As of 2011[update], only the First, Sixth, Eighth, Ninth, and Tenth Circuits had convened these panels.
Those circuits which chose not to establish panels would have bankruptcy appeals heard by the United States district courts.
The aftermath of the landmark Northern Pipeline Co. v. Marathon Pipe Line Co.[4] case in 1982 had different effects on the two circuits.
Even though the U.S. Supreme Court did not directly address the constitutionality of the panels in that decision, the First Circuit held that the emergency rules adopted after the decision was rendered pre-empted the use of their BAP, and subsequently disbanded it.
Judges on a BAP are generally barred from hearing a case from their own bankruptcy district.