Can small payments stall a lawsuit?

[tatt2monster]

My CH 7 won't be filed until Dec 1st, which will be 15 months after I stopped paying on my major credit cards. I have 3: 2 with Chase and 1 with Capital One. They are all under 4,000. The original debt is actually 3,000 for each, but there have been tons of fees n penalties since I stopped paying. One of the Chase debts was already sold to a CA/Attorney that threatened to take me to Superior Court but they stopped when I retained a BK attorney. That was in March.

Does anybody think they might try again? Or that the others will try? Would small payments stall it? Or even contacting them informing them of my intent to file BK; albeit against my attorney's advice (They feel I should wait until they contact me). But they have no way to reach me since my cell phone got shut off for nonpayment.

[HHM]

Small payments will not stall, especially once they have gone to 3rd parties.

[Bell30656]

Don't waste your money with making small payments in an attempt to stall. It's time to read up a bit on your state's civil procedure rules. If anyone actually files suit against you, first they have to serve you and then you get to start the dance. Just because someone files a lawsuit doesn't mean they will ever see a dime.

For example; I had a JDB filed two suits on me (different debts). I was served on the first suit November 2007. The second suit was served February 2008. (Both in Superior Court) Then to ice the cake an OC filed in Magistrate Court to which I was served November 2008.

I filed CH7 in December 2008 and none of the suits had made it to court yet. Court calendars are crowded and well procedure takes time. Lucky for me Georgia does not charge any fees when filing an answer or other paperwork for the defendant in a suit. My costs? A few dollars in certified letter postage and $50 for a mandatory arbitration period that went no where.

[treehugger1]

This is another example of how the enitre system is screwed up. Why on earth does your attorney care whether or not you tell a creditor/CA you are filing for BK? Unless, there is a reason you need to stall and the attorney doesn't want you to file yet. Even then, if you do some very deep research on this site, you will discover where attorneys helped folks stall BK for months. Why are you stalling?

Perhaps your attorney wants to be in a position where he/she sees your BK as nothing other than paper/electronic-filing your documents. This costs him/her literally nothing compared to what your pay him/her for the BK. Any additional suits/judgments/etc costs you more and your attorney more in terms of time and effort.

When you received your dunning letter from the CA, did you follow up with a request for verification of debt, or a cease-and-desist communications letter? This does not seem important, as you stated the CA-law firm stopped action when they had your attorney's name. Since you do have an attorney, give your creditors/CA's your attorney's number and tell them to pound sand. Or, educate yourself and start answering CA letters within your civil rights.

I agree that small payments won't make much difference in whether or not you are sent to collections or sued. These giant CC companies are operating in an electronic medium. There is little or no "humanistic" side to the story. In my opinion, if you are not paying the minimum balance (first default,) then you are no different than someonw who stops paying everything. You are in default, and I don't think there is a great deal of difference in how default is defined. Either you are paying as agreed , or you are not.

Just my opinion here

[tatt2monster]

Treehugger-correct, my attorney specializes in BK's and deals in volume, I'm sure they want as little involved in my BK as possible. I'm not hearing from CAs via letters or phone calls at all right now and thats what scares me. My cell phone was shut off and many of them can't reach me but it seems odd I wouldn't still be getting letters. I don't give an F about the CA's, but I honestly don't see the harm in calling all my original creditors informing them of my BK. I'm the one stalling; I had a lot of cash expenditures early this year, if I can just wait a few more months, my BK will be a lot less complicated.

Bigboy-I'm still gathering the money I need to pay attorney. I recently got a new job and when I add financial aid money for room n board, I will be over my cash on hand allowance that I want to spend down in the event they tell me I have to file a 13, although I make under 30K per year and will probably have no issue passing first part of means test, but I'm so overwhelmed with info that I want to be safe about it.

Here are my debts:

Hospital 1000
Capital One Visa 3000
Chase Visa 4000 Lawsuit threatened; notified of BK and they backed down
Chase MC 4000
Health Club 500
Electric Bill 75
Water Bill 75 Not notified; intend to reaffirm after BK
Tmobile 550 Notified of BK
Friend 150 Notified; will reaffirm after BK
Liberty Mutual 150

I believe I can contact the smaller creditors and they'd all be willing to work with me; the credit cards are another ballgame, but if they were willing to take $100 each per month and stop adding late fees and penalties then it's possible I can avoid BK or at least put it on the back burner for now.

One last thing, its been about 9 months since I stopped paying. I intend to file no later than October of this year; after some careful thought I decided not to involve next years tax return if I can avoid it.

[tatt2monster]

Oh my gosh, I have taken all the precautions you mentioned and then some. My roommate is to never tell anyone that shows up or calls that I'm "at work" and I would never volunteer that info to creditors. I have opened new accounts at two diff't banks and I do not owe money to either. I was doing a lot of cash only transactions around January and February and people in here told me I shouldn't do that because there is no way to prove the cash was actually spent or something like that. I have receipts for large purchases, but not for little things like coffee because I had no idea I'd be filing back then.

Bottom line, I will be filing early September or before.