Making
ASCII Matrix Files
The Text Matrix
When
you have finished entering all the information necessary to complete
your bankruptcy petition and associated forms and schedules, one of
the files that is part of the electronic filing process is the
creditors matrix file. Unlike almost all other files you might
download or upload to the Bankruptcy Court, the creditors matrix
file is NOT a PDF file - it is usually required to be an ASCII
text file containing your creditors matrix
in a format that is specified in the United
States Bankruptcy Court Attorney Manual.
In
the jurisdictions we are familiar with, there is usually a Case
Management and Electronic Case Filing (CM/ECF)
section of the Bankruptcy Court's web site where you can download
the Attorney Manual that gives you the particulars. In fact, we'll
explain later in this article how Ohio's matrix file requires a case
number header prepended to the creditors matrix file created by
WBank.
We have no personal knowledge of a court that accepts the creditors
matrix in PDF format, however,WBank
can produce a creditors matrix in either format - ASCII text or PDF.
Creating the ASCII Matrix File - The 1-2 Step
1. Make
ASCII Matrix File.
In the WBank program, click on the File
menu's Electronic Filing
submenu and select Make ASCII
Matrix File.
2. Give
the File a Name.
A typical Windows Save
As
dialog will appear asking you to name the creditors matrix file you
are about to create. One potentially important note in this regard is that you
should give your creditors matrix file a name in accordance with your
local jurisdiction's naming convention.
What's In A Name?
Here is some information that may be helpful. Sometimes
the naming convention is not specified. In Ohio's Northern District,
the Attorney Manual uses the following format in an example without
really endorsing it as a recommended convention:
[Year]-[Case
Number]cred_matrix.txt
In
the specification above, case number 60745 filed in the year 2006
would be as follows:
06-60745cred_matrix.txt
If
you don't specify otherwise, the creditors matrix file will be
created by WBank in the directory below:
C:\Program
Files\Puritas\WBank5\Files\ECF
The
path above follows the Microsoft convention for 32 bit Windows
applications by using the Program
Files
folder followed by company name, followed by program name and then
any program-dependent subdirectories. If you follow the Northern
District's file name example you'd end up with:
C:\Program
Files\Puritas\WBank5\Files\ECF\06-60745cred_matrix.txt
Be
aware that some
jurisdictions were limiting the file name (including the path) to a
length of 40 characters. The file name and path above has 65
characters! The path part of the name, by itself (that is
without the name added), is 42 characters
in length. You can see the obvious problem. We are told that the Bankruptcy Court case management
team has since expanded the file name limitations to 80 characters.
If you ever run into a similar problem, you should see what steps,
if any, can be taken to advise the Bankruptcy Court of the issue and
see if they can make the proper adjustment.
Or …
As
a last resort to solving the path length issue, you may need to create a new folder with a shorter
path, i.e., C:\B_Files.
As a side note, the example used by the Attorney Manual is not a
good one (C:\00-61200cred_matrix.txt).
The likelihood of this being the path in real law offices is nil because savvy
systems managers and users would never let the root directory be used
as a repository for individual data files in that manner. Designating a shared or mapped drive letter is likewise
probably not the most elegant solution.
For
obvious reasons, you should keep the file name short and use
alpha-numeric characters. Avoid using any ampersands (&), pound
signs (#), commas (,), periods (except as extension delimiters),
spaces ( ), forward-slashes or back-slashes (except as part of the
legitimate path list). The exception to this rule is that you can
always use the underscore character (_). Why the exception? Well the
underscore is part of computer history harkening back to the DOS
days when file names were not allowed to contain spaces.
Including The Case Number
When
you're on a roll, that's it. You do the file creation/save two-step
and you're done. Your creditors matrix file is ready
for transmission to the Bankruptcy Court. Unfortunately it doesn't always go that easy.
As
of January 1st, Electronic Case Filing has now become
mandatory in the United States Bankruptcy Court Northern District of
Ohio. Additionally, electronic filing is accepted in the Southern
District of Ohio, although it will not be required until July 2004.
Although it's not part of the Attorney Manual for the Northern
District (at least the version we consulted as we wrote this
article), there is a requirement that the first line of the
creditors matrix file must be a properly formatted case number
followed by two or three blank lines, aka carriage returns. We are
told that the Southern District has adopted this same requirement.
Including the Case
Number
Once
you have created your creditors matrix file using WBank,
you must add the case number to the top of the creditor matrix as
referred to in the preceding paragraph. In the steps below, you will
learn how to navigate to the file that you just created and manually
add the case number.
1.
Find the File.
If you're good with computers, you know where the file is stored and
you know how to get there and you can skip this step. If you don't
know how to find your file, here's how you do it:
Windows XP Users:
- Open up the Start
menu in the bottom right-hand corner of your desktop. Then, click on
the Search
menu item.
- In the left pane of the Search
window you will now be asked, "What
do you want to search for?"
Select All files and folders.
- Type the name of your file in the All
or part of the file name
box. In our example above, you would enter 06-60745cred_matrix.txt.
- Now check which drive is selected in the Look
in box
and verify that you are searching for the file in the proper drive.
For the above example, you want to search the C: drive.
- Press the Search
button and allow your computer to find your creditor matrix file.
Windows 2000 Users:
- Open up the Start
menu in the bottom right-hand corner of your desktop. Then, click on
For Files or Folders… located within the
Search
submenu.
- Type the name of your file in the Search
for files or folders named
box. In our example above, you would enter 06-60745cred_matrix.txt.
- Now check which drive is selected in the Look
in box
and verify that you are searching for the file in the proper drive.
For the above example, you want to search the C: drive.
- Press the Search Now
button and allow your computer to find your creditor matrix file.
Windows 95
& 98 Users:
- Open up the Start
menu in the bottom right-hand corner of your desktop. Then, click on
Files or Folders… located within the Find
submenu.
- Type the name of your file in the Named
box. In our example above, you would enter 06-60745cred_matrix.txt.
- Now check which drive is selected in the Look
in box
and verify that you are searching for the file in the proper drive.
For the above example, you want to search the C: drive.
- Press the Find Now
button and allow your computer to find your creditor matrix file.
2.
Double-Click on the File.
Having found the file in step 1, double-click on the file and it
should open or load in Windows' generic editing program called Notepad.
You'll see a list of your creditors in alphabetical order and your
cursor should be blinking at the insertion point at the very
beginning of the file in the uppermost, leftmost character position.
The Northern and Southern Ohio Districts want the case number
entered as follows:
[Year in 2
digits]-[case number]
or
yy-nnnnn
Where
the two y's
refer to the last two digits of the year and the n's are the
five unique digits that make up the case number.
In
our example above the case number would be entered as:
06-60745
The
sample creditors matrix below shows you how the first lines of the
creditors matrix should look with [enter]
referring to a blank line.
06-60745
[enter]
[enter]
[enter]
First Creditor's Name
645 McKee Trail
Hinckley, OH 44233-9209
3.
Save Your Changes.
After adding the case number, don't forget to save your file by
clicking on the save button.
And In The End
You've
created the creditors matrix file and you've added the case number. Now
your creditors matrix file is ready for transmission to the
Bankruptcy Court via the Electronic Case Filing procedure. When
you're at the PACER site, you'll use the Upload a File method and
you'll need to either (1) type the file name in the appropriate
entry box (and we mean the complete pathlist as explained above, or
(2) browse to it using the site's Browse button (remember, you'll
still need to know how to navigate to the folder where the matrix is
stored). Additional information can be obtained by consulting your
United States Bankruptcy Court Attorney Manual.
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