Pedestrian accident calls come in two flavors. The first is someone who was grazed in a parking lot and wants to know if they have a case. The second is someone calling from a hospital bed — or a family member calling on their behalf — while the injured party is still in the ICU. The intake process for each looks completely different, yet most law firms handle both calls the same way.
That is a problem. Pedestrian accident cases are among the highest-value personal injury matters your firm will take. Average settlements run five to ten times higher than a standard rear-end collision. Liability tends to be clear when the facts are captured correctly. And the evidence window — the critical 24 to 72 hours after impact — closes fast. What your intake person does in the first phone call determines whether your firm secures a seven-figure case or watches it walk to the firm down the street that answered the phone faster and asked the right questions.
This guide covers the intake framework your team needs to qualify, capture, and escalate pedestrian accident cases correctly on the first call.
Pedestrian cases are not car accident cases with the victim outside the car. The legal theory, the evidence, the liable parties, and the caller’s emotional state are all different.
The caller is usually in crisis. They may have been discharged from the ER with a dozen stitches and a traumatic brain injury that has not been diagnosed yet. They may be calling from a waiting room while a family member is in surgery. They are not thinking clearly, they are frightened, and they often do not know what information matters. Your intake person’s job is to hold the frame, ask the right questions, and get the critical details without losing the caller.
Liability is often layered. The driver who hit the pedestrian may share liability with a city government that failed to maintain a crosswalk, a property owner whose signage obstructed visibility, or a bar that overserved the driver. A standard auto accident intake script misses every one of those defendants.
The evidence evaporates quickly. Surveillance footage from traffic cameras and nearby businesses is typically overwritten within 24 to 72 hours. Skid marks fade. Witnesses scatter. The vehicle that hit the pedestrian may have damage repaired or may be taken off the road entirely. Every hour between impact and your firm’s involvement narrows your evidentiary window.
The injuries are frequently catastrophic. Broken femurs, spinal fractures, traumatic brain injuries, and amputations are not rare outcomes in pedestrian accidents. Your intake person needs to know how to capture injury information accurately and how to flag a case for immediate attorney review when the injuries cross certain thresholds.
Walk whoever picks up these calls through the evidence timeline so they understand why speed matters.
First 24 hours: Traffic camera footage exists. Business surveillance exists. The vehicle has not been repaired. The scene still has physical evidence. Law enforcement accident reconstruction units may still be active.
24 to 72 hours: Footage is being overwritten. Witnesses are becoming harder to locate. If nobody has issued a preservation letter, evidence is disappearing.
72 hours and beyond: Footage is likely gone. Skid marks have faded. The driver’s insurance company has already started building their defense. Any witness you find now had to be tracked down rather than interviewed fresh at the scene.
This is not background information. This is the reason your intake team needs to capture the date, time, and location of every pedestrian accident call on the first contact and flag cases for immediate attorney outreach within hours, not days.
Your intake person should ask these in order. Each question gates the next and determines how to escalate.
Get the exact date, time, and intersection or address. This determines whether evidence preservation is still possible and whether the statute of limitations is in play. For pedestrian accidents, most states have a two-to-three-year statute, but if a government entity is involved — a city crosswalk, a county road, a state highway — the notice of claim deadline can be as short as 90 to 180 days from the date of injury. If the accident was more than 60 days ago and a government entity is potentially liable, note it immediately and route to an attorney before the call ends.
This is the single most important liability question. The answer determines who is legally at fault and how defensible the case is.
Did they stop and call for help, leave the scene, or remain in the vehicle? A hit-and-run completely changes the case structure, the insurance claims, and how quickly uninsured motorist coverage needs to be identified. If the driver fled, ask whether there is any witness description of the vehicle and whether law enforcement was contacted. Hit-and-run cases should be flagged for immediate attorney escalation.
Do not ask “how bad is it.” Ask what body parts were injured and what treatment has been received so far. You need to know whether the caller is still hospitalized, has been discharged to home, or has not yet seen a doctor. If the caller has not sought medical treatment, explain clearly that they need to do so immediately — not because of the legal case, but because injuries that seem minor after adrenaline frequently reveal themselves as serious within 24 to 48 hours.
High-value injury flags to note immediately:
Any case with these injury flags should be escalated to an attorney before the caller hangs up.
If yes, get the report number, the reporting jurisdiction, and the responding officer’s name if the caller knows it. If no police report was filed, note whether an ambulance or EMTs responded — their records create an independent record of the incident. If there is no police report and the caller did not seek emergency treatment, the case is significantly harder to prove and requires attorney evaluation before taking.
This question matters more in pedestrian cases than almost any other injury type, because the driver’s insurance company may have already made first contact before your firm gets the call. If an adjuster has already spoken with the caller, find out exactly what was said and whether the caller made any recorded statements. A recorded statement given without legal counsel is often used to limit or deny a claim. This needs to be surfaced to an attorney immediately.
Also ask whether the caller has their own auto insurance policy. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage can provide a critical recovery pathway, especially in hit-and-run cases and situations where the at-fault driver’s policy limits are insufficient for the injuries sustained.
Ask whether the caller or anyone at the scene spoke to witnesses and whether they obtained contact information. Ask whether the accident happened near any businesses — gas stations, restaurants, pharmacies, banks — that might have exterior cameras pointing toward the road. If the caller identifies potential surveillance footage and the accident was within the past 48 hours, this needs to be in an attorney’s hands within hours, not days.
The following factors individually increase case value and collectively may indicate a seven-figure matter. Any call that hits three or more of these should be connected to an attorney before it ends.
Roughly 30 percent of serious pedestrian accident calls will be made by a family member — a spouse, parent, or sibling — while the victim is still hospitalized. This call requires a different script.
First, confirm the relationship and whether the caller has authority to retain legal counsel on behalf of the victim. If the victim is conscious and capable of making decisions, the caller may need to get the victim’s verbal agreement before you can proceed. If the victim is incapacitated, find out whether a healthcare proxy or power of attorney is in place.
Second, get the hospital name and room or unit, if available. Attorneys handling serious pedestrian cases often need to coordinate with the treating medical team early in the case — not to interfere with treatment, but to ensure medical records are preserved and that a lien does not create complications later.
Third, tell the caller exactly what to do in the next 24 hours: do not speak to any insurance adjuster, do not post about the accident on social media, and take photographs of any visible injuries, damaged clothing, and personal items that were with the victim at the time of the accident.
Do not tell a family member calling from a hospital waiting room that someone will follow up with them “in a few days.” These calls need same-day attorney contact.
The following statements have cost firms cases and, in some instances, generated bar complaints.
“It sounds like you may have been at fault for crossing outside the crosswalk.” That is not your intake person’s job to assess. Liability is a legal question. The intake role is to gather facts and connect the caller with an attorney who can evaluate liability correctly.
“The insurance company is probably going to offer you something pretty quickly.” Quick offers in pedestrian accident cases are almost always lowball offers made before the full extent of injuries is known. Setting an expectation of fast resolution damages the client’s patience for a proper resolution timeline.
“We’ll call you back when we have availability.” A caller with a fresh pedestrian accident case — especially a serious injury — will find another firm within the hour if you do not convey urgency. These calls need immediate routing.
“You probably don’t need an attorney for something like this.” If your intake person cannot assess case complexity — and they should not be expected to — they should not be steering people away from legal representation. That is not their role.
Anything that sounds like legal advice. Your intake team is not practicing law. If the caller asks “do I have a case?” the correct response is: “That is a question our attorney can answer after reviewing the details of what happened. Let me get them connected with you today.”
A pedestrian accident intake protocol is not a one-size-fits-all phone script. It is a decision tree that routes callers based on the facts surfaced in the first three minutes of the call. Here is the structure:
Track A — Immediate Attorney Escalation: Serious injuries (surgery, hospitalization, amputation, TBI), hit-and-run, government entity involvement within 60 days, caller is family member with victim hospitalized, driver impairment suspected. Connect to attorney before caller hangs up or schedule a call within two hours.
Track B — Same-Day Attorney Review: Crosswalk accident with police report and medical treatment in progress, clear liability but moderate injuries, surveillance footage potentially still available. Attorney reviews intake notes and calls back same day.
Track C — Standard Intake: Minor injuries, accident more than a week ago, no government entity involvement, police report filed, caller is the victim and medically stable. Standard intake process with attorney review within 24 to 48 hours.
The key is that Track A and Track B combined will represent the majority of your pedestrian accident intake volume. Most of these calls are not “standard.” Whoever picks up the phone needs to know that going in.
Callers who have just been hit by a car — or who are calling because someone they love has been hit — are in a state of acute stress. The first 30 seconds of your intake call either builds trust or loses it. This is not about scripted warmth. It is about demonstrating competence immediately.
The caller should hear two things in the first 30 seconds: that you understand the seriousness of what happened, and that you have a clear process for helping them. “I’m sorry to hear about what happened. We handle pedestrian accident cases regularly. Let me ask you a few questions so we can determine how we can help you and what needs to happen today.”
Not: “I’m so sorry, that sounds terrible, can you hold for a moment while I find someone who handles these cases?”
The difference in outcomes between those two responses — in case retention, in client trust, in the quality of information gathered — is not marginal. It is the difference between your firm being remembered as the one that handled this professionally or the one that fumbled the call.
Pedestrian accident victims and their families are evaluating your firm in real time during the intake call. They are not reading your website testimonials in that moment. They are assessing whether the person they are talking to knows what they are doing.
A well-trained intake process signals that your firm takes these cases seriously, has a system, and will fight for the outcome they need. A poorly handled intake call signals the opposite — even if the attorneys in the back office are excellent. The call is the product as far as the caller is concerned.
Get the protocol right, train whoever picks up the phone, and make sure the most critical calls — the ones with serious injuries and a closing evidence window — hit an attorney’s desk the same day they come in. That is how pedestrian accident cases are won before they ever get to discovery.
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