Mass tort campaigns need volume and the claimants need care. Resolving that tension is a documented process problem, not a creative one.
The tension nobody designs around
A mass tort campaign has to process a large number of enquiries quickly, while each enquiry belongs to a person who may be seriously ill, financially stressed, and uncertain whether they qualify. Firms usually resolve this by adding capacity: more forms, more media, more outsourced call handling. That scales the volume and degrades the treatment, which shows up later as poor retention, duplicate leads, and enquiries that were qualified badly and cost money to unwind.
What a defensible architecture documents
Before a campaign launches, the firm should be able to answer each of the following in writing. If it cannot, the campaign is generating liability alongside leads.
- Campaign-specific eligibility criteria, approved by counsel, with the date of approval.
- Conflict and duplicate checking across every source, including co-counsel and vendor-supplied leads.
- Consent language for contact, records collection and data sharing, reviewed against the relevant state and any applicable privacy law.
- Source attribution captured at enquiry, not reconstructed later.
- Secure document collection. Medical records over unencrypted email is still common and still indefensible.
- An escalation path for callers who are distressed or vulnerable, staffed by someone trained for it.
- A clear, scripted boundary between gathering information and giving advice.
- A status taxonomy so the firm can say how many enquiries were contacted, qualified, declined, and why.
The measurement gap is the commercial opportunity
There is a broader pattern here that applies to any firm investing in technology to handle this. Adoption is running well ahead of measurement. Thomson Reuters found generative AI use across professional services organisations nearly doubling year on year, while a substantial share of legal teams either do not measure return or are unsure whether they do.
For mass tort specifically, the measurement that matters is not cost per lead. It is cost per retained, qualified claimant, and the decline reasons behind everyone else. A campaign with a low cost per lead and no decline taxonomy is not cheap. It is unmeasured.
Vendor leads are your compliance problem
Firms frequently buy claimant leads and treat the vendor’s process as the vendor’s responsibility. It is not. If a lead was generated with consent language the firm would not have approved, or by a claim the firm cannot substantiate, the exposure sits with the firm. Due diligence on lead sources belongs in the campaign plan, not in procurement.
| Thomson Reuters’ 2026 report found generative AI use across professional services organisations rose to 40%, from 22% a year earlier, with 41% of law firms and 47% of corporate legal departments reporting use by their legal teams. Adoption is not the constraint. Measurement and governance are.Thomson Reuters Institute, 2026 AI in Professional Services Report, based on 1,500+ professionals. |
The scorecard question
For your last campaign, can you state how many enquiries were declined and for what reason? If the answer is no, the intake system is recording activity rather than managing it.
Score your mass tort intake governance
A structured review of eligibility, consent, conflict checking, escalation and decline reporting.
Sources
Thomson Reuters Institute, 2026 AI in Professional Services Report.
