Persuade the judge to make a child support order based on imputed income.
I have a question about how child support, child care and medical costs are related.
Joe and Sue have two kids, Joe is ordered to pay $200 in support weekly, and another $100 in child care adjustment, for instance.
Joe owes $300 per week, total, but Joe falls behind for a period, so now he’s in arrears. Since CS officers are only in charge of child support, they take the full payment of $300 Joe sends and puts $200 into child support and the other $100 goes to pay off the back support owed from his arrearage. Child care is getting shorted, then, but since CS officers aren’t in charge of collecting for anything but support, Joe catches up on his account quickly and the unpaid child care goes uncollected.
What happens with enforcing the medical or child care adjustments to the child support order?
Why wouldn’t you rent a larger apartment because of having a child? When you were married, you probably aspired to provide each child a bedroom of his or her own. Why should the child have a much lower standard of living (these days few middle class kids share a bedroom) because the parents aren’t married anymore?
When you were married, were you planning on dressing your kid in clothes from Wal-Mart and garage sales, or dressing him or her to fit in with middle class peers? Again, why the lower standard of living for the kid now that parents are divorced?
You can find that article suspect, but figures like that have been around for ages, prepared by multiple sources, and they all come out in the same range for the total to age 18. I just picked that link because it’s more detailed than most.
Those numbers are based on 2 kids per family, so already include some economies of scale over a single child. Also, they include no money for college, which makes them extremely conservative for many middle class families. Sure, it can be done for cheaper, (see the Duggans, or Cheaper by the Dozen), but, in practice, that isn’t how most people raise their kids.
It’s hard to rebut because I said, in my case, I lived in a 3 bedroom house. No need for a bigger apartment because I’ve never lived in one. And I never said that I buy Wal-Mart clothes, not that there’s anything wrong with that. I don’t but actually my child likes some of them, as well as higher priced stores. Even the higher-priced stores have good sales, I’m not teaching my kid that paying $40 for a shirt makes you worth more than someone who pays $15.
Then you haven’t spoken to me or a large portion of those I work with. No, it is NOT a prerequisite. IMO, someone could answer the phone sunshine and daisies and you’d still find offense at this point.
Explain how I am not enforcing the laws as they are on the books at this time?
It wasn’t to not overwork is, it was to stave off the rush in the courts. The legislature did put a one year hold on modifications under the new formula, however, some magistrates did use it right off on a case by case basis.
It had nothing to do with the child support office.
Billing statements are a waste of paper, I agree. It is my understanding that we are required to send them out under federal law and they all have the same blah blah on the bottom. When we switched to the computer program we use back in 1997 we were able to stop sending them out if people requested. That lasted only a few months and that ability was removed from programming.
You probably received a Notice of Right to Review this week. Another waste of paper. We review a very select few number of cases (used to be more, budget cuts gutted the review team). However, under Federal law we must send it out.
I apologize. Adding a “h” is not as bad as being called names, but whatever.
How she spent the money has nothing to do with the child support office. It’s between you and your ex. As noted above, organizations have tried to get laws passed requiring accountability, and the legislature has shot them down every time. It is NOT a child support office issue. It’s a logistic issue in the courts. Can you even begin to image how many motions would be filed if something like that passed? There is not enough court time as it is.
nyctea scandiaca: I am sorry to hear what your boyfriend is going through. I hear of cases like this and it makes me upset with the robed idiots who don’t read through the cases in front of them.
In your next post you stated it would be simple to apply payments into an audited account. Who would do the audit? Who would decide what is a fair expense? I may think paying $40 on a pair of shoes for TheKid is fine, but her dad probably wouldn’t. Then who handles the disagreements that would inevitably arise?
At this point I’m doing my damndest to get people to pay their ordered support in the first place let alone nanny them. I do see clients akin to your boyfriends ex, and it does annoy me. They’re the ones calling when the child support is a day late - at which point I remind them child support is not guaranteed and maybe they should find another way to secure a livelihood rather than depend on the employment of the other person.
I don’t completely disagree that the system is still biased. It is getting better, at least here in Minnesota. But it IS slow.
Side story: A few years ago I scrimped and saved to buy myself a new tattoo. According to the girlfriend (at the time) of the ex, I was satan for being so selfish. Did I not know how she was suffering since he had to pay child support and I wasted it so carelessly? I was not aware that I had to wear sackcloth as a custodial parent. I ended up sitting down with her WITH my bank account information showing here exactly where the money for the tattoo came from (I was doing some side work and I had birthday money). I was very upset that I had to explain myself to her. I have also had that discussion with the ex about where the child support goes. It becomes frustrating to justify every penny spent. Why did she play the violin? Wasn’t there a cheaper instrument for her to play? Why is she taking private lessons? Why do you allow her to buy lunch at school rather than brown bagging it? It took a while for him to get that what he paid in child support what nothing compared to the actual cost of having her in my house.
I do not like custodial parents who sit on their butts and consider child support “wages”. Heaven forbid the payor gets hit by a bus and the money stops. I do not particularly like custodial parents who dress to the nines and drive nice cars while the payors are in broken down hoopdies, living off very little. Ideally the support is to be used for the raising of the child(ren). It doesn’t matter whether it’s $50 or $1500. People who take that money and use it not for the welfare of the children irk the hell out of me.
At this time there is little recourse when a noncustodial parent objects to how the child support is spent, unless s/he has a very good attorney and time to go to court.
Men do have the ability to obtain public assistance no differently than women. If either party have children in the household the public assistance is the same. If they apply without children they have a limited collection time, period. When it comes to welfare there is not a difference to how men and women are treated.
I could not begin to say whether what you were paying was fair. There are too many variables for me to even begin to guess.
A decent percentage of my caseload consist of people court ordered to pay but refuse to do so - which is different than those ordered to pay but due to life choices and abilities cannot pay.
Many of these payors detest the other parent so much that they will do what they can to not pay. It never has anything to do with the child(ren), just the other party. For more than a few it works. Some do go completely off the grid. If we know where they are our options are to file civil contempt charges, which can carry up to 180 days in jail (sentences are stayed if the obligor pays) or file criminal contempt charges, which can carry up to a few years in prison. We do have the ability to file federal criminal contempt charges which can lead to time in federal prison - and the feds will sieze everything they can while doing it.
I try to be particular in choosing cases for contempt. A few years ago the County Attorney sent out an edict requesting us to push through as many civil contempts as possible. It was a trainwreck. If a payor is a drug dealer/gangbanger/scammer jail time will not cause payments to come in. More often than not the other person knew what the obligor was when the baby was born and understand nothing we do will coerce the obligor to go straight. If the obligor has mental and/or chemical health issues s/he has to work through that - we’re not a priority. Why waste the courts time, our time, and the parties time?
Those that I do file civil contempt on usually do end up paying some child support, even if it’s bail applied to the case.
We’re trying to get away from establishing orders based on imputed income unless we know for a fact the payor has a long track record of working an a particular field.
Imputed wage orders are bad for all involved.
Here in Minnesota we collect for basic support (child support), medical support and child care contributions. Payments are distributed to pay the current ordered support first (be it basic, medical, or child care) then the arrears.
When a person pays on arrears money first goes to interest then on to whatever obligation is listed first in the system, usually the basic support.
If an order says that some of the support is payable through the agency and some is payable directly to the other party, we only concern ourselves with what comes through us.
In the example you noted, the arrears would still be there on the basic support and child care support from when he was not paying, but the $300 he resumed paying would go out to Sue as current basic support and current child care.
@ MissTake – Bless you for your bravery!
My question is this- I have received 8 CS payments since my now 5-year old son was born, and nothing in the last 4 years. It is court ordered, as a result of my applying for public assistance. He moved to Mississippi and works under the table (yes, control-z, it seems to work for some). We have a child support enforcement office here in Florida, which says there is very little they can do. His FLORIDA driver’s license was suspended, yes- but he’d had enough DUIs that it was suspended anyway, and his Mississippi license is still valid. At one time, a little under 2 years ago, I was told that the state he lives in had requested a contempt hearing, but then it was never scheduled and I never heard anything else. We don’t have an office or caseworker, so every 1-3 months, I call the 800 number we have. They tell me they’ll send a communication to Mississippi, again-- then nothing happens.
I absolutely cannot afford a lawyer. Requesting enforcement isn’t working. What else can I do? I know you’re in a different state, and one that actually assigns caseworkers, but is there anything you can tell me about enforcement across state lines?
Also appreciated would be any advice on how to find people…
What was supposed to have happened was your Florida order should have been registered in Mississippi, which would then allow Mississippi to go after your ex. If they (Mississippi) had scheduled a contempt hearing, I’m guessing Florida has done that, but also has extremely crappy follow through.
Florida does have offices for walk in clients - I have no idea if any are near you ([url=http://dor.myflorida.com/dor/childsupport/phone.html]see here[/url). Talk up the chain of command. If Jane Drone cannot answer, talk to her supervisor until you find someone who will look into it.
Also know that communications between states can be a joke. Under Federal law we’re all supposed to communicate freely via computer systems, but that’s presuming the child support agency is using a somewhat up to date system, not tablet and chisel. coughIllinoiscough
If your order is registered and a case is open in Mississippi, they would have the ability to suspend his MS license.
For locating people - I like zabasearch, myspace, and facebook to name a few.
My son’s daycare alone is $220/month, and that’s only because as a single working parent who doesn’t receive child support, his daycare rates are subsidized. Health/Vision/Dental, through work, is another $225.
Equally confusing is the MSN link from Harriet the Spry which show an ANNUAL childcare cost, (in 2001 dollars, mind you) of $720.00 for a single parent household. Where do these people take their kids, and are there any openings??
Here’s a question that just came to mind.
When I was reading up about child support in this state (Oregon) something was mentioned that if I don’t cooperate with the CS office that they could deny me and my daughter assistance. At this point all they’ve done is send me a form asking for the last know whereabouts for her dad and I filled that in and sent it in. Haven’t heard from them since (almost six months ago) but I’m worried what’s considered ‘not cooperating’.
Yes, child support can request a sanction on public assistance for non-cooperation. I would call your financial worker and ask if everything is okay - whether the referral was sent to the child support agency. If it was, ask your worker for a phone number to the child support office working on your case.
If your child support agency is based in a populous county, it can take quite a while for a case to be opened. Often, many actions are being taken that a client isn’t aware of. We receive the applications, open a case on the system, then do a chunk of preliminary work before you or the other party receive notice.
Unless you receive a notice from the public assistance office notifying you of a sanction, I wouldn’t worry about it.
I don’t know the factual answer, but I can share what happened in my boyfriend’s case. He and his ex-wife live in two different states, and her state had no problem working with his state to get his wages garnished through his employer. He was told that if he didn’t cooperate, her state could have his state pull his license. She didn’t have to hire a lawyer - the people at her county CS office helped her to do everything. (Let me just add that my boyfriend always paid his CS; never missed payments; and she always knew where he was – unlike your ex, who it seems that you don’t even know where he is.)
Good luck to you!!
Easy - just like there are child support guidelines, there could be child care expense guidelines. It would be relatively easy to come up with an average amount that it costs to provide for a child of a given age - things like food and clothing, housing and utility expenses. One might ask, well who is to decide what’s fair, etc…? Well, the government decides many things like this for us: how much tax we pay, how much welfare or assistance we can get, how much a man must pay for CS… The average amount of money that it costs to raise a child is a observable, tangible amount that can be studied and averaged. Heck, I have seen such lists in baby care books detailing how much it costs per year to raise a child at each age. Surely the great minds of the government could come up with something fair – because right now, the way the system is, it is NOT fair. I feel that far too many women are using CS as their own wages, or as their own spending money.
Thank you for recognizing this problem. It is infuriating. My boyfriend’s ex is exactly what you describe - she without a doubt considers her CS to be her “wages.” For an unemployed mother of 6 whose husband does not make that much money, she lives very large - she takes multiple family vacations to Disneyland every year; she and her husband go on cruises and other trips; they have big screen televisions with all the latest video-game equipment (not for the kids but for her husband); they drive nice new SUVs; they live in nice big single-family homes; she has an eBay addiction; I could go on and on. Meanwhile, my boyfriend lives a very simple lifestyle, sharing a small group house with roommates, driving a compact car, eating ramen noodles, working his way through graduate school; for a couple of years he worked 2 jobs. Like I said before, not ONE day in her adult life has his ex-wife EVER worked. She latched onto my boyfriend and has lived off of him ever since.
The “system” offers opportunistic women a relatively easy way to get income without working - just have a kid by a guy with a job, and get paid to sit at home with your kids all day. And if the man tries to get custody, he is shit outta luck - everyone knows they won’t give the man custody unless there is outrageous abuse or addiction on the mother’s part. Even if a father tries from Day One to get custody of an infant - the mother can just claim she’s breastfeeding, and the man is SOL. Then when the kid is weaned, the mother can just claim that the kid’s already used to her, so it would be detrimental to send the kid to the father (this exact situation happened to a friend of mine). So on, and so forth. The fathers don’t stand a chance unless the mother fucks up big time. And even then, he needs deep pockets for legal expenses. It’s a lose-lose-lose for fathers everywhere.
Something has to be done to fix the inequity of the system!!
There’s more to it than that. Out of state cases often have incomplete documentation and/or procedural issues that make enforcement difficult. In order to hold him in contempt, the state has to serve him with process, and then has the burden of showing that he was ordered to pay and has not paid. He then has the opportunity to present any defense he may have. Several ways to defend against a contempt…one of which is to show a present inability to pay. If he’s working “off the books”, it is very difficult to get him jailed. Even if he is jailed, they’ll let him out eventually…usually when he’s made some token payment. Then the cycle starts over again.
Factor in to the equation that the state has a limited number of attorneys assigned to child support cases. When I did that kind of work, I generally was responsible for 2-3 counties at a time. A typical docket for one county may have 20-50 cases on it. The state demands that the attorneys produce a high volume of orders. That means that the harder cases get lower priority. A lawyer that spent the time it takes to win a difficult case is likely going to get called on the carpet for failing to produce enough volume. Out of state cases, especially difficult out of state cases, are the lowest priority on the totem pole. That’s not fair, but that’s reality.
Best advice I can give to those trying to collect is to complain loud and long to everybody that will listen. Squeeky wheels sometimes get greased.
Another option is to contact the U.S. Attorney’s office. There is a federal criminal statute applicable to non-support. In my experience, the feds are only interested in “sexy” cases…those where there is a large amount owed and the documentation is rock solid. They used to take maybe 2-3 cases a year, if that, back when I did child support…but it’s worth a shot.
That’s flat out wrong. Men can and do win custody cases everyday. I’ve won several of them for male clients. In my state, custody is determined in the best interest of the child, considering a number of factors, including but not limited to age/gender/health of child, mental/physical health of parents, continuity of care, ability/willingness to provide primary care, child’s record in school/community, moral fitness of the parents, available familial support, etc.
But aren’t the cards stacked against the fathers? In my case, you have an unemployed, uneducated woman with 6 kids, whose husband has been charged with (and will likely be convicted of) child molestation, versus a loving father who makes a good salary, who has a college education and masters degree… A father who has spent at least $10,000 on lawyers trying to get his kids… and he STILL does not have them. He had NOT seen them in A YEAR because his ex-wife has obstructed visitation repeatedly. The ex-wife has also not followed other court orders, such as an order to go to anger management classes, and order to take the children to therapy… she has done none of these things, and the judge knows it and STILL the court has not granted the father custody.
The judge ordered them to mediation, and here is what the mediator said… here is the BIAS and insanity he is up against:
Can anyone see how F*CKED up this is? Or am I delusional?
The mediator says that even though the father may be the better parent, and even if the step-father is a child molester, and even if the mother is only doing an adequate job, the kids STILL should stay with her!! Because her “lifestyle” is all they have known (because the mother has repeatedly blocked visitation); because they are not “bonded” to their father (again, because the mother blocks visitation, and because she brainwashes them against him).
I am upset and distraught beyond belief here! These kids’ lives are being RUINED. Please, I am begging someone, anyone, Oakminster - since you have had success in this realm, please tell us what to do! We are at the end of the rope.
If a father can’t get his kids when they are living with a child molester, then I have lost any and all faith in this “system.” How can this be? How can someone hired by the state to assess the situation - a professional person - say that the kids would be better off in a household with a child molester?!?!
Oakminster, please, any advice you have is desperately needed. The list of factors you provided that are considered… I could go item by item and the father would prevail as the better parent in each and every category, but yet the court hasn’t inquired about or investigated any of these factors at all. The closest we’ve gotten is the bulls*it report from the mediator (based on only brief interviews), which does not explore any of those factors you mention.
Sorry I am so upset here, maybe I need to open a pit thread…
I am sorry, but I can’t give you any specific advice on your case. I am not licensed in your state. Also, since your SO is represented by counsel, it would be inappropriate for me to offer him advice even if I were licensed in that jurisdiction. The factors I listed are the law in my state, but your state may have different standards.