History

History

As we entered the 21st Century, an estimated 122 million middle income Americans  were  enrolled in some form of legal service plan.  Trade union members and their dependents, whose unions have negotiated legal services as an employee benefit, make up the majority of those covered.  However, over the last decade, commercially marketed plans have greatly expanded the availability of legal service plans to credit card holders, bank depositors, credit union and association members and even people not affiliated with any group.

The growth of the commercial plans has sparked significant interest in the media and the financial community.  The publicity in major newspapers, national magazines and the broadcast media has brought the idea of prepayment for  legal services to tens of millions of people.  Direct mail marketing and multi level distribution systems are generating literally millions of attractively laid out, hard hitting pieces of sales literature designed to convince people that legal services are valuable and that prepayment is the way to pay lawyer fees.  

While the  fear that legal service plans are simply a method of guaranteeing a good income for  lawyers has not gained any validity, the spread of these arrangements definitely presents  exciting  new business opportunities for lawyers.  The most typical role for the private practitioner is that of legal service provider for plan members.  However,  some lawyers have found themselves leaving the active practice of law and becoming administrators, marketers and consultants. 

Group and pre-paid legal services plans offer access to the justice system for people of moderate means.  Some of the services provided are wills and trusts, consumer transactions, such as buying or selling a home, domestic matters, such as enforcing child support orders and simple divorces.  Many legal issues encountered by people every day, which if left unaddressed could become larger problems can be resolved with a phone call to a legal services plan lawyer. 

 

What We Do

The American Prepaid Legal Services Institute (API) is a nonprofit organization located in Chicago . API was founded in 1976 by the American Bar Association to act as a clearinghouse and technical assistance source for the prepaid legal services  industry, as well as supporting this method of delivering legal services to clients of moderate means . The API, which remains an ABA  affiliated entity , also acts as a membership association for those involved in the field.     

The API hosts a number of different educational opportunities, including an annual national conference held in locations  across the US and Canada . At these conferences, members and non-members are brought up to speed with the latest trends in the prepaid field, as well as given the opportunity to network with their peers from around the globe.  In addition, the API hosts a series of smaller, more intimate “mini-conferences” to help  lawyers understand the benefit of participating in group and prepaid panels.  These mini-conferences are held in various parts of the country. If you are interested in having your city host an API Mini-conference, please email Sara Walsh at walshs@staff.abanet.org.  Continuing Legal Educational (CLE) Credits are applied for all educational meetings