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Child Support - Can you believe this?!?!

Coco72's picture

We have 50/50 custody of SS11, and currently pay child support to BM. I was shocked when I found out that even with 50/50 custody DH would still have to pay, well it gets worse.......

We recently found out that BM is moving more than 50 miles away which no longer allows for our current 50/50 arrangement, we met with a lawyer and decided to ask the court for primary custody of SS, we have a very good chance of this happening. So yesterday we are filling out the paperwork and we got to the child support page, so we put our calculations in and with DH having primary custody, with a 60/40 split in our favor........

WE STILL HAVE TO PAY HER CHILD SUPPORT!!!!!

Has anyone else heard of this, or is going through this?

Comments

ProbablyAlreadyInsane's picture

One of my friends has something similar. She's the one that gets paid... But based on income for both of them he still pays her a pretty large chunk of money every month even though it's 50/50... (he also financially crippled her with debt, sold her dog kennel, which ruined her career though... So I don't feel that bad... lol)

But I guess it all depends on how much more your DH makes than her... Which is a bit ridiculous. I hope the courts are at least calculating her at minimum wage and full time (I'm asusming she's able to work more and probably just isn't)

beebeel's picture

I have indeed heard of the CP paying the NCP child support. I think CS in 50/50 situations is BS, so this is even more baffling.

Custody and CS are separate issues, so hold your horses on flipping out (easier said than done). Maybe this bm is on the dim side and you can offer to wave CS if the boy is living with dad for the most part. BM may agree, thinking she would owe.

ESMOD's picture

40% is still a pretty significant chunk of time... and I am guessing the income is very different between your DH and his EX.  Unfortunately some states try to equalize things...

Personally, I think that to an extent that is ok... but at some point it is excessive.  Like if the EX makes some minimal "acceptable" income relative to local poverty index standard then for 50/50 no one would have to pay CS.

Peridwen's picture

*Waves* Sucks some times, but at least it's not as much as it was. DH has 55% placement. DH & BM have a 10k difference in income. Thanks to the joys of tax brackets, not only does DH have to pay BM CS, his net income is actually the same as BM's net income. Then BM gets her chunk of CS and DH actually has less take-home pay than BM. Plus DH has to pay 55% of all medical/non-cs expenses where BM only has to pay 45%. He also does NOT get a credit for carrying the kids on his insurance. DH asked and was told no by child support enforcement.

TrueNorth77's picture

We have 68% custody and BM only has 32%, yet my SO still has to pay her several hundred dollars a month in CS, PLUS "maintenance". PLUS he pays 100% of their schooling (they go to a perochial school), all sports-related costs, field-trip costs, and most lunches, etc. It is complete BS. We live in a state that is "50/50". Meaning, they do what several have mentioned above- try to get the parent with the lower income up to a similar standard of living as the parent with the higher income. The theory is just like Justlurking said up there ^^^, that both parents agreed during the marriage that one parent would stay home and take care of the kids, while the other worked. The problem is that this is rarely the case, especially for us- BM was a lazy POS who refused to work the last 3 years of their marriage, and would quit a job weeks after getting one because she "didn't like it".The kids were in school all day, there was no "taking care of kids"!  It's part of why my SO and BM got divorced, yet now here he is paying her all of this money. And she had the nerve to message him yesterday asking how they were going to split up the school supplies this year- He already bought them all new clothes, 2 pairs of nice tennis shoes each, and is paying $2,400 for school. He finally (following my advice) responded and said he already is paying for everything else, she can cover the $70 in school supplies with the child support he gives her. Boom. Her response was "I dont' know why you have to make things so difficult, stop messaging me" (She actually was the one who messaged him, he was simply responding). Lol.   

Anyway, it is a flawed system, and It's ridiculous that the lower-earning parent just automatically gets CS, even if they are just lazy. Our friends and family still can't believe how much my SO has to pay her, when she is the one who didn't want to work. It boggles the mind.

ndc's picture

That's totally normal, at least in our state.  Here, once the parents have a certain percentage of overnights with the kid, there's a "shared parenting" formula that takes into account the incomes of both parents and the percentage of overnights each parent has.  I doubt this is unique to our state.  My SO and his ex have 50/50, but he makes more than she does.  She waived CS initially because he took all the marital debt, and the payments on that far exceeded the differential in their incomes.  But once the requisite time has passed to revisit CS, I'm sure his ex will seek a modification and he'll have to pay CS.  It won't be a lot, because their income differential isn't huge, but it'll be roughly 25% of the difference between their incomes.  If they weren't using the shared parenting formula (say if he didn't have the requisite number of overnights for that formula to apply) SO would be paying 25% of his total income.  25% of the differential between their incomes is much better.

advice.only2's picture

We had sole custody of SD and when she was 17 1/2 meth ex went and got on welfare and DCSS came after DH for 740.00 for 1 month, even after we showed and proved we had custody, they didn't care...so DH had to pay one month of CS until SD turned 18...so yeah I can believe it.