Dealing with not-so-nice paralegal

[Footprints1973]

We are just getting to file for our BK. Up until now, we have only dealt with our attorney, and he's been very nice, reassuring, and nonjudgemental.

So yesterday one of his paralegals called us during dinner to go over some questions she had on our paperwork. She talked to my DH. She was pretty rude. She said, "Why are you filing? You've been paying on your credit cards. Most people who file haven't paid on them." My DH said we paid our CCs for the last time a couple days before we met with our attorney. That was about a month ago (So yes, we have just missed our payments for the first time ever--but they are HUGE payments). We were making minimum payments for months and not using them for even longer. He advised us it to stop paying them and get ready to file.

We had to list 3 checking accts on our paperwork. One of them is ours. The others are for DH's grandmother. They have lots of money in them, but none of our money goes in there. It's all grandmas. It clearly lists on the account that his name is on there for estate planning purposes only (I believe its called Right of Surviorship or something like that). She said, "Well isn't that your money too?" The lawyer clearly advised us that it is not our property/asset, since all the money going in there is related to her annuites/social security, etc.

On our paperwork, we had listed the name of our church and that we had donated about $25 a month or so to them. She asked us for the street address of our church (which we've been going to for only a year). My DH gave him the street name and town but we did not have the exact address. She said "You mean you don't know your church's address?" Um, no. Sorry...I don't know the address of the church I went to before that for 15 years. Does that make me an idiot?

Just when we were starting to feel better, this person who is supposed to be on our side belittles us...

My Dh did call the attorney and tell him how his paralegal spoke to us. I don't know what exactly was said (have to talk to DH after work) but he told us not to worry, we were doing everything right.


I just needed to vent. Thanks for listening.

[ameliabedilia]

That reminds me of the nurse ratchett I had when I had my first baby. I chose not to do lamaze. When I checked in in active labor she told me to do my lamaze exercises and when I told her I didn't know those she said "You didn't take LAMAZE?" I was having contractions about a minute apart and she was talking to me like this. When she came back a little later, she said, "lamaze would have been really helpful right now". I could have killed her- so unnecessary and rude.
Don't stress about it- you are the customer and the lawyer wants your money, so it's good you talked to her boss. This is just a little annoyance on your path to financial peace of mind!

[Footprints1973]

ameiliabedila, your response about the Lamaze nurse made me chuckle. Everyone knows not to say anything to a woman in labor except, would you like some drugs?"

Anyway, thanks for your response! I needed it

[Flamingo]

If that paralegal called you during the dinner hour, believe me, she probably had a long hard day of details. But she still should have been courteous to you, there is no reason for that. As to the address for the church thing, that is information that she has to obtain from you as she just can't guess that information for you and supply incorrect information. Apparently she was given information on your case to obtain and was not familiar with your case at all, but your attorney is/was. Hopefully your call about the situation will remind her she has a job to do along with showing respect/courtesy.

I am laughing at the LAMAZE quip above....that was nothing - I had the world's worst battle-axe nurse when I had my second daughter at Irwin Army Hospital at Fort Riley, TX back in the 70s. There is no one on this earth that could have compared to that woman; I think she just hated mankind period - LOL!

[Flamingo]

Whoops.....Fort Riley - KANSAS, not TX!

[AngelinaCat]

Be verrrryyy careful....

We had to list 3 checking accts on our paperwork. One of them is ours. The others are for DH's grandmother. They have lots of money in them, but none of our money goes in there. It's all grandmas. It clearly lists on the account that his name is on there for estate planning purposes only (I believe its called Right of Surviorship or something like that). She said, "Well isn't that your money too?" The lawyer clearly advised us that it is not our property/asset, since all the money going in there is related to her annuites/social security, etc.

Laura

Be VERY careful of the accounts belonging to grandma. Make sure you get a really good understanding of how to handle it from your attorney.

We had a check come in to us that we could not get cashed anywhere, as we didn't have a local bank account, our CU is in another state, and some of the idiotic particulars of the situation was that it was drawn on BOA, and needed to be processed through BOA. Our god-daughter has an account there, and to help us out, had our names added to her account for the one-time purpose of cashing this check. That done, now the problem was to get our names OFF the account. In order to do so, g-daughter would have to close the account entirely and open a brand new one with all kinds of fees, etc., so we left the matter there and went on our ways.

Later, when the sale of the Mortgage Note was discovered, and our Trustee called for a 2004(b) examination, our attorney learned of this account. She SCREAMED at us over the cell phone: [talk about Nurse Ratchett? Her lawyer abilities are about as equal.]:

Att: "Why didn't you tell me about this account?"
Us: "We don't own it. It's not ours, never has been."
Att: "Your names are ON it. That's your money, therefore an asset."
Us: "No it isn't. We don't use it, never have. This was a one-time thing to cash a check."
Att: "The privacy laws prevent me from going and finding out what is in your names. That account is yours. You should have told me."
Us: "Ma'am, the account has NEVER been ours, is not ours now. We don't use it, or have anything to do with it. You could have asked us 10 zillion times if we had any other bank accounts, and we would have kept telling you NO, because we don't OWN this one."

And it went on. But apparently, and we are in Florida if that makes a difference, if your name is on an account of any kind, legally, you own it.

This is a long story and I hate to keep repeating it, but if you are interested, do a search on our nicnames, AngelinaCat, and AngelinaCatHub, with key words 'mortgage note', 'insider', 'preferrential payments', and '2004(b) Examination', and you should pull up the highlights.

I sure don't want anyone else to go through what we have. BTW we started out trying for a 13, and had to go 7 when I lost my job.

Good luck to you.

[liz417]

Footprints,

How rude of that paralegal! Regardless of how long/tough of a day she had, it doesn't matter. For a majority of us, this is a very difficult and emotional process, so I'm glad your hubby called the attorney, hopefully he reprimanded her!

Oh, the nurse stories...hee,hee. I had an "experience" with a nurse, I won't get into details, but she had the nerve to drive around with a license plate that read: <heart>ngnurse..."loving nurse" my a**!! She had no "bed side manners!!" Memories...

[Footprints1973]

Be VERY careful of the accounts belonging to grandma. Make sure you get a really good understanding of how to handle it from your attorney.

We had a check come in to us that we could not get cashed anywhere, as we didn't have a local bank account, our CU is in another state, and some of the idiotic particulars of the situation was that it was drawn on BOA, and needed to be processed through BOA. Our god-daughter has an account there, and to help us out, had our names added to her account for the one-time purpose of cashing this check. That done, now the problem was to get our names OFF the account. In order to do so, g-daughter would have to close the account entirely and open a brand new one with all kinds of fees, etc., so we left the matter there and went on our ways.

Later, when the sale of the Mortgage Note was discovered, and our Trustee called for a 2004(b) examination, our attorney learned of this account. She SCREAMED at us over the cell phone: [talk about Nurse Ratchett? Her lawyer abilities are about as equal.]:

Att: "Why didn't you tell me about this account?"
Us: "We don't own it. It's not ours, never has been."
Att: "Your names are ON it. That's your money, therefore an asset."
Us: "No it isn't. We don't use it, never have. This was a one-time thing to cash a check."
Att: "The privacy laws prevent me from going and finding out what is in your names. That account is yours. You should have told me."
Us: "Ma'am, the account has NEVER been ours, is not ours now. We don't use it, or have anything to do with it. You could have asked us 10 zillion times if we had any other bank accounts, and we would have kept telling you NO, because we don't OWN this one."

And it went on. But apparently, and we are in Florida if that makes a difference, if your name is on an account of any kind, legally, you own it.

This is a long story and I hate to keep repeating it, but if you are interested, do a search on our nicnames, AngelinaCat, and AngelinaCatHub, with key words 'mortgage note', 'insider', 'preferrential payments', and '2004(b) Examination', and you should pull up the highlights.

I sure don't want anyone else to go through what we have. BTW we started out trying for a 13, and had to go 7 when I lost my job.

Good luck to you.

Ok, I am a worried again. (sigh) I am in FL too. The very first thing we asked our attorney was about grandma's bank accts. My DH is afraid the court will go after her money. He assured us no. The account has his listed as "Right of Surviorship" which means is for estate planning purposes....he is basically her Power of Attorney in case she should become incapicitated or pass away (she is 86). I hope our attorney is right, he's been doing bankruptcy for many, many years and has a good reputation in our area, having represented several businesses and such....now I don't know what to believe.

[AngelinaCat]

Hi Laura: I didn't mean to scare you, but I didn't want what happened to us to happen to anyone else. The "Right of Survivorship" probably does safeguard the accounts. I have looked up what the Florida Statutes says and it is somewhat confusing:

http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm

Our situation with the god-daughter’s account wasn’t that way at all, even though we do have a Power of Attorney for her.

My experience with ‘Joint Tenancy” and “Right of Survivorship” was this:

When my mother and aunt (on my father’s side) got up in age and in poor health, we had to do something to plan for the future. There was a large piece of land involved that I was going to inherit, and my mother’s brother was flapping around like a giant buzzard waiting for the spoils. He wanted the property for his land-speculating son.

We talked with our attorney at the time—a very good one who is now a judge—and he told us that Florida’s inheritance laws were written such that I would inherit the land and ‘uncle’ couldn’t touch it because the inheritance trail goes downward, not sideways unless my mother had not had me. Still, being paranoid like I am, I wanted it in writing. So the attorney added my name to the deed with the clauses of “Joint Tenancy” and “Right of Survivorship” added. And that settled that and ‘uncle’ for the most part, left me alone. I was an only child, so that helped too. All this took place in 1983-85, so the laws may have changed since then.

Just make sure you and your attorney have a very good understanding of all this. And I hope and pray everything works out for you.

Unfortunately, god-daughter’s bank account is causing us even more grief. But that will come in a separate thread.

[AngelinaCatHub]

Ok, I am a worried again. (sigh) I am in FL too, probably same district as you. (middle FL). I am in the St. Pete area. The very first thing we asked our attorney was about grandma's bank accts. My DH is afraid the court will go after her money. He assured us no. The account has his listed as "Right of Surviorship" which means is for estate planning purposes....he is basically her Power of Attorney in case she should become incapicitated or pass away (she is 86). I hope our attorney is right, he's been doing bankruptcy for many, many years and has a good reputation in our area, having represented several businesses and such....now I don't know what to believe.

Laura

Please be aware, a Power of Attorney dies with the person. That is where the Executor of a will comes in. While she is alive, you have power to do her business, after death, you have no power at all. She needs a will. 'Hub

[AngelinaCat]

I need to add to what 'Hub said. If grandma becomes incompacitated, such as with Heartburn's problem, a relative with Alzheimer's, a simple Power of Attorney is no good either. My good lawyer that I referred to above, drew up a 'Durable Family Power of Attorney' for me to have for my mother. My mother had Alzheimer's and I had to handle her business.

[cool33097]

The secret is: tell your attorney everything so she/he is prepare for it. Once the attorney finds out information later in the game the "kind" lose their trust on you.