C and F Mistake Forum

[Anonymous User]

I may have royally screwed myself.

SHORT STORY: Disclosed a debt as being past due and provided all information about it, but hit no on subsequent question regarding being referred to collection agencies that I should have answered yes to. In addition, I realized I had completely forgot about another collection agency debt which has never been reported to credit reporting agencies and which the bar has not contacted me about, and have now amended my application to include it.

LONG STORY
On C and F I made 2 mistakes regarding debts. First, I correctly disclosed a sizeable debt (which I was disputing) that had been referred to collection as having been reported as more than 60 days past due, but incorrectly answered "no" as to whether or not I had a debt referred to collection.

I realized my mistake because: 1) Bar contacted me saying debt collector (who i didn't even realize I had not disclosed) was unresponsive to requests for information; 2) I contacted debt collector to tell them to respond to bar. During the same call, I settled my dispute with them; 3) I amended my application to note that I had settled the debt, and realized that I had made a mistake as to the other question.

My thought is that this, by itself, may not be HORRIBLE, since I had reported the debt, though carelessly failed to note it had been referred to collection. But it's not by itself.

In my panic over that mistake I realized that I left COMPLETELY UNREPORTED, a very small current debt that had also been referred to collection. I have amended my application to reflect this debt, which debt had and has not been reported to credit agencies. The bar has not contacted me about it at all.

Again, I figure by itself this would not have been a big deal, since I had simply forgotten, and amended to add it before any contact about it from the bar. But together, I feel like these are pretty bad. It obviously looks bad from a candor standpoint, and I have to admit that even in the best possible light it looks irresponsible.

I'm contacting my dean on Monday about how to proceed/if I should approach a C and F lawyer at this stage (not sure what I can do until Bar contacts me). I'm really just writing because I'm so freaked out about this, and needed to get it off chest. But if anyone has knowledge of how bad this is, or has been through something similar, I'd love to hear from you.

[Anonymous User]

OP: Adding that besides this, I don't have any C and F issues.

[kalvano]

The easiest thing would be to call whoever examines applications in your state and explain the situation to them. They aren't actively looking for ways to get you in trouble, they just want you to be forthright. I forgot a couple of things on my application and called and was told "no worries, just send an email summarizing it and we will put it in your file." There was no issue at all.

[dixiecupdrinking]

So you had an oversight that you have since corrected in full?

This is not legal advice etc but I would guess you have nothing to worry about.