Chapter 7 petitions go wrong less often because of difficult law than because of a messy process: documents arrive late, questions go unanswered, and the draft is built on incomplete information. A clear, repeatable workflow fixes most of this. The stages below suit an in-house office, a remote assistant or a mix of both. Adapt them to your own court and software.
1. Intake
The attorney meets the client, decides whether Chapter 7 is appropriate and engages the case. The client completes an intake questionnaire covering identity, household, income, assets, debts and recent financial events. A detailed questionnaire saves more time than any later step.
2. Document collection
Give the client a clear list of what to gather and a date to return it. Typical items include identification, recent pay records, tax returns, bank statements, vehicle and property documents, and statements or notices from creditors. This guide to the documents a debtor must gather can be sent to clients directly.
3. Completeness check
Before any drafting begins, compare what has arrived against the questionnaire. Note gaps and inconsistencies, such as an account mentioned in conversation but missing from the questionnaire, or income that does not match the pay records. Send a single, specific request to the client for what is missing, rather than several small ones.
4. Means test and eligibility
Calculate current monthly income using the correct lookback period, then work through the means test. Flag anything that affects the attorney's strategy. For an overview, see the means test in plain English. The attorney decides what the result means for the case.
5. Draft the petition
With complete information, the assistant or paralegal drafts the petition, schedules and statements. The attorney, not the preparer, decides on exemptions and any questions of strategy; the draft should list items where a decision is needed instead of filling in a guess. Two of the schedules that most often cause problems are covered in assets and exemptions and income, expenses and the statement of financial affairs.
6. Internal consistency check
Before the attorney sees the draft, the preparer checks that numbers agree across the means test, Schedule I and Schedule J, that every creditor appears once and where it should, and that the debtor's story reads the same in every document. Many amendments start with an inconsistency that this check would have caught.
7. Attorney review
The attorney reviews the draft against a checklist, resolves the flagged questions and sends corrections back. Our petition review checklist gives a structure. This step is the attorney's responsibility whoever prepared the draft.
8. Client review and signing
The client reads the petition and confirms it is accurate and complete. This matters, because the client signs under penalty of perjury. Any corrections at this stage are much cheaper than amendments after filing.
9. Filing
The office files the petition and any required documents, and confirms the court's acceptance. Make a record of anything that must still be filed within a deadline.
10. After filing
Track the follow-up items: the trustee's document requests, the meeting of creditors, any amendments and required courses. We describe the main milestones in what happens after the petition is filed.
Make it a habit
Write the steps down once, assign each to a person, and use the same sequence on every case. If you are an assistant looking for attorneys who value that kind of process, join NAVBA. If you are an attorney wanting to hand off the drafting stages, see how hiring a VBA works.
This article is general information about bankruptcy practice, not legal advice. Local rules, trustee preferences and state law vary, so confirm current requirements for your jurisdiction.
