NACBA's 30th Annual Convention
May 19 - 22, 2022
JW Marriott Starr Pass Resort & Spa
Tucson, AZ 

 

Early bird pricing has been extended to April 15! Register today to catch these savings! We look forward to seeing you in Tucson.

 

Date: Thursday, April 21, 2022
Time: 4-5:00 p.m. Eastern
Speakers: Zachary Kitchen, C.E.O. of Digital Crisis, LLC
 
You need to attend this webinar to protect your most valuable assets, time and money, by protecting you and your client's information. Get ahead of the curve so you can minimize your risk.

Description: Zachary Kitchen, a former hacker himself, will teach you how to protect your firm and the best practices to ensure your data is secured, and how to prepare for the event should it happen to you. It's only a matter of time, and not an “if” but rather, “when” scenario.
 
You receive tons of emails. How do you know which email is legitimate? How do you know the sender that sent that email wasn’t affected by a hack? How do you minimize junk emails and save time by focusing on clean emails?

MAY 19, 2022
9:00am - 4:00pm
JW Marriott Starr Pass Resort & Spa
Tucson, AZ
Cost: $249 for convention attendees / $349 for non-convention attendees
 
Practically Plug in Tax Resolution and Tax Preparation to Your Practice
Speakers: A. Lavar Taylor, Esq., Steven L. Walker, Esq. and Najah Shariff, AUSA

Tax is a common debt owed by many bankruptcy clients. Tax resolution and preparation work are some of the highest dollar-per-hour services you can offer and are compatible with a bankruptcy practice. The key to success is to smoothly integrate tax into your practice. How? NACBA's panel will describe how they have included tax services into their work. They will discuss practical steps to educate yourself, how to handle tax controversies and to identify when you should refer a problem out. Learn to identify tax resolution cases, evaluate tax transcripts, the attorney/client engagement process, how to get paid, fee structures and fee agreements, malpractice pitfalls, offers-in-compromise, installment agreements, innocent spouse relief, CNC, penalty abatement, IRS notices and critical dates. Furthermore, the panel will discuss tax preparation services you can offer your client. This all-day intensive study will provide a plan to integrate tax into your practice, forms and checklists, and other resources so you can begin to integrate tax into your firm when you are finished.

Increase the Value of Each Bankruptcy Case Using the FDCPA and the TCPA
Speakers: Brian Flick, Esq., Marc Dann, Esq. and Thad Bartholow, Esq.

The principal motivator for most clients seeking bankruptcy protection is aggressive debt collection. Bankruptcy effectively cancels this problem, but there are additional remedies for abusive debt collection. Your client may be entitled to damages and attorney's fees for events occurring before the bankruptcy is ever filed. The panel will discuss how to identify these issues and will take a deep look into two federal consumer protection statutes: The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) and the Telephone Communication Protection Act (TCPA). These statutes are used by many bankruptcy attorneys to give their clients additional relief from their creditors. NACBA's full-day panel will explain the law underpinning these claims and will give attendees practical steps to fold these actions into your bankruptcy practice. Further the panel will provide checklists, generic complaints and answers to common motions for summary judgment. Adding the FDCPA and the TCPA to your practice will increase the value of every bankruptcy case and benefit your client.

The Chapter 7 debtor was not entitled to exempt the portion of a settlement he negotiated with his employer and worker's compensation insurer where that amount was in a trust for the benefit of his medical care providers and, therefore, did not become part of the bankruptcy estate. Ryan v. Branko PRPA MD, LLC, No.21-449 (E.D. Wisc. March 2, 2022).

An ex-husband's efforts to collect medical expenses and a $50.00 direct payment ordered by the Family Court violated the automatic stay, where, unlike the debtor's other domestic support obligations which he collected through wage garnishment, payment for the debts was not limited to non-estate property as required by the domestic support exception to the automatic stay. In re Dougherty-Kelsay, No. 19-8013 (B.A.P. 6th Cir. March 21, 2022).

The IRS had no reasonable basis for challenging the bankruptcy court's exercise of personal jurisdiction, where it consented to jurisdiction when it filed a claim in the debtor's Chapter 7 bankruptcy, and the debtor notified it of his objection to the claim using the address the IRS provided. For that reason, the debtor was entitled to recover fees and costs associated with litigation of the IRS's claim. Nicolaus v. United States of America, No. 21-3010 (N.D. Iowa March 8, 2022).

The Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin joined the majority of courts in finding that section 1322(c)(2) “authorizes modification of a principal residence loan through bifurcation, when the last payment on the original payment schedule is due before the final plan payment is due.” In re Harris,, No. 21-26280 (Bankr. E.D. Wisc. March 16, 2022).

Because it was unclear whether the debtor's private student loan was issued under the auspices of a federally funded program, neither the debtor nor the student loan creditor were entitled to summary judgment on the issue of whether the loan was excepted from discharge under section 523(a)(8)(A)(i). Mazloom v. Navient Solutions, LLC., No. 18-60206, Adv. Proc. No. 20-80033 (Bankr. N.D.N.Y. March 29, 2022).

NCBRC has filed an amicus brief on behalf of the NACBA membership in the Tenth Circuit case of Goodman v. Doll (In re Doll). The case addresses the issue of whether a Chapter 13 standing trustee is entitled to keep pre-confirmation statutory fees when the case is ultimately dismissed prior to plan confirmation. Case No. 22-1004 (filed April 6, 2022). The bankruptcy court found in favor of the trustee and the district court reversed.

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Each year, millions of individuals and families across the country struggle to pay their bills. Often financial distress follows on the heels of other unanticipated events such as job loss, divorce, substantial out-of-pocket medical expenses and natural disasters. Bankruptcy may provide these debtors with the opportunity for a fresh start. However, bankruptcy debtors, lacking both financial resources and exposure to the bankruptcy system, often do not have the ability to protect the integrity of the bankruptcy system and preserve the bankruptcy rights of consumer debtors more generally. The National Consumer Bankruptcy Rights Center (NCBRC) was created to fill that vacuum.

NACBA is happy to bring to our members weekly caselaw updates. Each Thursday, NACBA members can read recent bankruptcy decisions impacting consumer attorneys and debtors within the purview of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Members simply sign into their NACBA Member Account to read the full discussions and access each opinion.