An individual can receive a discharge under Chapter 7 of the United States bankruptcy code every eight years.  Thus, if somebody filed for Chapter 7, four years ago, they are not eligible to be a debtor under Chapter 7 at the present time.  They can however, file a Chapter 13 bankruptcy, and attempt to repay their debts over time.  One of the significant changes of bankruptcy reform was extending the time to receive a discharge from six years and a day to eight years and a day.  Although this may have seemed like a long period of time, I have found that debtors have the ability to wait out the additional two years before filing another Chapter 7 bankruptcy.

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