Chapter 7 bankruptcy is liquidation proceeding wherein the consumer receives a discharge of debts within four months.  The consumer pays debts out of his/her non-exempt assets. He/she relinquishes those assets to a trustee (court-appointed official) who then converts them to cash for distribution to the creditors, or turn the assets over to the creditors. A Chapter 7 discharge can only happen once every six years and not everyone is eligible for debt relief under it.

Chapter 7 bankruptcy (which is sometimes called a straight bankruptcy) is a liquidation proceeding, in which a consumer turns over his/her non-exempt properties to the bankruptcy trustee, who then distributes them to the creditors. The bankruptcy would be discharged from all dischargeable debts in the span of three to five months.

The consumer’s attorney usually does the filing without the permission or advanced notice to the trustee or the judge.  That filing is called “Ex Parte (part of the document) Motion to Convert Chapter 13 to a Chapter 7." That is providing that the consumer has not done a bankruptcy conversion yet. Not that there are no requirements for notices, there are notice requirements, but it must be verified with the local bankruptcy district to see who it is to be mailed out to.

When a bankruptcy case receives a “discharge” it means that the consumer is released from certain specified types of debts, or that he/she is no longer legally or personally liable to pay debts that the bankruptcy court has already forgiven; but sometimes certain items survive bankruptcy, and the creditors would naturally try to resume collection from the consume