New comer really in need of advice!

emw8910 · January 2013

Hi guys! I've been a lurker on this board for a little bit but I usually don't have much to post about. However, something has come up that I'm pretty concerned about and wanted to see if anyone had any advice! I will not be able to call our lawyer until Tuesday.

A little BS: My DH has a DD who is almost 5. I have been in her life since she was 6 months old and DH and I have been married for 3 years. I have a great relationship with SD and we have an ok relationship with BM. Things were extremely rocky the first few years, have gotten much better though.

FF to now. DH and I took BM to court for legitimization and visitation, which we won standard for our state. Just this past month we took her back to court to modify child support because DH's income had changed and DH and I had a child. Even though we've always made our child support payments on time, BM decided to put an income deduction order (IDO) in place this time. Which is really no problem because we always make her payments.

My question is, now that the IDO is going to be in place, my husband is going to be taking a new job in the next month or so. Does anyone know how we go about getting the IDO switched over to his new employer and does BM have to know anything about it as long as she's still receiving payments on time? He will be making more money and if she knows that she will take us back to court and we just can't afford a lawyer again when we just paid for court a month ago.

I'm sorry this turned out to be so long! Any advice or anyone that has done that before that could tell me about it would be appreciated! TIA!!

SimpleJane · January 2013

I think its kind of shiiitty of you to want to hide the new higher income from her. You'll take her back to court while your income is lowered, but try to sneak around it when your income goes up?

J&A2008 · January 2013

I have no experience with child support, as we don't receive any, but isn't there a way for you to avoid court by telling BM and agreeing to the standard amount for his new income?

HisChamaoleGirl · January 2013

JA2008:
I have no experience with child support, as we don't receive any, but isn't there a way for you to avoid court by telling BM and agreeing to the standard amount for his new income?

this is what we did. We agreed on our own amount and filed it with the court to make it "official." so yes, it can be done

Nineoceans · January 2013

My understanding is you can only modify or request a modification of CS every three years? Otherwise the court system and CSEA would be consistently more overwhelmed than it already is.

Amanda88 · January 2013

We are supposed to recieve CS, but our CO requires us to notify BM of any change in employment and vice versa. I'd wait to talk with your lawyer before doing anything so that you can't be faulted for doing something wrong.

+just+j+ · January 2013

If you really think BM won't find out eventually, you're crazy. And if she finds out you tried to hide it, she'll probably be more pissed off and go for more. If things were rocky with her, you are not doing any favors by trying to keep secrets from her.

Do I think your H should make a big announcement to her and broadcast his new salary? No. But he shouldn't try to manipulate the system when he went to court to reduce it.

This is a part of life when you are divorced, have children, and pay child support. Just like you can have it reduced, expect to have it raised when you earn more.

SimpleJane · January 2013

Nineoceans:
My understanding is you can only modify or request a modification of CS every three years? Otherwise the court system and CSEA would be consistently more overwhelmed than it already is.

I think its different in every state.

Karma1969 · January 2013

Most states you can ask fir a child support review every two years. If there is a change in income it can be done at any time though. An automatic withholding order should transfer aotomaticslly to his new job but it could take a few oay periods for the transaction to be completed.

You normally don't need an attorney at a child support hearing after the initial one because it is based upon a formula.

Don't hide money. That is just sad.

Nineoceans · January 2013

Yeah I read the laws in my state and it's 36 months and even then can only be changed if someone is earning 30% more or less than the original order or the obligor adds a child to their household. Definitely check into your state laws. If you literally just had court I would think a judge would be fairly annoyed to do another review unless it's a decent raise. Just my two cents

arteri · January 2013

The CS IDO will follow his SSN to his new employer, after the employer pays him once. By law, your DH is supposed to call the court any time his employer, address or any other pertinent information changes. The only reason that they would question the income amount is if she takes him back to court and typically, you can only do that every so often, depending on the state you are in.

blush64 · January 2013

SimpleJane:
I think its kind of shiiitty of you to want to hide the new higher income from her. You'll take her back to court while your income is lowered, but try to sneak around it when your income goes up?

I agree with this. I have no respect for a man who would do something like that. He just wants to pay as little as he can to support his child? Great guy. But I guess that's fine as long as most of his money can be given to your child.

EDIT I can relate to having times of little money and not being able to afford a lawyer. I'm surprised there are people who find it ok to try to sneak around to make things stay the same knowing that the amount should be raised.

CurlyQ284 · January 2013

For my DH, somehow the state already knows he changed jobs so they automatically send the order to the new employer. We are in VA and the court order is in MI. We get a copy of the order when they send it, it just says something like 'employer must withhold x amount' with a bunch of legalese thrown in. It doesn't request that the income be reported. And in MI,from my understanding, you can only update the CS amount every 3 years.

emw8910 · January 2013

Ok, this got way out of hand. We are not hiding money so DH doesn't have to support his child. We've always paid our payments, support her in many other ways, BM brings home twice the money he does, has an aunt and uncle that literally pay almost half of her bills for her and has a roommate that pays half her house payment. We have to spend 2500 in lawyer fees each time we go to court, which we just did after paying her 400 too much in child support a month for about 6 months until we had the money for the lawyer. We went to court because his income had changed, we have a child now that we get a credit for, daycare fees went from 600 a month to 0 and child support was reduced 300 a month. We can't afford another 2500 to go back to court. She'll know that he has another job but not what he's making. I was just wondering how the IDO would work. Thank you for those that offered advice. For those that think we're terrible people and are trying to be sneaky, that's really not the case. I don't want to 'get off to a bad start' on here because my first post was misunderstood.

cautionwillburneyes · January 2013

I think you could probably just contact your child support office and let them know that he started another job and that they will need to contact them to have child support taken out of his check there.

You will probably also need to watch his first check or two and see if they take it out or not. If not, you'll have to send the child support office the payment so that he doesn't get behind. Now that it's court ordered to go through the child support office, don't send her any money directly or it will not count as child support. At least that's the case in my state.

Gwenillian · January 2013

In regards to disclosing the higher income, you should really check his court order. I know that mine has a clause that is apparently standard in my state that dad will disclose all raises in writing as well as all changes in employment (which would include the new place & new rate of pay). If he has that in his order & doesn't follow it, he can be held in contempt. I don't know if being in contempt could open the door for an adjustment to also go back to the date of the raise/change in pay, but I personally wouldn't want to chance it.

Oh, and it won't cost you $2500 if you figure out how much your dh should be paying at the higher rate of pay & then draw up a stipulation/adjustment for that amount. In most states that is something that doesn't require an attorney - just a form that both parents agree to. There are calculators online for many states & if not, the CS Office could probably help. You only need to spend the $2500 if for some reason you want to fight paying the correct amount as determined by your state.

dmndsr4eva · January 2013

His new employer sends a new hire list monthly to the state. The state searches it's database for child support orders and then reports it to the new employer. As others said there may be a delay in her getting her money so she will probably realize that something has changed.

HChad · January 2013

The laws vary by state. Some require notification, others' won't allow a review for a certain amount of time, others' allow a review with a "Significant Change in Circumstance", 10% of income up or down.

An IDO is may upset the BM if she doesn't understand the time involved. It takes time for the order to go into effect, for the info to get to the employer and for the state to get the payment. Changing jobs creates more of a lag in time, especially if the change in employment happens right after the IDO. My DH's IDO took over a month to go into effect (he was paying CS directly to his ExW in the month before the IDO took effect by judge's order). I would check with an attorney on what you need to do.

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