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HOW DO I STOP A GARNISHMENT?

A Chapter 7 stops or “stays” garnishments of money.

For example: Capital One Bank has started to garnish you for $3,000 on a legal judgment. The garnishment return is set to be heard in 3 months but they have not started to take wages from your paycheck yet. You contact a bankruptcy attorney such as our firm. If your bankruptcy petition can be filed quickly, we send your bankruptcy information and case number to the attorney suing you, your employer and your bank, and have the case dismissed hopefully before any money has been taken.  

What if they have already taken or frozen your funds?

You still have time, for often it is several months before the garnishment case comes to court and the employer must send the money to the court before it is released to the creditor. Therefore, we file your bankruptcy petition, inform the lawyer suing you, your bank, and employee payroll and the court of your bankruptcy, and the case is dropped and money (if taken) returned to you and usually long before it sent to the court.

How much can they garnish?

Wages: tends to be about 25 to 30% per pay period; this can add up for the period runs for 6 months.

Bank accounts: any amount less than the amount being sued for, but banks are cautious and usually freeze the entire account for the time period until the garnishment is released by bankruptcy.

Why is the judgment amount so much more than what I owe?

After you were sued they tacked on attorney fees, interest and collections costs and sometimes deficit amounts from a sale or repossessed property. So they can be suing you for 3 times what you really owe and you may be garnished for years before you even put a dent in the original debt. That’s why it is so important to stop an active garnishment.

Your job itself may make you a target for garnishment.

If you have a job with a large company or a local or well-known employer, it’s easy for the attorney to contact their payroll and start collecting.