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Child Support Modification Urgently Needed

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BarbP

Junior Member
What is the name of your state? Missouri

[Note: my actual state is not Missouri, I am posting this question on behalf of my son who has a child support order in Missouri ... he lives in Arkansas. Missouri is the state of jurisdiction for the children.]

My son has been paying child support of $575 for his 2 children since fall of 2001. He has been attending college and paying this out of his college money. He graduated with his BA degree in December and the college money has now ended. Since January he has not been able to pay the full $575. He has been diligently seeking full time work and has only had one interview. He has found a part-time job that pays $600 a month in salary and he also gets tips but can't be certain how much in tips ... $200/mo in tips would probably be safe to conside ... $300 at most. He needs to request a modification (reduction) in his child support order as soon as possible but can't afford a lawyer either under his present circumstances. Also, his car is in need of repair, he only has his bicycle at this time for transportation and cannot travel to Missouri from Arkansas for the time being.

Does anyone know of any legal aid service in Greene County, MO or family law practice that can work with him in consideration of his current financial straits to assist him to get a modification? Or could he simply supply proof of his present income plus a basic child support calculation expense form to Missouri's Child Support Services office and request a modification without need for an attorney? Per the Missouri Child Support website, it appears either parent can request a modification and that the Services office does the review, etc. , but would he be "safe" going about it that way or should he really have an attorney.

This issue is urgent. He has just received papers from Missouri issuing an order to garnish his wages for $862/mo. ($575 regular, plus additional to make up what he is behind for this year) ... and he doesn't make that much.

Thanks for any assistance.
 


ceara19

Senior Member
BarbP said:
What is the name of your state? Missouri

[Note: my actual state is not Missouri, I am posting this question on behalf of my son who has a child support order in Missouri ... he lives in Arkansas. Missouri is the state of jurisdiction for the children.]

My son has been paying child support of $575 for his 2 children since fall of 2001. He has been attending college and paying this out of his college money. He graduated with his BA degree in December and the college money has now ended. Since January he has not been able to pay the full $575. He has been diligently seeking full time work and has only had one interview. He has found a part-time job that pays $600 a month in salary and he also gets tips but can't be certain how much in tips ... $200/mo in tips would probably be safe to conside ... $300 at most. He needs to request a modification (reduction) in his child support order as soon as possible but can't afford a lawyer either under his present circumstances. Also, his car is in need of repair, he only has his bicycle at this time for transportation and cannot travel to Missouri from Arkansas for the time being.

Does anyone know of any legal aid service in Greene County, MO or family law practice that can work with him in consideration of his current financial straits to assist him to get a modification? Or could he simply supply proof of his present income plus a basic child support calculation expense form to Missouri's Child Support Services office and request a modification without need for an attorney? Per the Missouri Child Support website, it appears either parent can request a modification and that the Services office does the review, etc. , but would he be "safe" going about it that way or should he really have an attorney.

This issue is urgent. He has just received papers from Missouri issuing an order to garnish his wages for $862/mo. ($575 regular, plus additional to make up what he is behind for this year) ... and he doesn't make that much.

Thanks for any assistance.
Is there any way you could help him out with a lawyer? All of the problems combined puts him in a really tough situation.

He can try to take care of it himself, but he really needs to read up on the law in MO first. The people that typically work at state CSE offices don't even have any basic legal knowledge, so you can't count on them doing things right.
 

Whyte Noise

Senior Member
All he has to do is send the request, in writing, to the Missouri CSE office and that will start the CS modification process.

He will have to travel to Missouri for the hearing, however. It will be heard in the county that issued the original CS order, as Missouri CSE can no longer administractively modify any judicial orders.

They won't be able to take $862.50 a month from him since he doesn't make that much, however they can and will take 1/2 of his paycheck each pay period.
 
Whyte Noise said:
All he has to do is send the request, in writing, to the Missouri CSE office and that will start the CS modification process.

He will have to travel to Missouri for the hearing, however. It will be heard in the county that issued the original CS order, as Missouri CSE can no longer administractively modify any judicial orders.

They won't be able to take $862.50 a month from him since he doesn't make that much, however they can and will take 1/2 of his paycheck each pay period.
Does Missouri grant phone appearances? If not that sucks. My daughters father lives in NY 5 hrs away and hes never appeared in person for court, not even the dna process (he was able to do his in his hometown).
 

BelizeBreeze

Senior Member
I doubt seriously that you are hearing the whole story from your son.

First of all, Missouri doesn't garnish wages for three months of partial payment on Child Support. And your figure of $862/mo ($575 regular plus $287) also shows that he has only made minimal payments.

Get the REAL story from your son and come back.
 

BarbP

Junior Member
Whyte Noise said:
All he has to do is send the request, in writing, to the Missouri CSE office and that will start the CS modification process.

He will have to travel to Missouri for the hearing, however. It will be heard in the county that issued the original CS order, as Missouri CSE can no longer administractively modify any judicial orders.

They won't be able to take $862.50 a month from him since he doesn't make that much, however they can and will take 1/2 of his paycheck each pay period.
Thanks to all for their thoughts, really appreciate it!

On this above -- he has no problem traveling to MO for the hearing. Hopefully by then his car will be fixed, but if not he will try to borrow one or whatever is needed. But I have a question about how much they can take from his paycheck, and this question also goes to the modification just generally too: according to the MO Child Support Table, if he is earning under $750 a month gross, the child support would be $50 for 2 children. My son is making $600 secure in wages, another $200 pretty secure in tips, so figure $800 and per the Table that would be $60 for 2 children. The children have no special needs or circumstances ... their mother (his ex) has remarried and although she is not working, her husband has a very good job that pays well. They just bought a new house and a new car, etc. From my reading, although the Support Tables are a guideline, the states will usually assign support reasonably close to the guideline except if there are extenuating circumstances. Do you have any reason to believe that the court would keep his support payments so high despite the Child Support Table guideline?
 

fairisfair

Senior Member
BarbP said:
Thanks to all for their thoughts, really appreciate it!

On this above -- he has no problem traveling to MO for the hearing. Hopefully by then his car will be fixed, but if not he will try to borrow one or whatever is needed. But I have a question about how much they can take from his paycheck, and this question also goes to the modification just generally too: according to the MO Child Support Table, if he is earning under $750 a month gross, the child support would be $50 for 2 children. My son is making $600 secure in wages, another $200 pretty secure in tips, so figure $800 and per the Table that would be $60 for 2 children. The children have no special needs or circumstances ... their mother (his ex) has remarried and although she is not working, her husband has a very good job that pays well. They just bought a new house and a new car, etc. From my reading, although the Support Tables are a guideline, the states will usually assign support reasonably close to the guideline except if there are extenuating circumstances. Do you have any reason to believe that the court would keep his support payments so high despite the Child Support Table guideline?
Child support is based on what he SHOULD be making, not always on what he is making, otherwise, there would be a lot of unemployed and underemployed NCP's. The fact that his ex has remarried has no bearing on your son's case. These are his children and his responsibility. If he can find one part time job, he can find another. Yes, he needs to file for a modification, but don't be surprised when it is no where near your calculations of $60.
 

BarbP

Junior Member
BelizeBreeze said:
I doubt seriously that you are hearing the whole story from your son.

First of all, Missouri doesn't garnish wages for three months of partial payment on Child Support. And your figure of $862/mo ($575 regular plus $287) also shows that he has only made minimal payments.

Get the REAL story from your son and come back.

Here's the full deal -- I didn't include this info initially since we don't know if this is part of the arrearage or not. Some of my son's school funding fell off early last fall (the rest ended at graduation in December). When that happened, his ex offered to reduce his monthly child support by $100 a month, so it went to $475 a month from Oct thru Dec. She wrote "child support paid in full" on his receipts. The total amount he is in arrears is just $1100. If we just count from Jan thru Mar, his total owed would be $1725 for child support, and since his arrearage is $1100, then he has paid $625 over those 3 months. I will need to ask him exactly what he paid her in those 3 months, though, because maybe the $1100 is including $300 for the months of Oct thru Dec that she reduced the child support. I surmise that the $287 that MO is seeking to garnish above the regular $575/mo support, is to catch up the $1100 in arrears and once that is caught up the amount of garnishment would drop to $575. Does this help to clarify?
 

BarbP

Junior Member
fairisfair said:
Child support is based on what he SHOULD be making, not always on what he is making, otherwise, there would be a lot of unemployed and underemployed NCP's. The fact that his ex has remarried has no bearing on your son's case. These are his children and his responsibility. If he can find one part time job, he can find another. Yes, he needs to file for a modification, but don't be surprised when it is no where near your calculations of $60.
I know that the fact his ex is remarried has no bearing on his child support amounts per se -- I simply gave that information to show that she is not in financial straits, she is well able to hold up her share of the children's support, so that in him seeking a modification right now there are no special needs involved for the kids. As far as child support being based on what he SHOULD be making ... seems to me that presents certain difficulties. With his BA degree and his previous job experience, he SHOULD be making at least $30,000 a year in a full-time job just starting out. Today's job market is not excellent for the job-seeker. He is applying for everything he can possibly apply for, including an additional part-time job (trying to find one he can coordinate around the one he already has).
 

BelizeBreeze

Senior Member
BarbP said:
Here's the full deal -- I didn't include this info initially since we don't know if this is part of the arrearage or not. Some of my son's school funding fell off early last fall (the rest ended at graduation in December). When that happened, his ex offered to reduce his monthly child support by $100 a month, so it went to $475 a month from Oct thru Dec. She wrote "child support paid in full" on his receipts. The total amount he is in arrears is just $1100. If we just count from Jan thru Mar, his total owed would be $1725 for child support, and since his arrearage is $1100, then he has paid $625 over those 3 months. I will need to ask him exactly what he paid her in those 3 months, though, because maybe the $1100 is including $300 for the months of Oct thru Dec that she reduced the child support. I surmise that the $287 that MO is seeking to garnish above the regular $575/mo support, is to catch up the $1100 in arrears and once that is caught up the amount of garnishment would drop to $575. Does this help to clarify?
FIrst of all, SHE doesn't get to decide if support is paid or not. That's the court's domain. Therefore, regardless of what she wrote on the checks, he still owes that money.

As for her situation, the fair is wrong. Missouri allows for any third-party cohabitator, whether married or not, to be added as a source of income in the computation of child support.

In this scenario, your son needs an attorney who can subpoena the husband's financial records and impute an income to the ex.

So, you know what I would suggest at the present time.
 

fairisfair

Senior Member
BelizeBreeze said:
FIrst of all, SHE doesn't get to decide if support is paid or not. That's the court's domain. Therefore, regardless of what she wrote on the checks, he still owes that money.

As for her situation, the fair is wrong. Missouri allows for any third-party cohabitator, whether married or not, to be added as a source of income in the computation of child support.

In this scenario, your son needs an attorney who can subpoena the husband's financial records and impute an income to the ex.

So, you know what I would suggest at the present time.
Thank you for the correction, I was not aware that Missouri included his income. Does that mean that if son is living at home now, the parents income would be included as well?.
 

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