341 yesterday....could not have gone worse:(

[berrymom35]

First off:

This tt was hard on everyone. She did not let anyone go without out continuing their case until early next month...no one's went smoothly...I never heard he say.."good luck"..."no asset" or anything that I have read here...they were not 3 minutes...not simple and not easy....she was hard on every single person and everyone had lawyers with them.

Okay, first off our lawyer has been very inattentive to us...we had to barge into her office and force her to file for us after dragging her feet for three weeks after we signed our schedules. They don't return calls...don't answer the phone...and this is basically the paralegal. We only had ONE meeting with the attorney, who showed up barely in time for our 341.

When we first met the the atty, we had planned to file a 13 and keep our big, fancy house. After running the numbers and coming to our senses, we decided to give up the house, new car and our lives and go for a 7. My dh quit his part time job and we lowered our income and made it into range for a 7 and finally filed. Well, when we first met with the attorney we had a whole separate set of expenses to account for the big house...and to make a long story short..she screwed up our schedules and screwed us at the 341.

First, she put the wrong amount for a car payment...she put $230 and it was supposed to be $80. Of course the tt questioned the validity of a 1996 ford range with a payment of $230....then the atty put two separate lines for our children's sports..one for boys and one for our daughter who participates in competitive cheerleading. This costs us easily $100 per month with class fees and costumes...then my boys play football/baseball and do karate...this is all another $100 per month..our atty put one line that said
children's sports and school activities $137 (boy's sports)
Daughter's activities $108 (cheer)
Son's activities $40 (should be school lunches)

also, we had $290 per month for our property taxes, house and personal...they are not in our mortgage payments...also included in that is my taxes as I am self employed.

So, the way it was all titled made it look like there was some duplication. The tt said that if we were to fix it it lools like you might have money left over every month and I doubt that is the case...at least she gave us that much.
Plus, the atty did not put in our hair expenses..which I think is very valid..I have three males in the house that each get $10 hair cuts every month...and a daughter that gets one every other month...and I get a highlight and cut for $100 every two months..so that is $85 per month totaled that was left off completely...the tt also questioned our $250 per month entertainment claim...I told her that it costs our family of 5 $70 to go to the movies one time ...and $20 in fees to get into the public pool...$15 on cheap roller skating night....add going out to eat twice in one month at $50 per shot and we really are not doing a lot! She agreed. Has anyone else had to justify these amounts?

anyway, the tt said that she wanted us to re-do the schedules to show the correct amounts and titles and a couple of documents...one from the people who are owner financing our mortgage and one from dh's parents who we are paying for the truck. They she said she was forwarding our case to the UST and continued it until September 9th...where I guess we will have another 341? Our attorney said it's no big deal and that once we re-do the schedules and get her the paperwork she wants we probably won't have to go back...but what about the part where she said she was forwarding it to the UST?? What does that mean? Our atty just said, "yeah, sometimes that happens?" She is so incompetent and this is all he fault and we are so stessed out I can't even believe it!!!!!!! dh wants to turn them into the bar association for not aiding us in our case properly....can anyone give me any insight here?

I'm honestly on the verge of a nervous breakdown.

[whipster1]

250 for entertainment is a bit much...spread that around to food and electric bills and normal expenses IMO.

[2manybills]

berrymom: I'm sorry that your attorney let you down. I would contact your attorney, and if you do not get a return phone call, I would fax a letter. Tell the attorney you want the corrected schedules filed immediately with a copy approved by you. Tell the attorney that any costs associated with this or dealing with the UST's office is on them.

If you don't get satisfaction, I would turn to your State Bar. It certainly didn't help that the TT was so cranky!

If your attorney corrects everything, you should be okay.

[berrymom35]

She didn't really question that entertainment....mostly the way the kid's activities were worded.....she said there were duplications...and I agree. I should have looked at the schedules before I signed them....we met to sign them the morning we were burying my father...and we were in a hurry...and sad...and trusted that they had everything the way we agreed upon. We can fix the schedules...I'm just worried about this being forwarded to the UST...it makes me nervous.....I don't know what that means or what will happen next...we are below the median...a really pretty open and shut case we thought.

[2manybills]

If everything is corrected, and you have proof of expenses (should that be required) you should be fine.

It's totally understandable when you have had something as devasting as the death of your father to happen that you would not totally read everything you are signing.

[Trybaby]

I'm sorry it didn't go well and that your attorney is not doing the job. My attorney went through all my stuff and made changes before filing. I sure hope mine goes better than yours did. My attorney assured me it would.

I understand the nervous breakdown thing. My stomach is in knots and my meeting isn't until 8/25.

At this point I think you just need to do the $ to the satisfaction of the trustee just to get through it. Breathe deep, try to roll with it. I think we all know the feeling of just wanting it over with.

I'm sorry for your loss. Take care

[HakunaMatata]

First and foremost, I'm sorry to hear about your father. Please give yourself time to heal.

You had an incredibly stressful experience topped off with an aloof, incompetent attorney. I can only imagine your frustration and anxiety. Try to seek comfort in knowing everyone you witnessed endured similar consequences (continued cases). Sure, your numbers were way off; although, the trustee apparently detected "flaws" in all the cases presented during your timeframe.

You may have decided to give up the house and the car...you haven't surrendered your lives. Numbers can be corrected. You've been granted time to do this. And...most importantly, you have your family, you have support, and you're moving forward. Don't let the next 30 days beat you down. You've been given instructions on what needs to be achieved and you have the passion and strength to accomplish this.

Hang in there!!

[bkmaggster]

She didn't really question that entertainment....mostly the way the kid's activities were worded.....she said there were duplications...and I agree. I should have looked at the schedules before I signed them....we met to sign them the morning we were burying my father...and we were in a hurry...and sad...and trusted that they had everything the way we agreed upon. We can fix the schedules...I'm just worried about this being forwarded to the UST...it makes me nervous.....I don't know what that means or what will happen next...we are below the median...a really pretty open and shut case we thought.

I'm sorry you had a stressful time, but I wanted to bold your above statement as a reminder to people reading the board who are about to file. It is your duty to read the schedules you are signing. The trustee is required to ask you if you read the schedules before signing them.

Do not sign schedules without thoroughly reading them first!

[LuciluS]

berrymom, I too am sorry for the loss of your father. I pray you are now concentrating on your Expenses and having validated proof for those expenses.

Take your list with you when you go to the Attorney's office to sign the Amended Schedules and compare them. If there are mistakes, please have your Attorney complete the Schedules with the correct information and do not sign them until he does. He will probably try to rush you (based on the info, you gave him). If he does, just tell him nicely, this is our Chapter 7 and I'm going to make darn sure what we sign has the Right dollar amounts in the appropriated places.

Good Luck and once again, my sympathies in the loss of your father.

Luci

[Annie4]

I'm so sorry about your father berrymom, my step dad (since I was 2 years old) passed away as I was filing myself and everything just seems so much worse than it already is.

We had a horrible attorney at first, that office was like a bunch of circus freako's and we ended the relationship as I began reading about pro se.

The attorney's clerk was on the phone with her 2 boys most of all of our appointments and we never could get any answers out of her. Never saw the attorney at all. The man answering the phone said we wouldn't be getting a refund for what we paid because they are "just like any other b'ness....McDonald's, Walmart, etc.....and we signed that we knew we would get no refund".....and I said, "yeah, well we will see about that and we certainly got the same legal help that we would have at Walmart or McDonald's too buddy!" lol

I thought, "Ok....I can read, so surely I can do this since there's no way we can pay that any time soon?"

I hope you feel better and get it all worked out. This forum is awesome, I'm sure you'll find some answers.

[NewLifeAhead]

berriemom and Annie4.. My condolences to you and your families for your losses. It is stressful enough to go through a bk let alone going through it at the same time loosing a family member.

Our prayers are with you and best of luck to you for the remainder of your cases.

[banca rotta]

I'm sorry you had a stressful time, but I wanted to bold your above statement as a reminder to people reading the board who are about to file. It is your duty to read the schedules you are signing. The trustee is required to ask you if you read the schedules before signing them.

Do not sign schedules without thoroughly reading them first!

I too am sorry. I agree the most with maggster's reply.

I have posted many times on other threads for a case to be successful the filer really has to do all the work and just hand your last dollar to the attorney to act as a puppet on your behalf at the meeting.

It's so painful when these things happen. You pay the attorney and it goes like this.

As for the UST that's anyone's guess. I won't even speculate.


Good luck!

[Annie4]

ty ty

I also had to redo all of my schedules because the date was a month off. I did it sitting right there at the clerks office, she printed my schedules for me, because I didn't save my own copy like I should have, and she even told my 14 yr old son to take that pen and help me fill in the spots because we had 45 min to do it, lol. The first clerk was a ding dong, but that second one was so nice and helpful.

If you're filling them out over time (took me about a month, off and on, to do it slowly and get it all right. I kept almost chickening out, lol)....make sure you don't sign and date it until the day you're ready to take them and file. It has to be dated within a day, or that same day here or you get a notice and have to redo them. This tip should probably be in another place around here somewhere? lol