once paid in full how long to file

[veggirl]

I sent my attorney a check in full a couple weeks ago....I emailed her today to see if there is anything I need to do like the credit counseling phone call, she said it's too early for that and she'll let me know when the time comes....how long till i can file! I want to stop these phone calls and get the show on the road!

[AngelinaCatHub]

If your forms are in, she SHOULD have filed and can right now electronically on PACER. One reason I do not recommend paying in full. Lawyers seem to go into shut down or slow down. Get on her case now as the clock does not start untill you get a docket number. 'Hub

[AngelinaCat]

'Hub is right, but there may be circumstances that dictate that you wait a while. Example: if you were paid a large bonus last month, then your attorney would want you to wait until six months had passed so that the bonus drops off the radar of the 'six-month look-back' period.

We get a yearly stipend from a Trust that pays out the first month of each year. So the earliest we could have possibly filed would have been July 1. However, when our lead foot attorney kept dragging her feet on filing, we literally had to go into her office and DEMAND that she file on December 28, 2007--the last business day of the year. at 4:00 PM no less--otherwise we would have had to wait until July 1, 2008 to file. We were already being hit with a couple of lawsuits and the creditors preparing to get judgments.....

[veggirl]

lol---quite the contrary...a 10% pay cut since march!!!!

[music12]

veggirl, did you discuss the timing of filing with your atty? thing is, the certificate is valid for 6 months, so if the atty says it's too early for that, could it be that the plan is to wait that long?

[justplaintired]

We paid our attorney because we knew we had the money then and didn't want that hanging over our heads. To me dragging out the payments to the attorney would have just been another form of stress. We had a tax check and basically it went to the attorney. We received a rather large packet which took awhile to fill it out. Did you by chance fill out any papers yet? Income, expenses?

Try not to worry to much, did your attorney agree to accept phone calls from collectors? Find out if you can forward calls to them. Also, I agree we did our credit counseling soon after paying the attorney, however we didn't file so the certificate expired because we, not our attorney decided to wait awhile, stimulus check was coming...... anyway we had to do it twice, so be sure you don't do it too soon. Have your attorney give you a rough idea when you can expect to file. I am not sure if a certificate expires at different time frames from state to to state but in Indiana I believe it expires in 90 days. We actually had 2 certificates expire, both our own doing and none of it was our attorneys fault.

I know this is such a stressful time, but don't panic, if you like your attorney, and you're comfortable with them try not to worry. When we finally decided to go ahead, we had to wait about 3 weeks to file and we had hired the attorney a year and a half earlier!! LOL it wasn't the attorney fault it was ours. We just kept dragging our feet.

Good luck!

[veggirl]

I filled out the large packet, sent in all pay stubs and tax returns....isnt it just up to the attorney now? what do you mean by certificate?

[music12]

it's a pre-filing certificate you have to get by completing a "course", takes about an hour online, then having a 15 minute conversation with a sort-of advisor. pay around $50 for it and get a certificate saying you completed the course. it's supposed to tell you something about credit. i seriously remember nothing about it except how long it took.

you can't file bk without providing the certificate, so you have to do it.

[AngelinaCatHub]

it's a pre-filing certificate you have to get by completing a "course", takes about an hour online, then having a 15 minute conversation with a sort-of advisor. pay around $50 for it and get a certificate saying you completed the course. it's supposed to tell you something about credit. i seriously remember nothing about it except how long it took.

you can't file bk without providing the certificate, so you have to do it.

True, there are two so-called courses. One is mainly a prep to see if you are qualified for bk and what kind of bk you should pursue. Ours was mostly verbal and took about thirty minutes when we showed our budget and bills. She took our check and faxed the certificate. That is called a pre file course (or counciling).

You then have a post filing course. It is very good, ours cost about 35 bucks for both and online. Took two hours but worth it very much. Certificate immediately emailed to lawyer. They both MUST be entered into your docket. 'Hub

[justplaintired]

We used CCCS for our 1st certificate. It was all done online. Filed out papers then someone looked it over, sent us results and then a certificate. We never verbally spoke with anyone, we did online chat. It was very simple.

The second we used 50-30-20, also all online, lots of reading, lasted 2 hours per debtor, but also very informative, I actually organized my bills and file cabinet because of that class so I do think it's good that it's required.