The Six-Month Lookback: Which Months Count in the DC Means Test

The means test is widely misunderstood as a test of what a person earns. It tests a defined slice of what the person earned, and the slice moves with the filing date. In a city where a large share of the workforce is on term contracts, grant funding, consulting engagements, or a federal pay schedule subject to furloughs and shutdowns, the six-month window is often the most important decision in the case, and it is made before anything is filed.

The definition

Official Form 122A-1 begins with current monthly income, defined in 11 U.S.C. § 101(10A) as the average monthly income from all sources that the debtor receives, without regard to whether it is taxable, during the six-month period ending on the last day of the calendar month immediately preceding the date of the filing of the petition.

Six full calendar months. The window is counted in calendar months. A petition filed on any day in December uses June 1 through November 30. A petition filed on any day in January uses July through December. The month of filing is never inside the window.

Received, not earned. The test looks at when money arrived. A paycheck for late November work deposited on December 3 is December income. A performance award approved in December and paid in January is January income.

All sources. Wages, contract and consulting income, rental income, unemployment compensation, pension payments, child support received, and regular contributions from a partner, parent, or roommate toward household expenses all count. The statute expressly includes any amount paid by any entity other than the debtor on a regular basis for the household expenses of the debtor or the debtor's dependents.

What is excluded

Section 101(10A)(B)(ii) removes benefits received under the Social Security Act, payments to victims of war crimes or crimes against humanity, payments to victims of international or domestic terrorism, and, under the HAVEN Act of 2019, compensation paid under titles 10, 37, or 38 in connection with a disability, a combat-related injury or disability, or the death of a member of the uniformed services.

Social Security retirement, disability, and SSI are therefore outside the calculation entirely. A retiree living on Social Security alone has a current monthly income of zero on the form regardless of the benefit amount.

Income that fell

The usual timing question is a drop. A consultant who billed $9,000 a month through June and has billed $3,000 a month since the engagement ended in July has an annualized income that depends on how many high months remain in the window.

The DC median for a one-person household, for cases filed on or after July 15, 2026, is $85,391, or $7,116 a month. A petition in October uses April through September, three months at $9,000 and three at $3,000, averaging $6,000, below the median. A petition in August uses February through July, five high months and one low, averaging $8,000, above it. A petition in January uses July through December, all low months, averaging $3,000.

Above the median is not disqualification. It means the long form, Form 122A-2, with the IRS expense standards and the disposable income calculation under § 707(b)(2). Many District filers pass on the long form. But below the median ends the inquiry on page one, and a filer who can reach it by waiting a month usually should.

Income that rose

The reverse case is a new, better job. Six months of the old salary are inside the window and the new salary has barely started. Filing promptly keeps current monthly income low.

That approach has a ceiling. The United States Trustee and the Chapter 7 trustee can move to dismiss for abuse under the totality-of-the-circumstances standard in § 707(b)(3), and Schedule I reports actual current income on the filing date. A filer with a $4,500 current monthly income on the form and an $11,000 monthly salary on Schedule I passes the arithmetic and invites a motion. The window is a rule, not a loophole.

The spike

A severance payment, a lump-sum annual leave payout on separation from federal service, a performance award, a large consulting invoice, or a retirement account withdrawal received inside the window inflates the average. A $15,000 leave payout received in August adds $2,500 a month to current monthly income for every petition filed September through February, and disappears for a March petition. A December bonus is the same problem on a predictable calendar, and it gets its own post later this week.

Furloughs and shutdowns

A federal employee or contractor who went weeks without pay during a shutdown, and then received back pay in a lump sum, has a window that may contain both the gap and the catch-up. The back pay is income in the month received. Depending on where the shutdown falls in the window, the average can understate or overstate the regular salary. The form asks for what was received; the attorney's job is to pick the month where what was received reflects reality, and to be ready to explain the distortion if a trustee asks.

The married filer

A joint petition uses both spouses' income. A married person filing alone reports the non-filing spouse's income and then deducts the portion not regularly contributed to the household, the marital adjustment. The six-month window applies to the spouse's income as well.

Choosing the month

The decision has three inputs. The arithmetic, run for the two or three candidate months. The other clocks in the case: the 90-day and 70-day windows for recent charges, the 90-day preference period, the 180-day credit counseling certificate, and any garnishment, lawsuit, or eviction that cannot wait. And actual current income, because a case that passes the test on paper and fails it in substance is not worth filing.

When the inputs conflict, a filer losing $800 a month to a wage attachment may do better in a Chapter 13 filed now than in a Chapter 7 filed in three months. When they do not conflict, waiting out a high month is one of the few things in bankruptcy that is free.

Frequently asked questions

I am paid biweekly. Some months have three checks. The form asks for the total received in each calendar month. A three-check month is counted as received.

Does a tax refund count as income in the month received? Most courts treat a refund as a return of over-withheld wages rather than new income, and the form's instructions do not list it as an income source. An unspent refund is an asset on Schedule A/B.

My agency paid me late because of a shutdown. The month the money was received. Keep the earnings statement showing the pay date.

Can I exclude a month that distorts the average? No. The six months are fixed by the filing date. The only variable is the date.

Before choosing a month, the free DC means test calculator takes about three minutes and shows whether Chapter 7 is realistic before you pay for a consultation.