When a submitter's answers meet your defined conditions, a popup appears over the form with a tailored message explaining where to direct their request instead.
Deflections in Legal Intake Forms helps legal teams reduce the volume of low-risk or out-of-scope requests reaching the queue, while ensuring submitters still receive clear guidance.
How it works
You add one or more Deflection elements to an intake form and configure rules on each. Each rule defines the conditions under which a submission should be deflected — for example, if a request's value falls below a threshold, or if the category indicates it belongs to another team.
When a submitter completes the form and their answers match a deflection rule, a popup overlay appears over the form — not a new page — displaying a custom response message. If the form contains multiple Deflection elements, the first matching deflection encountered stops further evaluation; subsequent deflection points are not checked.
A matter record is automatically created for every deflected submission and marked as completed, with the resource set to Automated - Deflection and the deflection details captured in the matter notes.
Note: Deflection rules are evaluated at the point of submission. Submitters are not shown any indication of deflection logic while filling in the form.
Prerequisites
Before you can add deflections to a form, you need:
Legal Intake enabled for your organisation.
Form Builder access — available to users with the relevant admin permissions.
A published or draft intake form to add the Deflection element to.
Navigate to Form Builder
Go to Admin > Legal Intake > Form Builder by open an existing form or create a new one.
Step 1: Add a Deflection element to your form
In the left-hand panel under Form Elements, locate Deflection and drag it onto the form canvas at the point where you want the deflection check to occur.
Place the Deflection element after the fields whose values will be used in its conditions — for example, after Category and Value fields.
Note: When you add a Deflection element, any required matter fields not already present on the form are automatically added. This ensures all required matter fields are collected to create the matter record on submission.
Step 2: Configure deflection rules
Click Configure Deflection Rules on the Deflection element. The Deflection Rules panel opens.
Under Deflect this submission when, define the conditions:
Select a form field from the first dropdown — for example, Category or Value.
Select a condition operator — for example, is equal to, is less than, or is between.
Enter or select the value(s) to evaluate against — for example, a specific category name, a currency amount, or a value range.
Click + Add Another Condition to add further conditions to the same rule. All conditions within one rule must be met for deflection to trigger (AND logic). To deflect on either condition independently, save this rule first and add a new rule instead.
In the Response shown to requester on submission field, enter the message you want the submitter to see when their submission is deflected. You can use rich text formatting and include hyperlinks — for example, linking to another team's portal or contact email address.
Click Save to apply the rule. To save this rule to the deflection library for reuse across other forms, click Save to Library before saving.
Step 3: Add additional deflection points (optional)
You can place more than one Deflection element on a form to create multiple deflection points at different stages of the form. Each Deflection element can hold multiple independent rules — a submission is deflected if it matches any one of them.
Note: When a form has multiple Deflection elements, the first matching deflection encountered when the form is submitted triggers the popup and stops evaluation. Later deflection elements are not checked once a match has been found.
To add another rule to an existing Deflection element, click Configure Deflection Rules and define a new set of conditions and response message. You can also select Or use a saved deflection from library at the bottom of the panel to reuse a previously saved rule.
Result
When a submitter's answers match a deflection rule, a popup overlay appears over the form — the page does not navigate away — displaying:
Your request has been reviewed — the header shown to all deflected submitters.
A subtitle: Based on your answers, this may not need legal team review.
Your custom response message, explaining what the submitter should do next.
A note confirming that a record of the submission has been created for reporting purposes.
Back to Home and Submit Another Request action buttons.
In Xakia, a matter record is automatically created for deflected submissions with the following details:
Status: Completed
Resource: Automated - Deflection
Notes: The deflection rule that triggered and the response message are recorded in the matter notes.
Limitation
Deflection conditions can only reference fields that appear earlier in the form. If a field used in a deflection condition is later removed from the form, the rule will need to be reconfigured.
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Need help?
If you have any questions, please contact us at support@xakiatech.com or reach out to your Customer Success Manager.