Legal virtual assistants must be able to distinguish between sharing publicly available legal facts and applying law to a specific person's situation. This screening question tests whether you know where your duties end and the attorney's begin.
Define both terms simply, then give concrete examples: reading a statute or court rule is legal information; applying that statute to a client's specific facts or recommending a course of action is legal advice. Conclude with how you keep the two separate in practice.
Start by defining the two terms in plain, confident language. Legal information is the neutral, publicly available content of the law itself, such as the text of a statute, a court rule, or a DOLE issuance. Legal advice, on the other hand, is applying that law to a specific person's facts and then recommending a course of action. For a concrete example, say that pulling up the exact provision of the Labor Code on final pay and reading it aloud to a client is legal information. But if you then tell that client, "Given your separation date, you are entitled to this amount and you should file a complaint," you have crossed into legal advice. In practice, keep the two separate by making your boundary explicit. Say plainly that you can share the law and explain its general meaning, but you cannot tell the client what to do in their situation. In a Taglish interview, you might say, "I can give you the rule, pero hindi ko po kayo masasabihan kung ano ang dapat ninyong gawin." That single sentence protects you, protects the attorney, and shows the interviewer you know exactly where your role ends.
A common mistake is to answer a 'what is the law' question by adding 'so in your case, you can...' That turns legal information into legal advice. Always separate the general rule from the application to the client's facts.
Situation
In a previous virtual assistant role supporting a family law attorney, I was asked to update the firm's client FAQ sheet. A client had earlier asked whether they could move out of state with their child without the other parent's consent.
Task
I needed to decide what I could include in the FAQ as legal information and what required a lawyer's advice.
Action
I researched the relevant state statute on relocation and summarized the citation and the general 60-day notice requirement as legal information. I did not tell clients what they should do or predict how the court would apply the law. I then drafted a note for the attorney to add a sentence advising clients to seek case-specific advice.
Result
The attorney approved the FAQ update, and the department reduced repeat client emails by flagging the attorney-only portion clearly.
Knowing where the line is lets a VA provide valuable help without crossing into legal advice.
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