Practice Management Helpline
The Law Society’s Practice Management Helpline is a confidential telephone service for Ontario lawyers and paralegals.
Our Mandate
The Helpline answers questions about the Rules of Professional Conduct, the Paralegal Rules of Conduct, and other professionalism and practice management topics, including:
There are limits to the assistance that the Helpline can provide. The Helpline cannot:
The Helpline does not assist the public. Please see Public Resources.
If you are an Ontario lawyer, paralegal, law student, judge or one of their family members and you require support related to addiction, mental or physical health, work-life balance, career, family or other personal issues, please contact the Member Assistance Program.
To reach other departments of the Law Society, please see the Departmental Contacts.
About the Helpline
The Helpline is staffed by experienced representatives, including paralegals, and counsel. If your matter requires counsel input, a member of the Helpline’s counsel team will contact you.
The Helpline is a service for Ontario lawyers and paralegals that is strictly confidential however, it is not anonymous. When you contact the Helpline to discuss your situation, we will verify your identity as an Ontario-licensed lawyer or paralegal (or their authorized representative) to confirm that you are eligible to use our services before we answer your professional responsibility or practice management questions.
Helpline counsel and paralegals, like all Ontario licensees, remain bound by their obligations under rule 7.1-3 of the Rules of Professional Conduct and rule 9.01(2) of the Paralegal Rules of Conduct to report lawyer or paralegal conduct in certain limited circumstances.
The Helpline does not provide legal advice and any information or guidance provided by the Helpline should not be relied upon as such. The Helpline provides information and guidance with respect to certain professionalism and practice management topics to assist lawyers and paralegals in resolving issues on these topics. However, the Law Society is not responsible for resolving any such issues on your behalf or for any use made of the information and guidance provided through the Helpline.
Preparing to call the Helpline
Before contacting the Helpline, consider reviewing the Helpline’s Frequently Asked Questions and using the Law Society’s Decision Making Checklist to help resolve your professional responsibility or practice management question or issue. The Checklist will assist you in forming or framing your question or issue, determining your professional obligations, and identifying options for resolving the situation in accordance with those obligations. The Checklist also contains a list of available resources and supports that may guide your decision-making process.
Consider the following when preparing to contact or contacting the Helpline:
- The Helpline cannot assist you with a complaint. The Helpline cannot prevent a complaint from being filed against you, assist you with a complaint if one has already been filed against you, or discuss an open complaint.
- The Helpline will speak with Ontario-licensed lawyers or paralegals or, where appropriate, their authorized representatives. In some cases, the Helpline will answer inquiries from a lawyer or paralegal’s authorized representative (e.g., an assistant, clerk, or student calling on a lawyer or paralegal’s behalf). In other cases, the Helpline’s representative or counsel will need to speak directly with the lawyer or paralegal. This may occur because an authorized representative does not have sufficient information about the situation or there may be significant risk to the lawyer or paralegal if the situation is not handled with care.
- Ask your question at the beginning of the call. The representative or counsel will likely have specific questions for you, and you can fill in background details as necessary.
- Make notes of the information that you provide to the Helpline and about your discussion of the issues raised with the representative and/or counsel. The Helpline retains neither copies of correspondence or documentation sent to the Helpline by email, fax, or mail, nor submitted through the online booking system, nor detailed notes about the information provided or discussed during a call. Lawyers and paralegals contacting the Helpline are encouraged to maintain their own records of inquiries made to the Helpline.
Contact us
We want to hear from you, and we are here to help.
The Helpline’s hours are Monday to Friday 9:00 am-5:00 pm EST. Lawyers and paralegals can reach the Helpline in two ways: