By David J. Kelly, Minnesota Bankruptcy Attorney <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’ll never forget a certain day a few years ago when I had a hearing downtown at the federal courthouse. When I arrived that day the hallway outside the hearing room was crowded and my clients were there waiting for me. First thing they said, to my surprise, was that they were sure glad they had hired me. Before my arrival they had overheard someone else complaining loudly to their lawyer about having the money in their checking account seized by their bank. My clients knew I had made sure that wasn’t going to happen to them. They were very grateful.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you owe money to your bank or credit union on the day you file a bankruptcy, they may seize the money in your checking and savings accounts and apply it toward what you owe. The first time I saw a bank do this I thought they were violating the automatic stay. The automatic stay is the court order addressed to all the creditors when a bankruptcy is filed. It tells them to stop all collection efforts. It turned out the bank was exercising what they call a right to setoff. This is one of the exceptions to the automatic stay. Apparently the reasoning is that they are considered to have the money in your accounts already, so they aren’t really taking anything new from you when they seize it. This is twisted logic in my opinion, but nobody is asking me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n