10 Insider Tips to Find Answers to Consumer Law Questions

The NCLC Digital Library is the product of hundreds of consumer law experts’ contributions for the last 45 years. Odds are the answer to your consumer law questions can be found there. But pinpointing quickly what you need is not always easy, and you may not even be sure what the key issues are in a case. Here are ten insider tips for finding the answers you seek while also helping you ask the right questions.

1.  Free Practice Checklists

The NCLC Digital Library has a series of practice checklists that are free to the public and enumerate issues that commonly come up in a consumer law practice, linking to more information on the NCLC Digital Library. Checklists include an auto litigation checklist, analyzing a foreclosure case, a consumer credit litigation checklist, a student loan checklist, a debt defense checklist, and several more. They are all aggregated here.

2.  Quick-Reads on Best Practices to Address Common Client Problems 

NCLC’s best-selling book, Surviving Debt, free on the NCLC Digital Library, contains accessible, short chapters, each packed with expert advice and solutions for clients facing different consumer law problems: debt collection, wage garnishment, credit reporting, student loans, medical debt, credit cards, mortgage servicing, home foreclosures, property taxes, income taxes, criminal justice debt, bankruptcy options and more. There is no better way to get the “lay of the land” on each of these topics in just minutes.

3.  Free NCLC Articles on the Latest Hot Consumer Law Developments

NCLC has published over 250 free articles on the practice implications of the latest consumer law developments, with live links to additional resources on the NCLC Digital Library and elsewhere. Search them easily with an Advanced Search. On the left sidebar, select “Articles” and then select among filters for article topics, publication year, and author, and narrow it down further with keyword terms. Get on our free mailing list here to be notified about each new article. 

4.  Six Pointers for Successful Searching of Digital Library Chapter Content

Standard searches of the NCLC Digital Library produce results with hits in context, ordered by relevance, and with search terms highlighted in the text or footnotes of the corresponding results. You can narrow the results by treatise. Here are six other pointers to improve your searches and find what you need in the chapter content:

1. Search a treatise’s table of contents (the search box is at the top of the table of contents) which will produce hits of especially high relevance.
2. Use terms and connectors to improve search results, with a list of available operators found at the top of the Advanced Search page at “Terms and Connectors.” Proximity searches find results where one term is within a selected number of characters of another. Find pages where one term is found but not another. Put multi-word search terms in quotes for best results.
3. Order search results by “Sort by section” instead of “Sort by relevance,” if you know what chapter you want to focus on. In Advanced Search also select "Chapters" and the applicable treatise. To find results fastest for chapters at the end of the book, select “show 50” or “show 100” results per page instead of the standard 25.
4. Use the digital version of the print index, found as one of the tabs at the top of the left pane table of contents. It works far better than using the index found in a print book. Locate terms faster, including sub-terms, use live links to related index terms, and link directly to the relevant subsection.
5. Save and share your results. Bookmark useful individual search results to come back to next time and then organize multiple bookmarks into different collections—for example, one collection for “Case A” and another collection of bookmarks for “Case B.” Annotate the bookmarked subsections to remind yourself about the salient points. Or email selected subsections to colleagues or download them for future use.
6. Use the related content button on the right tool bar to view summaries and links to related content to the page you are viewing. 

5.  Over 30 Appendices Provide State-by-State Summaries of Key State Statutes 

The Digital Library contains over 30 appendices that contain 50-state, state-by-state citations and summaries of key consumer law state statutes covering over 40 topics—state statutes for your state on debt collection, exemptions, state court standing, foreclosures, credit regulation, automobile fraud, repossessions, lemon laws, credit reporting, and more. 

6.  3,000 Speaker Submissions and Videos from NCLC Conferences Free on the Digital Library

The NCLC Digital Library features for free over 3,000 speaker written submissions and session videos from past NCLC conferences—the last six Consumer Rights Litigation Conferences, the last six Class Action symposia, the most recent four Fair Debt Conferences, the last five Mortgage Conferences, and the last two Spring Trainings. All these materials are searchable—with keywords and with filters by conference type, specific conference, and session, and by conference track and related NCLC treatise. Conference materials are packed with practice tips from some of the most successful consumer litigators from around the country. 

Speakers submit their material with the understanding that conference attendees are vetted, and this free conference material on the Digital Library is restricted to active NACA members, legal aid attorneys, and those attending a vetted NCLC and NACA conference within the last three years. Simply login or create a login here. Contact [email protected] if your login does not allow access.

7.  3,000 Sample Pleadings and Discovery Are Easily Searchable 

The NCLC Digital Library includes almost 3,000 sample pleadings and discovery of all kinds—complaints, interrogatories, document requests, sample voir dire, opening statements, motions in limine, jury instructions, and more. Six different filters let you pinpoint relevant pleadings with or without a keyword search term—general pleadings type, class action pleadings type, bankruptcy pleadings type, pleadings subject, legal claims found in the pleading, and related treatise. 

8.  Unique Search of Federal Consumer Law Materials

All federal statutes, regulations, and official interpretations found in NCLC treatise appendices are free to the public and offer a unique search opportunity across key federal consumer laws and rules. At advanced search, select “Appendices” and narrow the search by keywords and/or related treatise. Select “new treatise content” to search for recent amendments.

Similar searches of the full text are available for 3,400 recent federal circuit court decisions on consumer law topics. The full text of the decisions is free to the public. At Advanced Search, select “Court Decisions” and then search by circuit, related treatise, and/or keyword.

Thousands more federal materials are available on the Digital Library, including agency letters and interpretations and legislative and regulatory history. At Advanced Search, select “Primary Sources,” and then narrow searches by year, law topic, federal agency, primary source type, related treatise, and/or keyword.

As a special bonus, a new edition of the beloved Federal Practice Manual for Legal Aid Attorneys is free on the site (for now). Also available for subscription on the site is the National Housing Law Project’s definitive (and newly revised) HUD Housing Programs: Tenants Rights. And for those handling their first bankruptcy, see NCLC’s Bankruptcy Basics on the Digital Library. 

9.  Practice Tools Designed for the Consumer Law Attorney

At Advanced Search, select “Practice Tools” and find invaluable aids to consumer law representation—three different consumer law math tools, interview checklists, client questionnaires, retainer letters, client handouts, co-counsel agreements, a calculator for bankruptcy look-back dates, sample notices and demand letters, student loan forms, and more. Narrow a search by practice tool type, a related treatise, and/or a keyword.

10. Housing, Medical Debt, and Student Loan Toolboxes; Webinars; Videos

The Housing Toolbox on the Digital Library brings together key NCLC materials on each of five of the latest hot housing law topics: tangled titles, zombie second mortgages, property tax foreclosures, homeowner strategies after natural disasters, and mortgage servicing pleadings. The Medical Debt toolbox aggregates in one place medical debt materials from recent NCLC conferences and from eight different NCLC treatises. The Student Loan Toolkit is a free 52-page step-by-step guide to advising student loan borrowers. The Digital Library also aggregates webinars and videos on consumer law topics here.

Whether you’re a seasoned litigator or just beginning in consumer law, the NCLC Digital Library is an indispensable tool for navigating complex legal questions and building stronger cases. With expert-authored content, practical checklists, sample pleadings, cutting-edge analysis, and intuitive search tools, it empowers advocates to act quickly and effectively for their clients. Explore the resources highlighted above, and let the Digital Library help you not only find answers—but ask sharper, more strategic questions from the start.