What is all of the talk about bankruptcy these days? Quite simply, it is the section of the federal law that will allow a person who is in an extreme amount of debt to get a “fresh start”. It will reduce the amount of debt that is required to be paid back as well as extend the time period in which the debt must be repaid. Will you need a bankruptcy attorney to help you sort through all of this? The answer is a resounding YES and let me explain why.

The bankruptcy laws are often referred to by their chapter number in the Bankruptcy Code. Debtors may file under five different chapters; three of them are for individuals: Chapter 7, which refers to Liquidation, Chapter 11, which refers to Reorganization, and Chapter 13, which refers to Reorganization.

The laws have really changed in recent years as far as bankruptcy goes, and you are now required to sit through a course before you will even know if bankruptcy is the way you should and even can proceed. That’s right, it is no longer YOUR choice about declaring bankruptcy; the judge must approve it. This will help to determine whether you can have your debts erased through Chapter 7 of the bankruptcy laws or whether you have to enter a type of repayment plan through Chapter 13. It is better to acquire the services of a bankruptcy attorney before deciding to blindly strike off on your own. When consulting with your bankruptcy attorney, he or she will make sure that you file all of the necessary forms to discharge the debt.

That is just one of the reasons you want a good and qualified bankruptcy attorney because if you make a mistake on those forms, your case may get thrown out and you are right back to where you started. Or you may mistakenly present yourself on the forms so that you only get approved for Reorganization instead of Liquidation, which means you still have all your debts.

There are a numerous ways that the new bankruptcy laws will have their effects on debtors:

* A strict financial means test must be taken that will not allow many debtors to file under Chapter 7.

* Debtors have to receive a briefing from a credit counseling agency that has been approved for this. The debtor must do this at least 6 months before filing a bankruptcy case.

* Debtors must also take a class that has been approved on debt management techniques before receiving their bankruptcy discharge. Yes, these two steps are mandatory, even though the majority of people who file do not do so because of financial mismanagement.

* It is now easier for a court to be able to dismiss a bankruptcy case altogether or convert a Chapter 7 case to a Chapter 13 case

* It is now permitted for a court to impose sanctions on lawyers or on debtors for filing a Chapter 7 case that either had been dismissed or was converted to a Chapter 13 case.

How can a Bankruptcy Attorney Solve Credit Problems?

Bankruptcy attorneys are lawyers that specialize in bankruptcy law. They provide legal means for an individual or a business to either wipe out debts or resolve them.

Bankruptcy attorneys explain to their clients the primary purposes and applications as to how the bankruptcy laws now specifically apply to them in their unique situation. They may give such pertinent information to their clients as to under what chapter they may file, what bills are allowed to be eliminated, the length of time that payments can be extended, the possessions that are allowed to be kept, and all of the other details concerning bankruptcy.

A bankruptcy attorney will properly present your case for Chapter 7, which involves liquidation and debtor rehabilitation, or Chapter 13 which is reorganization, which is probably not what you had in mind when you decided to file. This involves a court-approved plan of reorganization as well as payment of the debt over a certain time period using future earnings.

If you are on the fence as to whether you should hire a bankruptcy attorney, you are strongly advised to you do so. There are many stories, including a couple who had the misfortune of having to apply for bankruptcy and they thought they could file online. It turns out that they filled in the paperwork in the wrong way and consequently the debts that the wife had were left intact as they only filed singly and not jointly. Don’t make that same mistake. You will be out attorney fees in the short run, but you will more than make it up when your debts are discharged.

To find a Pre-Screened Lawyer in your area, please call our 24Hr Unbiased Lawyer Referral Hotline at 661-310-7999.

This interesting article addresses some of the key issues regarding credit,credit card,zerocredit,how to get credit. A careful reading of this material could make a big difference in how you think about credit,credit card,zerocredit,how to get credit.

Practically everyone in the United States has credit cards. From teenagers to retirees, almost everyone has at least one credit card. Everywhere we go we see ads – in the television, radio, newspapers, billboard advertisements – on credit cards. Some credit cards are even mailed directly to our homes. But what are credit cards, why should you have one and what are some of the risks involved?

Simply stated, a credit card is a financial arrangement between you, the consumer or the card holder, and an institution such as a bank. The arrangement specifies that you borrow money from the lending institution with the promise that you will pay them back in the future. The institution agrees that it will provide the money you need and in-turn you are expected to return payment over a certain period of time. Your payment will include not just the amount of money you borrowed, but also an additional charge based on a pre-defined rate of interest.

Credit can provide various services, making it an indispensable tool for today’s consumers. These include:

Convenience. You saw this wonderful dress in a shop. Perfect for tonight’s party, you thought. But you don’t have money right now. Thanks to your card, you can buy anything you want right now. Credit cards give you that wonderful allowance not to bring that much cash and to order goods from catalogs. In addition, many of the online-based shops and stores, such as Amazon.com, mainly accept payment using credit.

Emergency Protection. For emergency situation, credit cards can be an extremely helpful tool that could be your friend that could pay for your emergency needs, like when your car conked out in the road, or your mother gets hospitalized, or any emergency situations that you need money but can’t get it from the usual means.

Putting you in the right budget. Want to keep a detailed record of your expenditures? Credit cards can do that.

Security. In today’s world, carrying large cash has become a problem. If your cash gets lost, there’s no way you can retrieve it. Compared with credit cards, money cannot be returned back when it got lost or stolen. If your card, for example, got broken or it got lost or someone stole it from you, you can always ask for a credit card termination or cancellation. You will have another card, a new one that will replace it in a few days.

Traveling. If you’re quite a traveler, whether across the town or country, or outside the US, it is relatively easier to travel with a credit card.

When used responsibly, credit cards can help improve our daily lives. With credit cards, life can be much easier. However, the joy of using credit cards can quickly change to a curse!

Are you starting to get notices from creditors to pay or “else”? Are you worried that you might lose your properties like your house because of credit debt? Chin up: Dealing with credit card debt is not as hard as you may think.

And, if there’s any consolation, you’re not the only one facing such situations. At some point, many people like you face financial crises with credit card debt.

Sometimes the most important aspects of a subject are not immediately obvious. Keep reading to get the complete picture.

Here are some simple tips to help you cope with your credit card debt:

Make a Budget.

If you want to have a grab of your financial situation before you lose everything, making a budget is what you should do first. Assess how much do you get from your income or other means and your expenditures. For example, if getting that posh apartment means you have to limit your meals to once a day, then it is not a great and sound budgeting decision. Your goal is ensure that you can answer for all the basic necessities: food, housing, clothes, health-related costs, among others.

Contact Your Creditors.

Remember: Running away from your creditors is not the answer. It is not a solution, and may in fact lead you to bigger problems. If you are having trouble paying off your debts, address this immediately with your creditors. State to them sincerely and fully the reason why it has become hard for you to pay these debts, and check if they could give you a revised payment arrangement that will put you at ease on your payment terms. Do not let creditors turn over your situation to someone or an agency to do the collecting for them, as this means that they have given up on you.

Address Debt Collectors.

There is a law that gives certain conditions for debt collectors as to when and how they should ask you to pay. The federal law, Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, clearly states that those collecting debts may not bug you, give false assertions, or do practices that are not fair when they are getting to collect money from you.

Get Credit Counseling.

You could also consider getting the aid of groups or institutions that will help you in your problems. If you managed to have an improved payment arrangement of your debt with a good credit counseling organization, creditors may approve of your proposition and accept your modified arrangement plan..

Bankruptcy.

Generally, personal bankruptcy is known as the last choice to fix your ballooning credit debt. A bankruptcy unfortunately stays on your financial information report for years. Getting additional credit, buying a house, sometimes even getting a job might be hard for you. Technically, however, it is a legal way of addressing your credit debt.

Enjoy the use of credit to make your life easier. . .BUT don’t let it become a nightmare! Learn to use your credit responsibly.

Hopefully the sections above have contributed to your understanding of credit,credit card,zerocredit,how to get credit. Share your new understanding about credit,credit card,zerocredit,how to get credit with others. They’ll thank you for it.

After receiving over 60,000 comments, federal banking regulators passed new rules late last year to curb harmful credit card industry practices. These new rules go into effect in 2010 and could provide relief to many debt-burdened consumers. Here are those practices, how the new regulations address them and what you need to know about these new rules.

1. Late Payments

Some credit card companies went to extraordinary lengths to cause cardholder payments to be late. For example, some companies set the date to August 5, but also set the cutoff time to 1:00 pm so that if they received the payment on August 5 at 1:05 pm, they could consider the payment late. Some companies mailed statements out to their cardholders just days before the payment due date so cardholders wouldn’t have enough time to mail in a payment. As soon as one of these tactics worked, the credit card company would slap the cardholder with a $35 late fee and hike their APR to the default interest rate. People saw their interest rates go from a reasonable 9.99 percent to as high as 39.99 percent overnight just because of these and similar tricks of the credit card trade.

The new rules state that credit card companies cannot consider a payment late for any reason “unless consumers have been provided a reasonable amount of time to make the payment.” They also state that credit companies can comply with this requirement by “adopting reasonable procedures designed to ensure that periodic statements are mailed or delivered at least 21 days before the payment due date.” However, credit card companies cannot set cutoff times earlier than 5 pm and if creditors set due dates that coincide with dates on which the US Postal Service does not deliver mail, the creditor must accept the payment as on-time if they receive it on the following business day.

This rule mostly impacts cardholders who often pay their bill on the due date instead of a little early. If you fall into this category, then you will want to pay close attention to the postmarked date on your credit card statements to make sure they were sent at least 21 days before the due date. Of course, you should still strive to make your payments on time, but you should also insist that credit card companies consider on-time payments as being on time. Furthermore, these rules do not go into effect until 2010, so be on the lookout for an increase in late-payment-inducing tricks during 2009.

2. Allocation of Payments

Did you know that your credit card account likely has more than one interest rate? Your statement only shows one balance, but the credit card companies divide your balance into different types of charges, such as balance transfers, purchases and cash advances.

Here’s an example: They lure you with a zero or low percent balance transfer for several months. After you get comfortable with your card, you charge a purchase or two and make all your payments on time. However, purchases are assessed an 18 percent APR, so that portion of your balance is costing you the most — and the credit card companies know it and are counting on it. So, when you send in your payment, they apply all of your payment to the zero or low percent portion of your balance and let the higher interest portion sit there untouched, racking up interest charges until all of the balance transfer portion of the balance is paid off (and this could take a long time because balance transfers are typically larger than purchases because they consist of multiple, previous purchases). Essentially, the credit card companies were rigging their payment system to maximize its profits — all at the expense of your financial wellbeing.

The new rules state that the amount paid above the minimum monthly payment must be distributed across the different portions of the balance, not just to the lowest interest portion. This reduces the amount of interest charges cardholders pay by reducing higher-interest portions sooner. It may also reduce the amount of time it takes to pay off balances.

This rule will only affect cardholders who pay more than the minimum monthly payment. If you only make the minimum monthly payment, then you will still likely end up taking years, possibly decades, to pay off your balances. However, if you adopt a policy of always paying more than the minimum, then this new rule will directly benefit you. Of course, paying more than the minimum is always a good idea, so don’t wait until 2010 to start.

3. Universal Default

Universal default is one of the most controversial practices of the credit card industry. Universal default is when Bank A raises your credit card account’s APR when you are late paying Bank B, even if you’re not or have never been late paying Bank A. The practice gets more interesting when Bank A gives itself the right, through contractual disclosures, to increase your APR for any event impacting your credit worthiness. So, if your credit score lowers by one point, say “Goodbye” to your low, introductory APR. To make matters worse, this APR increase will be applied to your entire balance, not just on new purchases. So, that new pair of shoes you bought at 9.99 percent APR is now costing you 29.99 percent.

The new rules require credit card companies “to disclose at account opening the rates that will apply to the account” and prohibit increases unless “expressly permitted.” Credit card companies can increase interest rates for new transactions as long as they provide 45 days advanced notice of the new rate. Variable rates can increase when based on an index that increases (for example, if you have a variable rate that is prime plus two percent, and the prime rate increase one percent, then your APR will increase with it). Credit card companies can increase an account’s interest rate when the cardholder is “more than 30 days delinquent.”

This new rule impacts cardholders who make payments on time because, from what the rule says, if a cardholder is more than 30 days late in paying, all bets are off. So, as long as you pay on time and don’t open an account in which the credit card company discloses every possible interest rate to give itself permission to charge whatever APR it wants, you should benefit from this new rule. You should also pay close attention to notices from your credit card company and keep in mind that this new rule does not take effect until 2010, giving the credit card industry all of 2009 to hike interest rates for whatever reasons they can dream up.

4. Two-Cycle Billing

Interest rate charges are based on the average daily balance on the account for the billing period (one month). You carry a balance everyday and the balance might be different on some days. The amount of interest the credit card company charges is not based on the ending balance for the month, but the average of every day’s ending balance.

So, if you charge $5000 at the first of the month and pay off $4999 on the 15th, the company takes your daily balances and divides them by the number of days in that month and then multiplies it by the applicable APR. In this case, your daily average balance would be $2,333.87 and your finance charge on a 15% APR account would be $350.08. Now, imagine that you paid off that extra $1 on the first of the following month. You would think that you should owe nothing on the next month’s bill, right? Wrong. You’d get a bill for $175.04 because the credit card company charges interest on your daily average balance for 60 days, not 30 days. It is essentially reaching back into the past to drum-up more interest charges (the only industry that can legally travel time, at least until 2010). This is two-cycle (or double-cycle) billing.

The new rule expressly prohibits credit card companies from reaching back into previous billing cycles to calculate interest charges. Period. Gone… and good riddance!

5. High Fees on Low Limit Accounts

You may have seen the credit card advertisements claiming that you can open an account with a credit limit of “up to” $5000. The operative term is “up to” because the credit card company will issue you a credit limit based on your credit rating and income and often issues much lower credit limits than the “up to” amount. But what happens when the credit limit is a lot lower — I mean A LOT lower — than the advertised “up to” amount?

College students and subprime consumers (those with low credit scores) often found that the “up to” account they applied for came back with credit limits in the low hundreds, not thousands. To make things worse, the credit card company charged an account opening fee that swallowed up a large portion of the issued credit limit on the account. So, all the cardholder was getting was just a little more credit than he or she needed to pay for opening the account (is your head spinning yet?) and sometimes ended up charging a purchase (not knowing about the large setup fee already charged to the account) that triggered over-limit penalties — causing the cardholder to incur more debt than justified.

The new rules place restrictions on how much credit card companies can charge for these account setup or membership fees and requires that they spread out these fees over at least a six-month period if these fees consume more than 25 percent of the account’s credit limit.

What now?

It’s 2009 and these rules don’t take effect until 2010. So, credit card companies have one year to wreck havoc on consumers (not that they haven’t been doing so over the past 30 years). So, you’ll need to keep your eyes open for an increase in tricks designed to plummet you into more debt and make a habit of insisting that these companies abide by the new rules of the game once they kick into action in 2010. However, there are three universal points to live by to get the most out of these new rules: always read your cardholder agreement and notices, always pay on time and always pay more (much more) than the minimum monthly payment.

Time to Get Out of Debt

These new rules may also have other side effects. Some credit card companies are already lowering credit limits and increasing the minimum monthly payment amount from around two percent of the outstanding balance to as much as five percent. So, some cardholders may see their payments double and this could cause a lot of problems for cash-strapped consumers. This just means that there is no better time than now to start getting yourself out of debt and out from under the thumbs of the credit card banks.

There are a few ways to get out of debt. Bankruptcy is often an obvious option for people financially pinned against the wall, but the 2005 bankruptcy law revision made it more difficult for many consumers. Consumer credit counseling is another option that’s popular, but it involves more organizational relief than financial relief. Debt settlement is growing in popularity because it provides financial relief through negotiated reduction in the amount owed, but people looking to enroll with a debt settlement company should make sure they are dealing with a well-established, reputable company. Alternatively, some people trying to get out of debt can negotiate their own debt-reduction settlements with the help of do-it-yourself debt settlement kits.  Do-it-yourself debt settlement kits are available online and are less expensive than a professional, third-party debt settlement program.

A newfound study has concluded that consumers have increased their debt by 3.6% last year after increasing at 8.6% in 2004. Over the same two-year period, minimum monthly payments have increased by 10%. Experian’s “National Score Index” also found that the number of late payments increased by nearly 20% between 2004 and 2006. The “Index” is based upon a nationwide analogy of the millions of consumer credit profiles. These figures exclude mortgage debt.

In February of 2004, the average debt was $10,371 with average credit card payments of $489.00.

In February of 2005, average debt from credit cards rose to $11,261.

In February of 2006, average debt from credit cards rose to $11,669.
Source: Experian’s National Score Index

These are simply that-averages. Most people have much more credit card debt than the listed $11,669.

There is a logic behind all of this madness and it is both disturbing and threatening. Should you be late 3 days on one credit card, it will be listed on your credit file as being 30 days late. That is the format that the credit bureaus use to categorize tardiness. If you are 31 days late, that card will be disclosed as being 60 days late and so on. You get the general idea.

Now for the disturbing part. While you are late on one credit card, the remainder of your card companies are monitoring your credit file on a daily basis. When they see that you have been late on one card, they can and will raise your interest rate to whatever they choose. This is perfectly acceptable, as they were the largest contributor to the last political campaign. Notice that I did not say that it was legal, only acceptable.

You see, credit card companies want you to be late, either with them or someone else. It makes them a lot of money in the long-run. With the new bankruptcy laws that went into effect, you will be bankrupt before you are ever even able to file bankruptcy. And, after you do file, you will have to pay (out of your pocket) to attend credit counseling classes. In these classes, the credit counseling agency will basically decide whether or not you are a candidate for bankruptcy! If you are a candidate, you can stand to lose everything. If you are not a candidate (according to the credit counseling agency), they will take control of your paycheck and they will pay your monthly payments late. Your credit file will be ruined anyway. You just won’t have a bankruptcy listed on your credit file. In effect, you will become a surf for the kingdom.

The reason that you must first undergo credit counseling is a known fact that is hidden in plain site. The credit card companies own and rule the consumer credit counseling agencies. They advertise themselves as being non-profit, but they actually work for the credit card companies. Everything in the financial world is linked together, whether it is linear or not.

Insolvency is a state of being unable to pay your creditors because your liabilities exceed your assets. This situation is not very pleasant because it ruins your image and credibility. However, you should not worry over it because millions of people go through it every year, and if you may ask them, it’s never easy to get through it, but eventually you will. The worst part is that your insolvency remains on the records for up to ten years and in between that time you cannot file for insolvency again even though you may have cleared previous debts.

If someone had co-signed up for a loan with you, that person may be forced to pay for your debts. This is why you need to be careful when you pick up on someone to co-sign your loan. You can imagine the tension that may arise thereof if this person is your spouse who may, at that time not be willing to pay up for your loans.

Bankruptcy laws protect you from losing all of your money and property. This is especially true if you file under chapter 13 because this gives the provision for you to settle your debts on a monthly basis from your regular income, meaning that your assets will not be liquidated to settle your bills. After filing for bankruptcy, your name will be published in the newspaper and definitely this will make potential creditors and business partners lose faith in you. However, you can work on rebuilding your credit.