what do I do?

[suzyqpug]

Ok, The calls are coming in. I just sen tout the creditor letter letting them know that i am not paying my credit card balance. Citi, BOA, and a few 1800 serice (comes up on caller ID). have been calling. One calling at 8:15 a.m. I have never answered the phone yet. SHould I answre and tell them that I am filing a BK? Do I give them my attornies name or should i just not answer it? I know once i answer it they will start fighting with me. What do you think I should do?

[Flamingo]

You can answer them or ignore them, whatever you want to do. If you have retained your attorney, you can answer them and provide the attorney's name and phone number to them. They won't stop calling until they actually receive the bankruptcy filing information when you file, or if you provide the filing number to them when you obtain it. The calls can get bad so it's up to you what to do as to handling them. If you cannot handle it, take the phone off the hook when you are home and have friends/family call you on your cell.

[suzyqpug]

I do not have a case number yet. SHe is filing in Oct. WIll they try to sue me if I do not anser the phone. I just sent out letters to the creditors, telling them I am not paying anymore. What time are they allowed to make phone calls. Like what time in the morning can they start to call thats legal?

[AngelinaCat]

Even though you are filing later, go ahead and give the attorney contact info to the callers. That is what we did and we didn't have any problems.

[AngelinaCatHub]

You can answer them or ignore them, whatever you want to do. If you have retained your attorney, you can answer them and provide the attorney's name and phone number to them. They won't stop calling until they actually receive the bankruptcy filing information when you file, or if you provide the filing number to them when you obtain it. The calls can get bad so it's up to you what to do as to handling them. If you cannot handle it, take the phone off the hook when you are home and have friends/family call you on your cell.

I guess I was more fortunate. Once we decided to go 13 (later changed to 7) all we told them was, we are filing, attorney name, phone number, and all of them stopped. SIXTEEN months later, I FINALLY got my lawyers arse in gear on the last working day of the year at 4:30. 'Hub

[AngelinaCatHub]

I don't know how she does it, but Mrs. always works her way in front of me. 'Hub

[magyar123]

I do not have a case number yet. SHe is filing in Oct. WIll they try to sue me if I do not anser the phone. I just sent out letters to the creditors, telling them I am not paying anymore. What time are they allowed to make phone calls. Like what time in the morning can they start to call thats legal?

No, they can NOT sue you for not answering the phone. THey can however try to sue you for not paying, get a default judgment against you which could include garnishment of your pay and bank account levies. If one of those credit cards is with the bank that you have a checking/savings account with, close it immediately and go to a different bank.
By the way, original creditors are NOT bound by any laws as to when and how often they can hound you.

[justplaintired]

I say answer the calls. You have an attorney direct all calls his/her way. Avoiding the calls can lead to calls at work, to family or even neighbors. We didn't want that. We quit paying in Jan, retained our attorney in Feb, answered calls in March, (we avoided these calls and that led to calls at work), Anyway, once we gave them the info on attorney, name and phone number, they were all nice, took the info and left us alone. They did call our attorney to double check we were actually in BK. Also we did tell them what chapter we were filing. Also so you know, we are still not filed. So we had no case number to give, just the attorneys name and number.

It really wasn't so bad. If I had known how easy it would be to tell them, I would have answered the calls as soon as we had our attorney.

Good luck!!

[bk4sky]

Ok, The calls are coming in. I just sen tout the creditor letter letting them know that i am not paying my credit card balance. Citi, BOA, and a few 1800 serice (comes up on caller ID). have been calling. One calling at 8:15 a.m. I have never answered the phone yet. SHould I answre and tell them that I am filing a BK? Do I give them my attornies name or should i just not answer it? I know once i answer it they will start fighting with me. What do you think I should do?

ive just retained my lawyer a month ago, and he actually gave me a script of exactly what to say, basically you give them your attys name, address and phone number and say please do not call me again. i only told 3 of my creditors so far, but all of them were very nice and i havent heard from them since. once you give them the atty info, they will verify with the atty that you have retained him and then they should not be calling you after that. so i totally say answer.

[Lajazz947]

I was avoiding all the calls and my attorney told me Friday to just tell them that I was working on a plan and that they would need to be patient.

While I doubted that this would help I actually got some very sympathetic responses and calls were nil last couple of days. I actually feel good about it. I know that I will have to repeat the story over and over but I just feel better.

I actually did sit down and do an amortization schedule for all my debt cutting it down by 60/50/40 and 30% and using 2/4/6/7% interest rates on a five year plan so that i would know exactly what is best for me if I were to negotiate prior to filing a 13 which is a real possibility.

I am also taking into account the cost of a 1099 to see if it makes sense.

I am of course assuming that I can negotiate own which seems to be the case nowadays.

I told every caller about my amortization plan so that I could set the stage.

My creditors are:

Chase
BofA
Capital One
AMEX
First Equity
Wells Fargo
HSBC

Some are already offering to negotiate after nearly 90 days, some just 60.

[ssdsco]

I was avoiding all the calls and my attorney told me Friday to just tell them that I was working on a plan and that they would need to be patient.

While I doubted that this would help I actually got some very sympathetic responses and calls were nil last couple of days. I actually feel good about it. I know that I will have to repeat the story over and over but I just feel better.

I actually did sit down and do an amortization schedule for all my debt cutting it down by 60/50/40 and 30% and using 2/4/6/7% interest rates on a five year plan so that i would know exactly what is best for me if I were to negotiate prior to filing a 13 which is a real possibility.

I am also taking into account the cost of a 1099 to see if it makes sense.

I am of course assuming that I can negotiate own which seems to be the case nowadays.

I told every caller about my amortization plan so that I could set the stage.

My creditors are:

Chase
BofA
Capital One
AMEX
First Equity
Wells Fargo
HSBC

Some are already offering to negotiate after nearly 90 days, some just 60.

[Lajazz947]

Very interesting. So the payments have to be lump sum?

What percentage did they start at? I would be ecstatic to do some of mine at 20% and find a way to pay a lump sum or 6 payments.

Did you get the impression that maybe 1 years worth of payments was possible?

I guess that anything goes nowadays.

Thanks

[ssdsco]

Very interesting. So the payments have to be lump sum?

What percentage did they start at? I would be ecstatic to do some of mine at 20% and find a way to pay a lump sum or 6 payments.

Did you get the impression that maybe 1 years worth of payments was possible?

I guess that anything goes nowadays.

Thanks

I never talked to the creditors. These offers which I got for all my large debts over $5k were unsolicited. I'd consider them the starting point for negotiations. The offers which had payments up to six months were, get ready for this, drum roll, ZERO percent.

I didn't consider any of the offers because my exempt retirement assets make me solvent for IRS purposes and I'd take a big tax hit.

Your success at negotiation will probably have a lot to do with your situation. If you're judgment execution proof and have access to money from exempt assets or a rich relative and it doesn't look like your situation is going to change anytime soon if ever then you have a lot of negotiating power.

[liz417]

Very interesting. So the payments have to be lump sum?

What percentage did they start at? I would be ecstatic to do some of mine at 20% and find a way to pay a lump sum or 6 payments.

Did you get the impression that maybe 1 years worth of payments was possible?

I guess that anything goes nowadays.

Thanks

Hi Lajazz,
I just got my 1st "offer" from Amex (all my cc know that I'm filing ch 13), anyway, the offer was to reduce the debt $12,500k by 50% at 0% interest. I stopped paying in mid May. I heard that they will negotiate even further as time passes. I am in no position to negotiate since I don't have the extra funds available.


Good Luck!

[Lajazz947]

Hi Lajazz,
I just got my 1st "offer" from Amex (all my cc know that I'm filing ch 13), anyway, the offer was to reduce the debt $12,500k by 50% at 0% interest. I stopped paying in mid May. I heard that they will negotiate even further as time passes. I am in no position to negotiate since I don't have the extra funds available.


Good Luck!

Liz, SSd

Thank you so much for sharing. I am really trying everything that I can to stay out of BK but as I have learned here it IS a tool and nothing else.

My credit will be shot for a while either way so i am just weighing my options. My petition is complete but my attorney wants to review a few things before we take the plunge since it has allot of items that he thinks the trustee will bring up.

He did say however that he feels that most judges are really sympathetic as long as you are not trying to hide something and he has been doing this for 25 years so that's a good sign.

If anyone else has negotiation quotes PLEASE pass them along and I will do the same as I start to speak to some of the CC's.

Thanks again.