How to File for Chapter 13 Bankruptcy: Steps, Costs, and Deadlines

To file for Chapter 13 bankruptcy, you confirm you qualify, take a pre-filing credit counseling course, prepare a voluntary petition with full financial schedules and a three-to-five-year repayment plan, file everything with the bankruptcy court clerk in your federal district, pay the $310 filing fee, and begin making plan payments within 30 days. The case then moves through a creditors’ meeting and a confirmation hearing before a judge, and once the plan is approved you make monthly payments to a trustee for the full plan term in exchange for a discharge at the end.

Most of the work happens before you file. Here is what each step actually involves.

Confirm You Qualify

Chapter 13 is only open to individuals and married couples filing jointly. Corporations, partnerships, and LLCs cannot use it. You need regular income, which can come from wages, salary, commissions, self-employment, or steady government benefits.¹

Your debts have to fit under federal caps. As of April 1, 2025, noncontingent, liquidated unsecured debts must be below $526,700, and noncontingent, liquidated secured debts must be below $1,580,125. Those terms mean debts where the amount is fixed and not dependent on some future event. Above those limits, Chapter 11 is the alternative.¹

A recent dismissed case can also block you. If a prior bankruptcy was dismissed within the last 180 days because you failed to comply with court orders, or you voluntarily dropped the case after a creditor moved to lift a lien, you have to wait out that window.²

Know What It Will Cost

The court filing fee is $310: a $235 case filing fee plus a $75 administrative fee.² If you can’t pay it upfront, you can apply to pay in up to four installments over 120 days, extendable to 180 days for good cause.³ Miss an installment and the court can dismiss your case.

Attorney fees are the larger expense. They generally run from roughly $3,500 to $6,000 or more, depending on complexity and location. Many districts set a “no-look” fee the court treats as presumptively reasonable, and attorney fees are typically paid through the plan rather than all upfront.

Two mandatory financial courses cost between $10 and $50 each. And the Chapter 13 trustee takes a commission from every payment that flows through the plan, capped by federal law at 10 percent.⁴ The actual rate varies by district and is built into your plan math, so no separate bill arrives.

Complete Credit Counseling and File Your Taxes

Before you can file, you must complete a credit counseling course from an agency approved by the U.S. Trustee Program. The course has to happen within the 180 days before your filing date, and the certificate of completion is filed with your petition. Skip it and the court will dismiss the case.¹

You also need to have filed all required federal tax returns for the four tax years before your bankruptcy. The IRS watches for this, and missing returns can stall the case.⁵ If you’re behind, get them filed before the petition goes in.

Prepare the Petition and Schedules

The petition itself is Official Form 101, the Voluntary Petition for Individuals Filing for Bankruptcy.⁶ Attached to it are the schedules that document your entire financial picture:

Schedules A/B list everything you own, from real estate and bank accounts to household goods.
Schedule C claims the property you believe is exempt from creditors.
Schedule D lists secured debts like mortgages and car loans.
Schedule E/F lists priority debts (such as tax obligations and child support) and general unsecured debts (credit cards, medical bills).
Schedules I and J show current income and monthly expenses, which together establish how much you can afford to pay.

You’ll also complete the Statement of Financial Affairs, which covers recent activity like property transfers, lawsuit payments, and gifts. All forms are on the U.S. Courts website. Accuracy matters: hiding assets or misstating finances can mean dismissal or criminal prosecution for bankruptcy fraud.

Build the Repayment Plan

The repayment plan is the core of a Chapter 13 case. It sets how much you pay each month, for how long, and who gets what. Plan length is driven by your income compared to your state’s median for your household size. Below the median, the plan runs three years. Above, generally five. No plan can run longer than five years.⁷

Form 122C-1 determines your current monthly income and whether you fall above or below the median. If above, Form 122C-2 calculates disposable income by subtracting standardized expense allowances. That disposable income is the floor for what unsecured creditors receive each month, though your actual payment will be higher because secured and priority debts are also funded through the plan.²

The plan treats debts differently depending on type. Priority claims such as back taxes and child support arrears generally have to be paid in full. Secured debts are treated according to collateral value and the terms you propose. General unsecured creditors get whatever your disposable income supports, which can range from pennies on the dollar to full repayment.⁷

One guardrail applies in every case: unsecured creditors must receive at least as much through the plan as they would in a Chapter 7 liquidation. This “liquidation test” blocks filers with significant nonexempt property from using Chapter 13 to shortchange creditors.

A plan can also cure mortgage arrears while you resume regular payments going forward, and it can address car loans and junior liens in ways Chapter 7 cannot. These are strategic design choices worth working through with an attorney before you file.

File the Petition

Once the forms, schedules, and plan are ready, you file everything with the bankruptcy court clerk in the federal district where you live. You can file the plan with the petition or within 14 days afterward, depending on local rules.

The moment the clerk accepts your petition, the automatic stay takes effect. This federal court order stops most collection activity immediately: lawsuits, wage garnishments, collection calls, foreclosure proceedings.⁸ No separate motion is needed.

The stay has limits. Criminal proceedings continue. Collection of child support and alimony from property outside the bankruptcy estate is not stopped. Tax audits and assessments can proceed.⁸

Chapter 13 also extends a separate codebtor stay to anyone who cosigned a consumer debt with you. Creditors cannot pursue the cosigner while your case is active.⁹ That protection ends if the case is dismissed, converted, or closed.

Meet the Post-Filing Deadlines

Filing starts several clocks at once.

First Payment Within 30 Days

You must begin making plan payments within 30 days of filing the plan or the date the court enters the order for relief, whichever comes first. This is true before the plan is confirmed.¹⁰ The trustee holds those early payments and distributes them once the plan is approved. If the plan isn’t ultimately confirmed, payments already made on certain secured debts are applied to those accounts, and the trustee refunds the rest minus administrative costs.

The 341 Meeting of Creditors

Between 21 and 50 days after filing, you attend the Meeting of Creditors, known as the 341 meeting. The Chapter 13 trustee runs it, not a judge. You answer questions under oath about your finances, your assets, and your plan. Creditors are invited but rarely appear in routine cases. Bring a government-issued photo ID and proof of your Social Security number.

Plan Confirmation

After the 341 meeting, a bankruptcy judge holds a confirmation hearing to decide whether to approve the plan. The judge checks that priority claims are paid in full, unsecured creditors receive at least their Chapter 7 equivalent, all disposable income is committed, and the plan is actually feasible.¹¹ Creditors or the trustee can object. If confirmation is denied, you’ll usually get a chance to amend and refile the plan.

Debtor Education Course

A second financial education course, separate from the pre-filing counseling, is required before discharge. The completion certificate must be filed with the court no later than the last plan payment. Without it, no discharge issues, even if every payment was made on time.

If Your Circumstances Change

Plans run for years, and life doesn’t hold still. If income drops or expenses spike, you, the trustee, or a creditor can ask the court to modify the confirmed plan. A modification can raise or lower payments, extend or shorten the schedule, or change how much a particular creditor receives. The modified plan still can’t exceed five years from when the first payment was originally due.¹²

The law specifically allows a payment reduction to cover health insurance for you or a dependent who otherwise would be uninsured, provided the expense is reasonable and documented.

A missed payment or two won’t automatically end the case, but significant arrears usually prompt the trustee to move for dismissal or conversion to Chapter 7. Dismissal lifts the stay and creditors can resume collection the same day. Conversion to Chapter 7 hands the case to a liquidation trustee who may sell nonexempt assets. The better move, when trouble is temporary, is to ask your attorney to file a modification before the trustee acts. If completion is genuinely impossible even with modifications, a hardship discharge may be available: it requires showing the failure wasn’t your fault, that unsecured creditors have already received at least their Chapter 7 share, and that no workable modification exists.¹³

Receive Your Discharge

After the final payment, the trustee files a final report. Your debtor education certificate needs to already be on file, and if applicable, you certify that domestic support obligations are current. The court then enters the discharge order, typically within a few months of the last payment. Debts covered by the discharge are permanently eliminated and creditors cannot try to collect on them again.

Not everything gets wiped out. Long-term debts that extend beyond the plan (like a mortgage where you only cured arrears), certain tax debts, student loans absent a successful hardship adversary proceeding, child support and alimony, criminal restitution and fines, and debts arising from fraud or willful injury all survive.¹³ For debts that were required to be paid in full through the plan, the discharge confirms satisfaction. For unsecured debts that got only a partial payout, the discharge erases the balance.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 109 – Who May Be a Debtor
2
United States Courts. Chapter 13 – Bankruptcy Basics
3
Legal Information Institute. Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure Rule 1006 – Filing Fee
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 28 USC 586 – Duties, Supervision by Attorney General
5
Internal Revenue Service. Understanding Federal Tax Obligations During Chapter 13 Bankruptcy
6
United States Courts. Voluntary Petition for Individuals Filing for Bankruptcy
7
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 1322 – Contents of Plan
8
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 US Code 362 – Automatic Stay
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 1301 – Stay of Action Against Codebtor
10
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 1326 – Payments
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 US Code 1325 – Confirmation of Plan
12
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 1329 – Modification of Plan After Confirmation
13
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 1328 – Discharge