What Can You Do if You Can't Make a Regular Chapter 13 Trustee Payment ?
Jan. 9, 2018
Please make regular payments to the trustee on the first day of the month by money order, writing your case number on the money order. Your first payment is due on the first day of the month after we file your plan with the Court.
Sometimes, unexpected things can happen in the future, and through no fault of your own, you might be faced with a situation where you cannot make a regular payment to the trustee. Hopefully this will never happen to you, but we have had clients who have experienced situations such as loss of a job, car accidents, health problems, family problems, or any of a number of other things that unexpectedly occur and make it extremely difficult or impossible for the client to make a payment to the trustee when that payment is due.
The trustee keeps track of all payments by computer, and if payments start to fall behind schedule, the trustee will be alerted to that fact and sooner or later can bring an application to the bankruptcy court for dismissal of a person's case.
Hopefully you will never have any problems in the future concerning the ability to make regular monthly payments. We do want you to know, however, that if something unexpected should occur, and you cannot make a regular timely payment to the trustee, you should let us know. There is a special procedure available where we have the right to make an application to the bankruptcy court to temporarily suspend one or more trustee payments due to something unexpected happening in a person's life which adversely affects his or her ability to make the monthly payments.
The above procedure can also be used if you cannot make a rent payment, mortgage payment, or car payment on time so if you unexpectedly are unable to make such a payment when it becomes due, please let us know.
Therefore, if you are unable to make one or more monthly payments on schedule, the worst thing you can do is to simply not pay and not say anything to anybody. The best thing you can do is contact us and let us know what has happened that makes it difficult or impossible for you to pay.
As long as you keep in communication with us, we can take steps to protect your legal rights and to fight against any efforts of the Chapter 13 trustee or a creditor to dismiss your case. We know you want your bankruptcy to be successful and we want to help you make it successful.
We like to keep clients fully informed of their rights and that is why we are giving you this document. Hopefully you will be able to make all your payments on schedule in the future without any problems and your bankruptcy will be totally successful. Since no one knows what the future will bring, we did want you to know now that if something unexpected does happen that makes it difficult or impossible for you to make a required payment, that you do have rights that we can assert on your behalf to protect you from dismissal of your case.
We are here to help and want to answer any questions you might have at any time, so feel free to call us anytime you have any questions or concerns.
If you ever need the services of an attorney in the future for any other types of matters, we would like you to know that we do many other things besides bankruptcy. We help people with such things as traffic tickets, personal injuries from accidents, social security disability, uncontested divorces, real estate matters, workers compensation, legal malpractice, medical malpractice, and many other types of legal matters. If for some reason we cannot help you in a particular legal area, we can certainly refer you to other extremely well qualified attorneys who have expertise in a legal area with which you might need future assistance.
DISCLAIMER: In this report we discuss results that many people can obtain through a successful bankruptcy. This does not mean that every client can obtain all of the results listed. Every client's case is individually analyzed on its own merits, and if you retain our office to represent you, we will advise you what results we believe we can achieve for you. Call us for a free consultation.