Child Support and Modification
The overall goal of child support is to attempt to keep the children in the same economic situation the children would have been in if the parents were still married. Child support is a statutory calculation primarily based on:
- Number of child(ren) between the parents
- Weekly adjusted gross income of each parent
- Annual overnights the child(ren) will spend with each parent Childcare cost “such as before or afer school care”
- Health insurance costs for the child(ren)
- Because child support is statutory courts and judges have limited discreton to determine the amount of child support owed by one party.
Because child support is statutory courts and judges have limited discreton to determine the amount of child support owed by one party.
When Intervention Efforts Fall Short
After a judge orders the partes child support obligaton, one or both of the partes fnancial situaton or overnight parentng tme may change. These changes afect how much a partes child support obligaton may shif. The court recommends reviewing the child support obligaton annually. Partes are allowed to modify the amount of child support if their fnancial situaton has changed, the parentng schedule has been diferent from the original agreement or if other factors used to calculate child support have changed.
At Heartland Family Mediators we calculate inital child support orders as well as modifcatons.