Public Access to Court Electronic Records (PACER) is a website that allows people to get case information online from federal courts. 

Anyone can have a PACER account. You do not need to be a lawyer to use PACER, but you will need to register. Find information about how to create a free account on PACER's homepage. 

If you do not wish to complete the online form, you may contact the PACER Service Center for a registration form at (800) 676-6856. 

With your PACER account login, you can access your bankruptcy documents anywhere, anytime, as long as you have internet access.

The site includes the following types of information:

• A listing of all parties and participants including judges, attorneys, and trustees
• Related information such as cause of action, nature of suit, and dollar demand
• Dates of case events
• A claims registry
• A listing of new cases each day
• Appellate court opinions
• Judgments or case status
• Types of documents filed for certain cases
• Images of your documents, like your petition, schedules, and motions

If you want immediate access to PACER, you will need to enter a valid credit card or debit card number when you register. PACER will then send you an email confirmation with your username and password. 

If you can wait, or if you do not have a valid credit or debit card, PACER will send you a confirmation in the mail with your login and password. It should reach you within 7 to 10 business days.

You will be charged $.10 per page to access the web-based PACER systems. You are not charged per minute of use. The charge applies whether or not you print out pages, view, or download them. The cost to access a single document cannot be more than $3.00, about 30 pages. The court will tell you the charge before the document is uploaded.

If you accrue a total of less than $30 worth of charges in any given quarter, fees are waived for that quarter, and your balance will be reset to $0 for the next quarter. If you exceed $30 worth of charges, you will be billed on a quarterly basis for your transactions. 

For most users, PACER ends up being a free service.

Using PACER

Go to the PACER site for the Bankruptcy Court where the case has been filed. Illinois has three US District Courts for bankruptcy. Each one has its own system that you can access with your PACER account:

• Northern District of Illinois
• Central District of Illinois
• Southern District of Illinois

Once you get to the right site, sign into PACER using your PACER login and password.

To search for a case, click on "Query" toward the top left corner of the window. Use any or all of the search fields provided to find your case. If you have your case number, then use that to search for your case. Once you have found and brought up your case, use the "History/Documents" tab to view the documents filed in your case. To view or download a document, click on the number that appears to the left of the document that you wish to view or download.

Your account will be charged $0.10 for every page you view, print, or download. If you accrue a total of less than $30 worth of charges in any given quarter, the fees charged are waived for that quarter, and your balance will be reset to $0 for the next quarter. You will only receive a bill if you exceed $30 in charges in a quarter.

If you don't want to be charged again for opening the same document more than once, you might want to print out a copy for yourself or save the document to your computer or laptop before closing the document.