t use the website, we will let you know of other places where you might get help.

What We Offer

By using this website, you are asking a lawyer to give you legal help on your specific legal questions. They will be your lawyer for this limited purpose and will not do anything for you other than provide this help. The lawyer will answer your questions through the website and does not have to separately email you an answer or have a phone call or meeting to answer your questions. If the lawyer leaves your question open for a response from you, you will have 10 days to reply before the question closes. When the lawyer is finished answering your question, the lawyer will no longer be your lawyer.  If you have a court date or you need to file something with the court by a specific date, a lawyer may not answer your question in time.  You should keep looking for a lawyer while you wait to see if a lawyer will answer your question. Unfortunately, not all questions posted to the site will receive an answer. If an attorney cannot assist you, an administrator will notify you.

You can use the website to ask 3 different legal questions per year.  You can’t create a new account to ask additional questions.  You must meet our rules every time you use the website. 

About The Lawyers

The lawyer who answers you is helping you for free. The lawyer will only write about the problem you put on the website. The lawyer will not help you after that or do anything else for you. In most jurisdictions, the lawyer’s name will only be known to the people who help run this website. The lawyer will not:

• make calls or file papers for you;
• go to meetings for you
• go to court for you.

If you use this website, it means you understand this. The lawyer who answers you can practice law in the state where you live. The lawyer will help you understand your state’s laws only and laws may be different in other states. The people who run this website do not provide the legal advice.  They are not responsible for the advice the volunteer lawyer gives you through this website.

Rules Lawyers Must Go By

Lawyers can't knowingly help both sides of a legal issue or a case. For example, they can help either a renter or the renter's landlord in a dispute. But they can't help both of them on opposite sides of the same dispute. The lawyer or the law firm or office they work for may be helping the other side in your case and the lawyer answering your question may not know it. If the lawyer or office does know that they are helping the other side of your dispute, they can't answer your question. Using this website means you understand that the lawyer may be part of a firm or office where another lawyer in their workplace is helping the other side.

We do our best to keep what you say secret

We will do our best to keep what you put on this website secret. You should know the law could require us to report what you say on this website.  For example, if you say you are going to hurt yourself or someone else, or you say that you or someone you know is abusing a child, the law may require us to tell someone.   For a limited time, we keep records of:

• What kind of legal problem you had
• What the lawyer told you
• Which county you live in
• Where you went on our website
• Information input to determine eligibility for the service
• All other information you give us

We keep this information to help us make our website better. We will not sell it. We won't share it with people in a dispute with you unless a judge orders us to do so or you ask us to do so to help resolve a concern about the lawyer helping you. Also, there are people who help us run our website and legal aid organizations that support the website who may see your question and the lawyer's answer. These people help our lawyers make sure they do a good job trying to answer your questions.  This information may also be studied by researchers who work with us to improve access to justice. Any personal information that could identify you will be removed before files are shared with these researchers or results are made public. Also, all volunteer lawyers for this website can see the questions that you type into the website but will not share them unless a judge orders them to do so. You agree that this is alright with you.

• You read this, understand and agree to the above rules.
• You agree to tell the truth and give all the information you know about your legal problem.
• You agree to post only three separate legal questions per year.
• You will not create a new account to ask additional questions.

If you don't agree, you can't use this website.