Quick question

[JustaFriendinTN]

What is the name of your state? TN

My son's dad and I are still together. He has an older daughter to which he pays child support for and is current on said order.

The mother of the child just took him back to court for an increase in support claiming that now the child is in after school care that is costing $200 a month. He is obligated to pay 60% of he child care expenses in addition to the child support. Here's the thing:

The child was put into after school care a month before the order was set because the mother knew that although my fiance had recently gotten an pay increase it wasn't enough to warrant an increase in child support. Fast forward to now, we have just been made aware that she took the child out of after school care a month ago. The order was set back in Nov. 06. She claims that she has a nanny watching the child now that she pays $60 a week. The father of the child found this suspicious so he went up to the school probably about 5 or 6 times when it was time for the child to get out of school. When the school let out, the child's mother's husband, who doesn't work, was the one picking her up and taking her back to their apt so there is not nanny that she claims to be watching the child.

My question is: Can he take her back to court and have his child support reduced based on the fact that she is not paying child care and it is infact her husband that is watching the child? Also, if it does go to court and she decides before they go to court that she is going to put the child back into child care, is there anything that can be done?

Thanks!

 

[seniorjudge]

Keep your questions in one of the three other threads you started on this topic.

 

[JustaFriendinTN]

Thank you for the quick response however, none of my other posts had to do with this topic.

 

[fairisfair]

he can request a modification, but if the child is of an age where child care is an ongoing issue, the court is unlikely to address it. Next month the child may be back in childcare and the court isn't going to waste it's time dealing with the same issue over and over. A better solution might be for dad to petition to modify to pay childcare direct to a licensed childcare provider. No child care bill, no childcare payment.

 

[JustaFriendinTN]

he can request a modification, but if the child is of an age where child care is an ongoing issue, the court is unlikely to address it. Next month the child may be back in childcare and the court isn't going to waste it's time dealing with the same issue over and over. A better solution might be for dad to petition to modify to pay childcare direct to a licensed childcare provider. No child care bill, no childcare payment.

I guess the thing that he is upset about in addition to paying her money that she is just pocketing is that the court will not take into consideration that he has another child until it is convienient for the mother of the child. TN does allow for deductions for subsequent children but since there isn't an order for our child, they don't believe that he is paying me support. We just never saw the need to get it done through the court since we have alway remained cordial and have now gotten engaged. However, when it came time for them to consider the fact that he was paying insurance for his daughter and that the mother would have to pay 40% of that, the subtracted what he pays for himself and then divided the remaining amount by 2 since my son is also on his insurance.

He brought up the issue of paying the child care at the last modification hearing and was told that if he wanted to pay the child care provider directly, he would need to pay the entire amount but not get to claim the amount that he is paying on his taxes, the mother would still get to claim it. It just didn't make sense for him.

Any suggestions???

By the way he did have lawyers at the hearing however they weren't much help.