Family law cases are complex and sensitive by definition, so they require a detailed understanding of each client’s unique situation.
And that means asking a lot of questions. Whether dealing with divorce, child custody, or support arrangements, gathering accurate information early on is a must for building a strong case and providing good legal advice.
A ready-made family law questionnaire can help you with that, so let’s see some of the main questions you should ask upfront to save time and reduce stress for clients.
Speed things up with our built-in family law questionnaireÂ
Content Snare features a ready-made questionnaire template with automated reminders, so you can start collecting information from clients hassle-free.
40+ questions for your family law onboarding form template
Legal representatives may require additional info from clients, but the questions you’ll see below are must-haves for all family law cases.
Note: We’ve added a few screenshots to show you what Content Snare’s family law questionnaire template looks like. You can also access it for free from our library of built-in form templates. |
Client information
This section serves as the foundation for identifying your client and their circumstances.
1. Full legal name
2. Date of birth
3. Address
4. Email
5. Phone number
Marriage/relationship details
These questions are vital for understanding the timeline and context of the case.
6. What is your marital status?
This can be married, domestic partnership, divorced, or separated.
7. Please provide your spouse’s contact information.
This includes their full legal name, date of birth, address, email, and phone number.
8. Is your spouse/partner currently employed?
9. When did you and your spouse/partner get married or begin your relationship?
10. Were there any significant events, separations, or reconciliations during your marriage/relationship?
If yes, please provide more details regarding these events.
11. Have you or your spouse/partner been married before?
If yes, please provide details about these marriages.
12. Did you sign a prenuptial or postnuptial agreement?
If yes, kindly upload this document.
Children
This set of questions allows you to capture details about your client’s children — a critical aspect for handling child custody, support, and visitation matters.
13. Do you have any children?
Note: If not, skip the rest of this section.
14. Please provide your children’s personal information.
This includes their full legal names, dates of birth, and addresses.
15. Are any of the children adopted, from a previous relationship, or otherwise not biologically related to both spouses?
If yes, please provide more details about it.
16. Are there any special needs or concerns regarding your children?
These can be medical, educational, emotional, and so on.
Employment and income
These questions are important for determining spousal and child support.
17. Are you currently employed?
If yes, please provide details of your job title and employer.
18. What is your annual income?
This includes salary, bonuses, and other sources of income.
19. Do you receive any additional financial support?
Think about things such as child support, spousal support, rental income, and similar.
20. Is your spouse/partner employed?
If so, kindly provide details about their employer, job title, and income.
21. Have either of you experienced recent changes in employment or income?
If yes, please clarify these changes.
Assets and debts
Another section that helps in preparing for property division and financial negotiations.
22. What properties do you own individually?
List all assets such as homes, vehicles, land, and similar.
23. What properties does your spouse/partner own?
List all assets such as homes, vehicles, land, and similar.
24. Do you and your spouse own any properties jointly?
If yes, please list these properties.
25. Do you have any bank accounts, savings, or investment accounts?
If yes, please list them.
26. Does your spouse have any bank accounts, savings, or investment accounts?
If yes, please list them.
27. Do you and your spouse have any joint bank accounts, savings, or investment accounts?
If yes, please list them.
28. Do you have any debts? Think about any credit card debts, student loans, medical bills, and similar.
If yes, please list these debts.
29. Does your spouse have any debts? Think about any credit card debts, student loans, medical bills, and similar.
If yes, please list these debts.
30. Do you and your spouse have any joint debts?
If yes, please list these debts.
Custody and visitation preferences
It’s also important to identify the client’s preferences regarding custody, visitation, and parenting time. Such details allow you to guide discussions about what’s in the best interest of the child.
31. What type of custody arrangement would you prefer?
This can be sole, joint, or partial.
32. How would you like visitation or parenting time to be structured?
33. Are there any concerns regarding your spouse’s ability to care for the children or their relationship with the children?
If yes, please clarify these concerns.
34. Do you have any concerns regarding the safety or wellbeing of your children in relation to your spouse?
If yes, please clarify these concerns.
Previous legal proceedings
This section helps provide additional context and avoid complications from prior cases.
35. Have you been involved in any previous legal proceedings? For example, these can be proceedings such as divorce, custody, or restraining order.
If yes, please clarify these legal proceedings.
36. Has your spouse been involved in any previous legal proceedings? For example, these can be proceedings such as divorce, custody, or restraining order.
If yes, please clarify these legal proceedings.
37. Are there any active legal matters or pending cases related to this current situation?
If yes, please explain these cases.
38. Is there a history of domestic violence, abuse, or restraining orders between you and your spouse/partner?
If yes, please explain these cases.
Other
You should also leave some room for clients to share any other relevant information, documents, or specific requests if needed.
39. Have you received any formal communication from your spouse’s legal representation?
If yes, kindly upload these documents or files.
30. Are there any specific documents you feel are important for us to review?
If yes, kindly upload these documents.
41. Is there anything else you’d like to add about your family situation that might be relevant to this case?
If yes, please provide more details.
Create a perfect family law questionnaire with Content Snare
You can use this question list as-is, but we strongly advise adjusting it to match the needs of your specific clients. This is where Content Snare comes in handy — our platform offers a fully editable template with all of the questions mentioned above.
It means you can quickly rearrange fields or sections, delete the ones you don’t need, and add questions that better suit your types of clients. More importantly, Content Snare enables you to:
- Automatically remind clients to fill out your form without sending emails on your own
- Add confidential fields to further protect sensitive family-related data
- Use different field types to make your questions simpler and more intuitive for clientsÂ
- Support clients if they ever get stuck with in-form conversationsÂ
But we’re only scratching the surface here — Content Snare features many other advanced options that help users spend 71% less time gathering information from clients.
If you want to drastically improve your client onboarding process, it’s best to sign up for a 14-day trial and see what makes Content Snare such a superior data collection tool.