Complaints

• Initial Complaint

  06/29/2023

  Complaint Type:

  Service or Repair Issues

  Status:

  Answered

  More info

  My son used ******* ****** * ********** to file his bankruptcy but they weren't taking any clients at this time and referred us to use Jon G*****. My fiancé called and scheduled a "free consultation". He didn't know much about bankruptcy so we wrote some questions down that we thought were important. Jon asked him to bring in certain documents and went over them with him during the "free consultation". We decided to go with him and two or three weeks later I paid 1738 for the bankruptcy. We then made an appointment to come in and he asked to bring in 3 months of the last paystubs and a couple of other papers. He never asked anything about monies in the bank or assets prior to this date. This lawyer didn't even run his credit until the day we went to go over the bankruptcy with him itself. My fiancé had a substantial about of money in the bank that he states would not really be conducive for him to file for bankruptcy at the time. He said my fiancé needed to spend at least 5 thousand in order to file. He did apologize for not asking or mentioning this prior to this, and went on to say "I mean if you need to buy furniture, but not spend it all at one time, you have to be able to show what you spent this money on. we can then file. We agreed to think about it and get back to him. About two days later we ended up emailing him telling we were going to cancel because we are not trying to spend this money due to the fact that we are saving for our wedding. This attorney ended up charging us 700 dollars for "2 hrs"and literally maybe spent a total of an hour on this case. It's sad that most of us are struggling and trying to do better and you have people like G*****. I just pray someone takes the time to read this and not make the same mistake we made. This was definitely a snake move.. We will let karma but more importantly GOD handle this situation.

  Business response

  06/29/2023

  To Whom It May Concern,

  Thank you for allowing me the opportunity to respond to this complaint, and please let me know if the attachments do not populate (I could not be sure).

  I met with **** ***** for an intial consultation re: bankruptcy options on the morning of Thursday, March 16th, 2023.  We had a productive meeting, lasting 1.1 hours.

  Between that time and this month, I had two brief phone conversations with Mr. ***** re: the bankruptcy, totaling .3 hrs.

  I then drafted his bankruptcy petition, in preparation for our Saturday, June 17th, 2023 signing appointment, in which we both contemplated that a Chapter 7 bankruptcy would be filed.

  Since much of the petition had been drafted during our intake appointment back on March 16th, 2023, the further edits and drafting only took me .3 hours. 

  On Saturday, June 17th, 2023 at 10am, I met with Mr. ***** in my Westlake office for 1.2 hours, and we went over why his case was not currently ripe to file, and strategies to combat this. Namely, Mr. ***** had too much money on deposit, and stood to needlessly lose these funds to a bankruptcy trustee if we would've taken the case forward on that day.

  Although I had 2.9 hours of attorney time spent on the file at my hourly rate of $350, you will notice that I agreed to freeze the time spent on file to 2.0 hours pursuant to my email communication with Mr. *****.  This was done for client satisfaction.

  When a refund was requested (on June 20th), I mailed out the refund in 24 hours, on the following day, June 21st.

  I do not know why this complaint was filed, and am willing to answer any other questions the BBB may have of me.  I should not be penalized for my diligence on this matter, nor do I believe Ms. *****'s complaint should be published within my business information on your public records, as it is not based in fact.

  Sincerely,

   

  Jon G*****

  Customer response

  06/30/2023

  Better Business Bureau:
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.
  
  [To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]
  

  I absolutely do not agree with the time Mr G***** is saying this canceled case took him. I was in attendance both times we went to his office in Westlake. The consultation was about an hour and his website states free consultation.  Also he should have asked about money or assets in the consultation or before collecting any money. When I made the payment over the phone I asked him if he ran his credit and he said no.  Which meant **** didn’t know how much he even owed. He scheduled the appointment for that Saturday after we both left our overnight job. This is very upsetting because we trusted this lawyer was going to do the right thing. He knew he made an error or he would not have apologized to myself and **** and said we need to spend the money to file or may lose the money for payments that are owed in his credit.  We were not aware that the money in the bank was a problem again had he mentioned that we would have not paid him in advance.  I also **** never received a copy of his credit report and this petition he created. So he takes $700 dollars from us and we get absolutely nothing, It is my belief Mr. G***** handled this poorly and is taking advantage of the situation.  Your suppose to help people not take there money and walk away without doing anything for it. We work hard to provide for our family.

  Regards,

  
  ******** *****
  
  
  
  
   

  Business response

  06/30/2023

  I am sorry Ms. ***** still feels this way, and am in no way seeking to capitalize on her and her fiance’s situation. The insinuation that my apology to them means I didn’t perform my due diligence is flat out wrong. I knew the client had a goal of filing for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, and after our asset review, it was discovered he was not in position to do so without losing significant liquid funds to the trustee. My apology dealt with the fact that I was sorry he could not meet his goal of filing, and not for any error or wrongdoing on my part. I advised him of how to prospectively change this and get in a position to file.  JG

  Customer response

  07/05/2023

  Better Business Bureau:
  
  I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID ********, and have determined that this does not resolve my complaint.  For your reference, details of the offer I reviewed appear below.
  
  [To assist us in bringing this matter to a close, we would like to know your view on the matter.]
  
  Regards,
  
  ******** *****
  
  Again, Mr. G***** apologized for failing to give information that was needed to be known in order to file for bankruptcy.  Like I stated before had he mentioned this we would not had agreed to file. Which means we would not had paid him in full in advance.  Again this was a snake move and he got away with $700 for doing absolutely nothing.  Where is the petition and credit report we paid $700 dollars for sir. I mean can we have that.
  Or can you refund us the money that you kindly took from us. I pray that people see this and see how this attorney handles things.  Asking us to spend 5000 on a piece of furniture is not helping. If we had money like that to spend we would had just paid his creditors as oppose to finding help from a bankruptcy attorney. I will leave this matter with this said I pray you pay for your misconduct.  I know nothing will come about this matter but I hope I got my point across and somehow you pay for the 700 dollars you HUSTLED from us..
  
   

*Some consumers may elect to not publish the details of their complaints, some complaints may not meet BBB's standards for publication, or BBB may display a portion of complaints when a high volume is received for a particular business. ↩