I filed--question about on-going fees and credit reporting

[sailing2013]

I recently filed, and I have a question about fees and credit reporting.

1) Since I've filed, does this mean the creditors can no longer charge fees and interest to my account? I thought I read somewhere that filing "freezes" your accounts.

2) Relatedly, since I've filed, does this mean creditors no longer age the information they send to the credit reporting agencies? That is, since I was 30-days late on an account when I filed, the creditor will not now report me as 60-days, 90-days, etc.

Cheers,
Steve

[Pjmax]

Your credit reports will take awhile to catch up. Mine were evolving until about a month after discharge. Any fees, interest accrued, if there are any, doesn't matter, because your BK'd accounts will (should) eventually show a 0 balance, included or discharged in BK. Any lates incurred up until filing can remain on your account. Transunion (sometimes) and Equifax will generally erase payment history on BK accounts. Experian does not.

Once discharged, you may have some report cleanup to do, to get everything reporting correctly.

[bcohen]

1) Since I've filed, does this mean the creditors can no longer charge fees and interest to my account? I thought I read somewhere that filing "freezes" your accounts.

Filing for bankruptcy only "freezes your accounts" in the sense that your credit card issuers will cancel the accounts and decline any attempted purchases--even if the card was in good standing or paid off prior to filing. It does not prevent your creditors from adding fees and interest to your accounts, and reporting the new balance each month to the credit bureaus. Eventually, when the discharge is granted, the creditors are required by law to zero out the balances, so the fees and interest which they add during the pendency of your case are really "funny money" which will never be paid.

2) Relatedly, since I've filed, does this mean creditors no longer age the information they send to the credit reporting agencies? That is, since I was 30-days late on an account when I filed, the creditor will not now report me as 60-days, 90-days, etc.

I wish this were true, but sadly it's not. Some creditors will stop reporting new derogatory information, as soon as they receive notice of your bankruptcy filing, but most will not. I know that Discover Bank likes to report a new charge-off status every month, for the purpose of torpedoing my credit score, and this debt has been charged-off since November of 2009! The JDB which bought my Citibank MasterCard debt also likes to report the new balance each month, and report a new charge-off status as well.

Once the discharge is granted, you can be sure that I will go after these creditors for damages if they don't cease and desist from further negative credit reporting, and zero out the balances owed.

[sailing2013]

Thanks for the insightful information!