Child support question. Please read details...
Background: I have dual citizenship. My children have dual citizenship. I encountered a very bad period early 2000 in which my husband left me and took our children. He filed for child support before he left. I, being a dentist, was ordered to pay $1200 per month. I didn’t have a job at the time and lost my house, everything. fast forward: I remarried, found my children. My daughter spent a year here in 2010. I have paid both their private school, wire tranfers, internet. My child support arrears were $40,000. I recently got settlement in my now divorce from my now husband, it is being held up because it includes a 30 day waiting period if I want to challenge. Should I challenge? I have paid private schooling, clothes, and cash western union transfers as they are teenagers now. My settlement is not that much considering I am going back. Should I pay and shut up or should I challenge? I have all the records. I am going back, I should say, it
s a small town and everyone will have heard the worst about me.
I did not not lose my license to practice for any wrongdoing. I could not keep up with the uniform payments to maintain it.
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14 Answers
Three words.
Get an attorney.
Most likely you will be responsible for all arrears including interest which is 10% on all overdue monies. Most courts frown upon owed child support and regardless of all the other contributions you have made if you have violated a court order for child support you will be required to pay all monies owed past and current.
thankyou @Coloma I have an attorney. I can call this quits right now by paying it. just wanted to know what I should do. thanks again.
You are asking an emotional question for a financial issue. Call your lawyer for the financial issue and what the long term impact would be. Not by by asking people on the internet.
I’m sorry to hear you are in the place that you are in right now.
@trailsillustrated Gah…divorce is hell. I paid child support for 2 years when my daughter went to live with her dad the last 2 years of high school. Thank God those days are over!
@trailsillustrated just so I understand, the court is holding your settlement in order to make up the arrears in child support and you have a right to contest that. Is that right?
I might seriously consider contesting it if you can prove all that you have provided since you were able to find and reconnect with your kids. I’m not saying that you should welch on commitments, I just think that if you have been an active financial supporter of your kids since 2010, the courts should consider that. Practically it might come down to whether it costs less to fight it then it does just to pay it and be done.
@SuperMouse you are correct. It is this state’s laws to hold the money, giving the garnishee a right to protest, 30 days in my circumstance. I am not about welshing, I am considering whether all my private pays ( school, clothing, cash) I should go after. It may take many months, I have told my children I would be home by july
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@trailsillustrated I am sorry about the wording, I didn’t have the impression that you wanted to welch out on it, I was trying to stave off the potential judgmental comments about not paying. I can tell by your question that you want to do the right thing here.
I tend to think it is definitely worth asking the courts to consider your contributions to your kids over the past few years. I have no idea how they look at this type of situation but it seems worth a try. It is clear that once you found your kids and got in a position to help, you did so without hesitation.
You do need to get some legal advice but if you have been paying for school fees, clothing and the like for your children, those expenses should be deducted from your child support debt. I wouldn’t just pay it and wear the error. You have to pick up the pieces and get on with your life too. I hope I got the gist of the question right @trailsillustrated.
@Bellatrix you got it right. Anybody thats been on here for long knows what happend to me. It
s pretty much my own fault but not so much. thanks all, a difficult position
@SuperMouse i did not take it that way. I understand this is a circumstance outside of most people’s realm. Thankyou for your help.
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I agree that you should fight it – obviously the financial hardship of this destroyed your ability to keep the career that those exorbitant child support fees were based upon. In fact, you should have had the support amounts reviewed several times over the years as your financial circumstances changed, so the arrears wouldn’t have built up so much. You kept all those records for a reason – use them to your advantage. Good luck!
@bkcunningham in 2006. I couldn’t afford a lawyer to have to the payments reduced until 2007 and I did get them drastically reduced. I wasn’t able to get legal aid ever because of my background I guess. I’m just going to pay it- I sort of talk it over with their dad, and he isn’t going for a reduction, I just want it over with. Thanks all.
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