What this article helps with: Exactly what Lia Respond answers and what it never answers, how a reply actually happens, and what each of your two audiences needs to do: admins setting it up, and case managers working alongside it.
Who this is for: Firm admins deciding whether to turn it on, and the case managers who will work with it every day. There is a section below for each.
When not to use this article: This is about the reactive side of Lia, the part that answers when a client writes in. For the proactive treatment work, see Care Coordination: reminders, follow-ups, and check-ins.
Overview
A client texts your firm at 11pm asking what happens next with their case. Today that message sits until someone opens it in the morning, and often longer than that.
Lia Respond answers it. Right then.
It reads the message, looks at where the case actually is, checks the answers your firm has already written, and replies. If the question is outside what an agent should be answering, it tells the client a person is picking it up and puts an escalation in front of the right person at your firm.
Lia Respond is reactive. It does not start conversations, chase anyone, or send reminders. It waits for your client to write in and then handles it. That makes it the usual first step for firms who want to see what an AI does with their client communication before handing over anything more.
What Lia Respond answers, and what it never answers
This is the first thing worth knowing, so here it is before anything else. The line below is enforced, not a preference, and it does not move based on how a client phrases the question.
Lia answers these | Lia never answers these, it escalates |
Where the case is now and what happens next, when your phase descriptions and FAQs cover it | Legal advice, case strategy, case value, settlement, liability, or what the outcome will be |
Who the case owner is, when your firm shows that to clients | How long will my case take. Lia does not predict timelines |
Appointment logistics already recorded in Hona | Medical advice, symptoms, medication, or treatment recommendations |
Confirming whether a client made it to a visit | Insurance questions, and anything involving the other side |
Capturing a new provider or appointment the client mentions, and writing it to the case | Real-world actions it cannot perform, like arranging a ride or calling a third party |
"I'm done treating", "I have a new doctor", and similar case updates | Anything from a client who is frustrated or distressed, or who asks for a person |
Firm-specific questions your firm context or website background covers | Anything your firm's own escalation rules say to hand over |
Two things that follow from this.
The right column is not a dead end. The client hears something like "I'm reaching out to one of our team members on that", and your team gets the escalation. Nobody is told a robot cannot help them.
The left column is only as good as what your firm has written. Lia answers from the FAQs on the client's case type, your phase descriptions, and your firm context. A case type with two FAQs produces an agent that escalates almost everything, which feels like a broken product but is the agent doing exactly what it was told.
Lia also stays out of the way when your team is mid-conversation with a client. If the latest message belongs to an exchange a person is already handling, Lia waits rather than talking over them.
What happens when a client texts
The message lands in the conversation exactly as it does today, on your firm's existing Hona number.
Lia pulls the case together. The current phase and its description, the FAQs your firm wrote anywhere on that case type, your firm context, upcoming and recent appointments, the client's providers, the assigned case owner, notes captured at enrollment, and the recent history of the conversation.
Lia decides whether it can answer, using the line above. If it cannot, it does not guess.
Your client gets something either way. A real answer, or an acknowledgement that a person is picking it up. What a client never gets is silence.
Anything Lia does not answer becomes an escalation assigned to the case owner, or routed by your firm's escalation rules.
Lia's messages are tagged in the thread, so anyone reading it can tell at a glance what came from an agent and what came from a person. In the example above, the client asked whether they need to tell their provider about the firm, which is exactly the kind of question Lia hands over: it acknowledged the client, logged the escalation, and moved on.
After hours
After hours
Clients text when it suits them, which is frequently the evening. Lia observes contact hours of 9am to 7pm in the client's own timezone for anything it starts. A client writing in outside those hours is different: they reached out, so Lia can answer that message rather than leaving them waiting until morning.
Where an answer is not available, the acknowledgement does the work. The client learns their message landed and that the team will follow up, instead of wondering whether anyone saw it.
For firm admins: turning it on and setting it up
Two things gate whether Lia Respond does anything at all.
Lia enabled for your firm. Hona turns this on. It is not a setting you can reach.
The client enrolled. Lia works per client, per case. An unenrolled client gets nothing, which is the safety property that lets you start small.
You can enroll clients by hand, or set enrollment to run automatically on the phases you choose. Most firms start by hand on a handful of cases, then switch on automatic enrollment once they trust it.
What decides quality, in order
FAQs and phase descriptions. By a distance the biggest lever, because this is where the answers come from. FAQs are read across the whole case type rather than only the client's current phase, so an FAQ written on a later phase still reaches a client who is earlier in their case. If you do one thing before launch, do this.
Firm context. Terminology, business hours, and background about your firm, so answers sound like they came from you.
Escalation rules. What reaches a person, and who. These are yours to set, so you can widen the escalate column above as far as you want.
All three live in Agent Settings. See Agent Settings: teaching Lia about your firm.
Rehearse before a client sees it
Live preview runs the real agent against your own phone, with your real settings, without involving a client. Sit down with your FAQs open and ask it the ten questions your clients actually ask. It is the fastest way to find the gaps. See Testing Lia with Live preview.
Brief your case managers first
Do not skip this. Turning Lia Respond on changes a case manager's day, and a team that has not been told will assume something is broken. The next section is written for them, and it is worth sending before you flip the switch.
For case managers: what changes on day one
Two things change the moment Lia Respond is on for your clients.
1. You stop getting pinged for every inbound message
That is the point of it, and it is also disorienting if nobody warned you. Messages Lia handles no longer need you. Your inbox gets quieter, and that is the product working rather than the product failing.
2. Escalations become the thing you watch
An escalation is Lia telling you a specific client needs a person, and why. This is now your queue. They show up in three places:
On the client's page, under To review.
On your Lia dashboard, under Clients to Review. Filter it to yourself and you get your own list.
In your notifications, according to your firm's escalation rules.
Each escalation carries the reason and what Lia already tried, so you are not starting cold.
Resolving an escalation is its own step. Replying to the client does not clear it. Handle the client however they need, then mark the escalation resolved from the review panel, or from the escalation itself. Until someone does that, it stays open and stays in your queue.
There is one narrow exception, and it runs the other direction: if an escalation was raised because a client had stopped responding to outreach, that one clears itself as soon as the client writes back. Nothing else resolves on its own.
The habit that matters
Check your escalations the way you used to check your messages. Same rhythm, much shorter list.
The one failure worth naming: a case manager who does not know what an escalation is will leave one sitting for a week, and the client will have been waiting that whole time. That is the single most common problem when a firm turns this on, and one conversation prevents it entirely.
Full detail is in Escalations and drafts: how Lia hands work back to your team.
Questions case managers ask in week one
Questions case managers ask in week one
"Why am I not being notified about my client's messages anymore?" Because Lia answered them. Open the conversation any time to read the full thread, including everything Lia sent.
"Can I still just text my client myself?" Yes. Nothing stops you. Lia recognizes a staff-sent message on a thread and stays out of the way.
"What if I do not like how Lia answered something?" Each message has a thumbs up and thumbs down. Use them, and tell your admin, because the fix is usually an FAQ.
"What if my client needs Lia to stop?" Pause Lia for that one client from the case header. It does not affect anyone else.
How Lia Respond fits with the rest of Lia
Lia Respond is the foundation. Everything else stacks on top of it.
Piece | Who starts it | What it covers |
Lia Respond | Your client | Answering whatever they write in, at any hour |
Care Coordination | Lia | Reminders, post-visit follow-up, and check-ins while a client is treating |
Provider Liaison | Lia | Emailing provider offices for attendance, bills, and records |
A firm can run Lia Respond on its own. Adding a skill later does not change how Respond behaves, it adds proactive work on top.
Availability
Lia Respond is in early access. The agent behind it has been running with firms since the spring as part of Care Coordination, so the behavior is well tested. What is new is offering it on its own, to firms that want the reactive layer without the treatment workflows.
Turning it on involves a short setup conversation with someone from Hona rather than a self-serve switch, mostly so your FAQs and escalation rules are in good shape before your clients meet it. Talk to your account team to get started.
Where to go next
What is Lia?: the overview of Lia and how the pieces fit together.
Agent Settings: teaching Lia about your firm: FAQs, firm context, and escalation rules, which decide how good the answers are.
Enrolling clients on Lia: putting clients on Lia by hand or automatically.
Escalations and drafts: how Lia hands work back to your team: the day-to-day for case managers.
Testing Lia with Live preview: rehearsing before a real client is involved.
Guardrails: what Lia will and will not do: identity, contact hours, opt-outs, and HIPAA.
FAQs
Will Lia answer something it should not?
Will Lia answer something it should not?
The right-hand column above is a hard limit, not a preference, and it holds regardless of how a client phrases the question. Lia also has no case strategy or settlement information to draw on in the first place. When it is unsure, it escalates rather than improvising.
Do clients know they are texting an AI?
Do clients know they are texting an AI?
That is set by your introduction message, and the one Hona ships by default says so: it introduces the agent by name and states that it is an AI assistant. That introduction lives in Agent Settings and is yours to edit, so if your firm rewrites it, check that it still tells clients what you want them to know. We recommend keeping the disclosure in it.
Can we run it only for some clients?
Can we run it only for some clients?
Yes, and most firms should at first. Enrollment is per client, so you choose exactly who is on it. You can also pause Lia for one client from their case header without affecting anyone else.
What if a client tells Lia to stop texting?
What if a client tells Lia to stop texting?
STOP and its equivalents stop all outbound contact immediately. A casual "please stop texting me" gets one acknowledgement and an escalation to your team, then nothing further.
Why is Lia escalating almost everything?
Why is Lia escalating almost everything?
Nearly always a thin FAQ bank. Lia only answers from what your firm has given it, so a case type with two FAQs produces an agent that escalates constantly. Adding real FAQs across the case type is the fastest fix there is.
Does this replace our case managers?
Does this replace our case managers?
No. It takes the repetitive inbound questions that do not need judgment, and routes everything that does back to a person with the context attached. Firms use it so case managers spend their day on the cases that need them, not on answering the same question forty times.
Conclusion
Lia Respond is the smallest useful step into Lia: your clients stop waiting for answers, and your team stops typing the same ones. If you want it turned on, talk to your account team, or chat with our support team or email [email protected].