The CARES Act recently enacted by Congress to provide relief to individuals and business from the financial impacts of COVID 19 contain a number of provisions relating to bankruptcy. Most of the changes impact cases under Chapter 13, and some are pretty significant. For further information on how Chapter 13 cases are impacted visit the website maintained by trustee Sabrina McKinney: https://www.ch13mdal.com.
The only change directly impacting a Chapter 7 bankruptcy relates to eligibility. For purposes of calculating a debtor’s income to determine his or her eligibility for Chapter 7 relief, COVID-19 related payments from the federal government are excluded from the analysis. This simply means that when the means test analysis is applied to determine whether you qualify for Chapter 7, no payments coming to you as a result of the CARES Act will be counted.