The Ostrich Effect

I was chatting with a colleague of mine about clients who claim to never be served with legal notices, and we ended up on a discussion of the ostrich effect.  When claims of lack of service are fully investigated, what we discover 9 times out of 10 is that, in fact, notices were served to our clients, they just ignored the notice or didn't understand the notice.  At any rate, this is generally referred to as the ostrich effect - the belief that problems will go away on their own if you just ignore it and pretend like everything is hunky dory.  We see this all the time with people who just suddenly become aware of a pending wage garnishment, foreclosure sale, or utility shut-off.

As I've blogged about in the past, the first quarter of the year is generally a very busy time for bankruptcy attorneys.  A confluence of events leads to a number of people suddenly realizing that they need to file for bankruptcy:

• Christmas credit card bills
• property and income taxes
• annual dues and memberships
• winter heating costs
• increased lay-offs and unemployment rates during the winter season

And all of this culminates into the April 15 deadline for people to have their utilities shut off due to the end of Wisconsin's winter moratorium.  Literally thousands of debtors who haven't been paying their utility bills, all scrambling at once to file bankruptcy as an 11th hour attempt to keep the lights on.

So it is in that spirit that I bring up the ostrich effect in the hopes that this whimsical illustration will remind folks to not wait until the last possible minute.  Consult with an attorney.  Our initial consultations are free, and it never hurts to arm yourself with as much information as early on as possible.