ListServ Information

What Are The ListServs?

The VCBA operates two ListServs (i.e. e-mail discussion forums). The primary ListServ facilitates communication among the membership about association business, pending legislation, legal questions and recent developments in the courts and in the collections field. It is open only to lawyers who are members, either individually or through firm membership, of the VCBA.

The second ListServ is open to lawyers who are members of the VCBA, as well as their paralegals, secretaries, legal assistants and other staff. This second ListServ may be used for inquiring about or sharing information about the requirements or preferences of specific court clerks offices, seeking assistance in covering a case, and asking about other such administrative or simple procedural issues. Though referred to as the paralegals and staff ListServ, lawyers are welcome.

Rules And Guidelines

The last thing the VCBA wants is for the ListServs to be a source of aggravation or to result in unmanageable e-mail clutter. Common sense should guide use of the ListServs, but at a minimum, participants must adhere to the following rules and guidelines, to which all members agree by maintaining a list-serve subscription. If a member finds that the number of e-mails is overwhelming, despite these rules and guidelines, then the member should contact a VCBA officer or one of the list administrators. Options are available for members to receive compilation e-mails or summary e-mails rather than separate e-mails for every message. A disadvantage to these options is the delay in receiving messages that may be time-sensitive, so we encourage all members to try the ListServ(s) for a few weeks before choosing an abbreviated e-mail option.

1. The VCBA primary ListServ is to be used for the exchange of professionally relevant information. Examples include questions about FDCPA issues, pleading forms, court rules, pending legislation, issues specific to certain courts or judges, interpretation or application of statutes, collection strategies, law office and collections practice management, and other issues likely to be of interest to lawyers who collect for or otherwise represent creditors’.

2. The VCBA paralegals and staff ListServ is to be used for inquiring about or sharing information about the requirements or preferences of specific court clerks offices, seeking assistance in covering cases, and asking about other such administrative or simple procedural issues.

3. When posting an e-mail to either ListServ, the sender shall include his or her e-mail address, along with other contact information, in the signature line or the body of the e-mail, so that off-list responses can be sent when appropriate.

4. When responding to a list e-mail, the response should not be sent to the entire list unless the sender reasonably believes that the response will be meaningful or useful to all or most members. Because all of us are increasingly inundated with e-mail, this rule must be observed to keep the ListServs manageable and useful. For example, if a member asks if anyone can cover a warrant in a specific court on a specific date and another member confirms availability, the specifics regarding fees, case background and logistics should be communicated in private, off-list e-mails. No information regarding client fees shall be transmitted through either ListServ.

5. Although the VCBA ListServs are open only to VCBA members (and their staff, in the case of the paralegals and staff list-serve), cautious discretion should always be used when sending an e-mail to the list.

6. The ListServs are for informational purposes only and no parts of them constitute legal advice. The information shared is not intended to create, and receipt of it does not constitute, a lawyer-client relationship.

7. The ListServs shall not be used for personal messages.

8. The ListServs shall not be used for any purpose in violation of local, state or federal law.

9. The messages and information exchanged on the VCBAs ListServs are the opinions of the originators of the messages. No message posted on the VCBA mailing list shall be deemed an opinion or a position of the VCBA or its officers or directors.

10. Participants in the VCBA ListServs understand and agree not to post copyrighted material, unless the participant is the copyright owner or has the written permission of the copyright owner to post the material.