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Notice of March 27, 2022 Expiration of Bankruptcy Related Provisions Contained in the Consolidated Appropriations (CARES) Act of 2021

Tuesday, March 29, 2022

On March 27, 2020, the President signed into law the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act. A year later, on March 27, 2021, the President signed into law an amended version of the Act which extended the provisions in §1113 of the CARES Act for one year. As of today, no information extending these provisions has been received and therefore, the provisions expired on March 27, 2022. The expired provisions affect Official Forms 101, 122A-1, 122B-1, 122C-1, and 201. Those forms now revert back to the pre-CARES Act versions as of March 28, 2022.  Listed below are details of these recently expired provisions:

  1. Official Forms: Forms 101 and 201 were amended to permit a debtor to elect chapter 11, subchapter V if aggregate debts are less than $7,500,000, and Forms 122A-1, 122B, and 122C-1, were amended to incorporate the CARES Act change to the definition of “current monthly income” and the calculation of disposable income.

  2. Chapter 13: The CARES Act added Subsection (d) to 11 U.S.C. § 1329 to permit a debtor to modify a confirmed plan, after notice and a hearing, if they were experiencing a material financial hardship due, directly or indirectly, to the COVID-19 pandemic. Debtors were given the ability to request a temporary suspension of plan payments and the life of a Chapter 13 plan was temporarily allowed to extend up to seven years after the first payment under the original confirmed plan became due. This subsection, 11 U.S.C. § 1329(d), expired on March 27, 2022.

Case Management/Electronic Case Filing (CM/ECF) Events

In addition, due to the expiration of the §1329(d) provisions, please note the following CM/ECF events will no longer be available or have been modified:

  • The Notice of Mortgage Forbearance event has been deactivated and is no longer available for docketing. 
  • The corresponding Certificate of Service (Forbearance) event has also been deactivated.
  • Modifications were made to the Notice of Mortgage Payment Change (Official Form 410S1 required by FRBP 3002.1(d)) and the Notice of Payment Changes events to remove reference to the Notice of Mortgage Forbearance.  A warning message was part of both events which directed filers to docket a separate Notice of Mortgage Forbearance if it was being requested.  Both of these events are still active and available for filers; however, the ‘warning’ messages have been removed.

There remains a possibility that these CARES Act provisions could be renewed or extended.  The Court will continue to monitor the situation and provide updates.