Wisconsin Child Support Legal Questions

It is difficult to answer your question without more facts from you. (1) what is the current placement schedule? Is it shared / equal placement? does the other parent have pirmary placement? (2) how long ago was the child support order set? if more than 33 months, there is a presumption under Wisconsin law, that there is a substantial change in circumstances sufficient to  modify the support order; (3) if you are under a court order to pay child support, and cannot comply due to significant health reasons that impair your ability to work, certainly a letter from your doctor at the preliminary level of the court commissioner hearing may help. Keep in mind that technically, the letter from your doctor is "hearsay evidence" and can be objected to by your ex spouse or their attorney. If the case goes to a contested hearing, you may have to bring in the doctor to testify. It might be best to talk first hand to an experienced family lawyer before filing a motion to modify the support payments.... Read More

Why don't you have visitation rights to spend time with your children? The answer to your question is no, unless your parental rights have been terminated, both you and the mother have a duty an obligation to pay child support. If you are disabled or there is some other medical reason why you can't work and pay support, that would be a different issue.... Read More

Using the Wisconsin serial payer formula and assuming (a) your gross monthly is $2,200 and (B) the 3rd child is born AFTER the first two, you get an offset on support for the third child, based on your obligation to support the first two. $2,200 x 25% = 550. $2,200 - 550 (support for first 2 children) = $1,650 (adjusted gross), $1,650 x 17% for the third child = $280.50... Read More

Contact the family court clerk in your county where your case is from and ask them if they can provide a list of not for profit lawyers or law firms who may be willing to take your case pro bono or for limited fees. Many counties also offer a free limited legal advice clinic. Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Waukesha and Washington counties also offer such services.... Read More

Certain motions must be personally served, such as contempt and order to show cause hearings. General motions may be mailed. Mail the motion for support out to his last known address with an affidavit of mailing. While I can't promise you it holds up in court, it may, as there is no technical legal requirement for a general motion for support to be personally served.... Read More

In my opinion, you should have a lawyer present with you in court; there is much at stake; custody, placement, child support, among other issues. At a minimum, make an appointment to consult with an experienced family lawyer to see what rights you have and what can be done in court to help you. Many offer a free initial consultation. ... Read More

Under federal law, the custodial parent claims the child tax dependency exemption, unless waived by the custodial parent or as ordered by the court. In addition, the custodial parent must  sign IRS waiver form 8332 in the year where the non custodial parent claims the child. Whether arrears are owed or not, is irrelevant to the question of entitlement to claim the exemption, unless there is something spelled out in your court papers that the non custodial parent can’t claim the exemption, where it is allocated to them, if there are any arrears of was record . If your ex served you with a contempt motion and you have claimed the exemption improperly, they may order you to amend your return without claiming the child, which would remedy the situation with her filing an amended return as well claiming the child or the court could order you to pay whatever tax loss she can prove by the difference of claiming the child as opposed to not claiming the child. Effective 1/1/18, for your information, under the new tax reform act, all personal exemptions have been eliminated, including the child tax dependency exemption. The child tax card credit has been increased from $1,000 to $2,000.... Read More

The only person who can waive back child support owed (arrears) is the recipient to the money, which apparently is her. If she had been on state aid at  any time, part of those arrears may be owed to the state, and that she cannot waive, only the state through the child support enforcement attorneys or corporation counsel for the county where the case is pending. Child support can be held open, but it cannot be waived or terminated as it a right that belongs to the child. Further, any such agreements to "hold open" child support, is subject to the approval of the court, and since the court must make a specific finding as to why the percentage guidelines are not being applied, absent a rationale explanation from both of you as to why, the court may refuse to approve the order. Further, even if the court were to do so, she could easily come in and after the fact and say there is now a need for continued support and ask the court to set a child support order on you anyhow, depending on if there is a substantial change in circumstances at that point. So be careful; you may be consenting to allow her to change the last name of the child, thinking you are out of the arrrears and child support, only to find out that such an agreement may be unenforceable by the court or that she comes back into court down the road anyhow and requests support from you.... Read More

The answer to your question is that "it depends." If the other party has primary placement of the children and you are paying the full percentage guideline for support, usually, variable costs doesn't kick in. If you have a shared or equal placement arrangement and the amount of support you are paying is using the shared placement formula (which considers your income, their income and the percentage of time you both spend with the children), than variable costs needs to be allocated between the parties and that may include school supplies and lunches, which is what your question referred to. Medical expenses is a separate line item regardless of child support, and both parents are expected to provide health insurance (one or the other) and help with the cost, as well as any uninsured medical and health expenses for the minor children.... Read More

if the other parent has primary placement, defined as 75% of the time counted as overnights, the non-custodial parent under Wisconsin law is required to pay 25% of their gross monthly income if there are two children. You don’t indicate when child support was set and whether you were on disability when the order was set, or if this is something new. You also don’t indicate what your gross is, only perhaps your net. Under federal law, if you are receiving social security disability, your children would be receiving an amount directly per month and you would be able to file a motion with the court to have your payments adjusted accordingly.... Read More

If I understand your post/question correctly, it sounds like you and your ex have entered into a post divorce agreeement for your child to come and live with you and which you will no longer be paying child support. In addition, you have raised the question of whether your ex is going to be obligated to pay child support in reverse, and whether you can agree to "hold open" child support from her. You cannot terminate or waive child support under Wisconsin law, but you can agree to have it "held open." This means that you would have the right to back into court to ask for child support in the future, if there was a change in circumstances of a substantial and significant nature. Your agreement on this still however, must be approved by the court and the court may or may not approve a stipulation as to holding child support open. You will need to spell out in the agreement the reasons why you are both asking the court to hold it open as the court must make specific findings why the child support guidelines are not being followed. Any family law agreement, pre-judgment or post judgment, must be submitted to the court for approval and are not binding until the court approves the same.... Read More

If your ex continues to harass you, depending on the number of messages or attempts to contact you and the content of those messages, you may consider applying for  harassment restraining order against him. It carries criminal sanctions if he violates the restraining order, once in effect. ... Read More

I just wrote a blog on this very topic at our law firm's web site. From a technical perspective, secondary income (second job/ part time job/ overtime) is income under Wisconsin DCF guidelines for purposes of support; whether such income will be included by the court is purely discretionary. When it comes to a part time job, it my depend  on how long you have worked at the job. If for a long period of time and your family has become dependent on that secondary stream of income, the more likely it will be included. If it is a brand new job, and you are doing it solely to help ends meet, and further, your family has not been dependent on it, the less likely the court may decide to include it.... Read More

I recently wrote a blog at our law firm's web site under family law issues. Under Wisconsin law, you are only entitled to retroactive child support, going to the time a motion or petition. requesting child support is filed and the other party is served with notice of the request; so, the answer to your question is generally no, unless you fall within one of the statutory exceptions to support commencing when the motion is filed and served.... Read More

There must some typos in your post. One would need more details to determine the extent of your legal problem. Who took your children? Are you married? divorced? children born out of wedlock? Is paternity established? Have you ever been to court to establish custodial rights to the two children? ... Read More

Under Wisconsin DCF guidelines, generally public assistance benefits cannot be used for child support. DCF 150.02 d. reads as follows; "All other income, whether taxable or not, except that gross income does not include any of the following: d. Public assistance benefits under ch. 49, Stats., except that child care subsidy payments under s. 49.155 Stats., shall be considered income to a child care provider."    ... Read More

I just wrote a blog on this topic at our law firm's web site under family law issues ; you cannot waive or terminate child support, because it is a right that belongs to the child. You can both instead, agree to what is called a "hold open" in support, where neither parent pays money in support to the other, but you need to spell out in your agreement the reasons why you are doing that and deviating from the state child support guidelines.... Read More

It is your wife's responsibility to make sure all child support payments are being paid, and if hervemployer wasn't  properly withholding the money and sending it in, she should have been doing it on her own: she subjects herself to a contempt finding by non-payment of  child support. Further, she subjects herself to possible criminal charges of felony non-support, if the amount  in arrearages are large enough to  arouse the interest with the local DA. ... Read More

If you have primary placement and he is paying the full 17% gross monthly percentage, he would not have any obligations above that to pay for variable costs. If on the other hand, you have a shared placement arrangement, both of your incomes are considered in the formula and variable costs would be a consideration. ... Read More

if your ex isn't following the court orders, file a contempt motion against them. Plan to have a process server personally serve the motion on them to insure proper notice. You also may want to try sending a written letter first demanding payment within 20 days with notice that if it is not properly paid, you will be taking them back to court on a contempt charge.... Read More

In Wisconsin, there is a specific formula that calculates child support using the DCF guidelines of shared placement that considers both parties' gross monthly income and the percentages of time both parents will be spending with the children. Your friend is correct that if there is 50/50 placement and the incomes are the same between the parties, there wouldn't be a child support order. However, if there is 50/50 placement and the other parent makes more money than the other, it would trigger a child support order using the formula indicated above.... Read More

The only person who can forgive the child support arrears you owe is the person you owe the money to, presumably your ex. If they were on asssitance, there may be money also owed as part of the arrears to the state. The state can negotiate that portion of the arrears and compromise with you, but any balacne owed to your ex spouse or the parent of your child, is an issue between you and them. You can also try to compromise the amount by offering to pay a limited lump sum payment to waive the balance.... Read More

there is a presumption after 33 minutes months from the entry of the last support orders that there has been a significant and substantial change in circumstances. This is a presumption. If you are inside of the 33 months, the presumption wouldn't apply, but the legal test is you still need to show there has been a significant and substantial change in circumstances. That is fine by comparing the financial circumstances at the time of your divorce, to what they are now. I would encourage you to discuss your case with a family lawyer in advance to see what your chances might be, how long it might take, and what the cost might be to you.... Read More