A minor post-341 hiccup

[JackBondLove]

I recently had my 341, but unlike a lot of folks here, my trustee did not seem so nice. He seemed to me like a nosy border guard, asking questions like why do I have so many bank accounts, etc. I began answering that question one by one - in one case, I said I kept a checking account at one credit union because they gave me a good deal, to which he responded something like, "that's not a good reason to have a bank account with them" Huh??? I just continued discussing all my accounts, and must have bored him, because he wanted to move on.

Anyway, on my 2009 tax return, I had a certain small amount (i.e., less than $100) listed as estimated tax payments, and the same amount to be carried over to next year's taxes as estimated payments (something I typically did over the last 12 years.) The reason theses amounts were the same was because I had zero tax liability. The panel trustee said something like I would have to get that refunded and surrender it to the estate. I then mentioned that I had received some type of letter from the IRS stating that this was an error (and had not gotten around to calling the IRS about it, and that I had no estimated tax payments, but that I would investigate it ASAP. The same amount was listed the same way on my 2008 taxes (also zero tax liability.)

So when I got home, on a hunch I took a look at the 2007 tax return. Sure enough, this amount was what I had *underpaid* for that year (as opposed to *overpaid*), and I had made a mistake on the 2008 return in putting that down as estimated taxes (which then carried over for 2009.) So the next day, I filed an amended return for both 2008 & 2009, and sent a copy of that, along with the 2007 return, and the IRS letter, and a note explaining the total situation with the estimated tax - i.e., that it was an error going way back that was just recently discovered.

I would hope that the panel trustee would be able to see this mistake, but I wonder if if he would use this as an excuse to deny the petition.

[keptdigging]

I can see him being annoyed at all the accounts... more work for him. And if there's a lot of activity between accounts that could look like you were hiding something.

But by law you had to file showing ALL bank accounts and turn over the tax return AS FILED. You're following the law.

Now the TT can make your life miserable I suppose. But I don't see here that you've even done something wrong, let alone wrong enough to get denied a discharge!

Also if worst came to worst, the TT is not the judge. At some point the law has to be followed.

[JackBondLove]

I can see him being annoyed at all the accounts... more work for him. And if there's a lot of activity between accounts that could look like you were hiding something.

I did mention to him that most of my cash was in a brokerage account that I had liquidated, with some in a checking and some more in a savings account, and eventually all basically went to a single checking account, from was drained at the time of filing. Any transfers were done from directly from account to account (although for the savings account, I had to go through an intermediate account since that was the only account in which I would transfers from/to both the initial and final accounts.) The bottom line is that he would see a total of $X for one month, and then $X - $2K the next month. No funny business.

[yourbabymomm]

We listed a bunch of accounts too and the trustee goes "What's with all the bank accounts?" The other woman there (I guess this is a panel trustee? Not sure of the terminology) said, "Most are the children's accounts with very minimal balances" and he's all "Oh o.k." and didn't mention anything else.
We have 4 accounts (2 for each kid) at 2 banks. One was NFCU which we had to close our account at due to the BK because they'd close it anyway. The other two are with our new bank, USAA. So add to that our checking and savings that we closed at NFCU that we included with our petition, plus a personal account for my husband that he has because his work gives paper checks for commission out of that bank, and our new checking and savings at USAA and you get a crapload of bank accounts. I'm sure he was as confused as I was.
Hopefully everything ends up well and we all have a smooth 60 days!
Our 341 almost didn't happen because I fudged the time, which is another story, but all's well that ends well. Closest I've come to having a heart attack.

[keptdigging]

I'm probably going to have a fair number of accounts as well when I hit my 341. Just been closing out some old savings accounts with $100 balances (never got the chance to "save"...) but then all the new and old accounts from moving personal and business out of banks I owe money to... then there's brokerage, retirement... and 6 months of statements required for all.