Maybe this is some provision of the bankruptcy laws that I don't understand, I have no idea - but it seems screwy to me.
Several years ago my credit union set up an online bill-pay service. The service was optional, it cost a monthly fee of $5.95, but they offered to waive the fee if I agreed to online-only statements (instead of a paper statement in the mail). I had no problem agreeing to that. For at least 3-4 years now I've been printing my statements from the online banking and paying bills online with no fee.
We filed our Chapter 7 in early February. Included in the bankruptcy filing was our car loan with the same CU, which we reaffirmed.
This weekend I noticed in the online banking a charge of $5.95 for online bill pay. Confused, I called up the credit union yesterday. They gave me a bunch of runaround, didn't seem to believe me that I had signed up for online statements years ago, and told me there was no way I could see my statements online even though I was looking at them on my computer screen. Looking back, I see now that they've charged me that same fee at the end of February, March and April (but not before then). The CSR told me she would research and call me back.
When she called back, she said that because of the bankruptcy they can't allow the online statement option and therefore it will cost me $5.95/month until my bankruptcy is complete, unless I want to cancel the online bill pay service.
I know that collectors are prohibited from making any collection attempts, and every statement we've received from our mortgage has said something about "for informational purposes only." Our CU statement has all of our accounts on one statement (checking, savings, car loan), so maybe that has something to do with it...I can see why they would want to avoid a potential violation and not mail me a statement, but I can still print it from their website. The April statement doesn't say anything about "for information only," it clearly states that a payment of $xxx is due on 5/12/10 (and also that we'll have it paid off in August!).
Today is actually our 60th day and the last day for objections. I'm checking PACER relentlessly. I expect discharge paperwork to show up within the next couple of days. The total fees charged for this so far are less than $18 - as long as they take it off by the end of May it's not worth my time to raise hell over it. Still, I'm curious - does this sound normal to anyone?
Several years ago my credit union set up an online bill-pay service. The service was optional, it cost a monthly fee of $5.95, but they offered to waive the fee if I agreed to online-only statements (instead of a paper statement in the mail). I had no problem agreeing to that. For at least 3-4 years now I've been printing my statements from the online banking and paying bills online with no fee.
We filed our Chapter 7 in early February. Included in the bankruptcy filing was our car loan with the same CU, which we reaffirmed.
This weekend I noticed in the online banking a charge of $5.95 for online bill pay. Confused, I called up the credit union yesterday. They gave me a bunch of runaround, didn't seem to believe me that I had signed up for online statements years ago, and told me there was no way I could see my statements online even though I was looking at them on my computer screen. Looking back, I see now that they've charged me that same fee at the end of February, March and April (but not before then). The CSR told me she would research and call me back.
When she called back, she said that because of the bankruptcy they can't allow the online statement option and therefore it will cost me $5.95/month until my bankruptcy is complete, unless I want to cancel the online bill pay service.
I know that collectors are prohibited from making any collection attempts, and every statement we've received from our mortgage has said something about "for informational purposes only." Our CU statement has all of our accounts on one statement (checking, savings, car loan), so maybe that has something to do with it...I can see why they would want to avoid a potential violation and not mail me a statement, but I can still print it from their website. The April statement doesn't say anything about "for information only," it clearly states that a payment of $xxx is due on 5/12/10 (and also that we'll have it paid off in August!).
Today is actually our 60th day and the last day for objections. I'm checking PACER relentlessly. I expect discharge paperwork to show up within the next couple of days. The total fees charged for this so far are less than $18 - as long as they take it off by the end of May it's not worth my time to raise hell over it. Still, I'm curious - does this sound normal to anyone?
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