I lost my job and cannot pay my child support!
You have always been a good provider for your children. You have always been on time with your child support payment….until you lost your job. While you tried your best to keep up with the payments, life has other obligations. You need a roof over your head. You need food on the table. You have utility bills you have to pay. You have car payments you have to make. After a while, you simply run out of cash. And, now you can no longer pay your court ordered child support. What should you do?
First, let’s talk about what you probably should NOT do.
YOU SHOULD NOT skip out on your child support payments. While it may be inevitable for you to skip out on a few payments, you should try to avoid skipping too many payments. Every payment you missed will have an interest attached to it, which means the longer you wait to make your payments, the more money you may have to pay in the end. Also, if you miss too many payments, you may be a risk of having your driver’s license suspended, have your tax refunds be confiscated to pay the arrears, or may even face jail time in certain situations. There are also other penalties you may have to face.
YOU SHOULD NOT make a reduced payment to the other parent outside of the Texas Support Disbursement Unit (SDU). Perhaps you did not pay attention to it, but most child support orders include a provision that states that any money you pay outside of the Texas SDU may be deemed as a gift. Therefore, if you end up making payments to the other parent outside of the Texas SDU (say...through Zelle or Venmo), even if you have a record, you may still end up not getting credit for any of it. In the end, you may end up paying that person twice, plus interest!
YOU SHOULD NOT mix apples and oranges. This is more common with people whose child support order was a result of a divorce. For example, let’s say that the other parent was supposed to pay you back for the car that the other parent took as a result of the divorce. But since you cannot make child support payments, you decided to let the other person not pay you back in an attempt to “zero out” the differences. This has a similar issue as the point above, that is you are “making payments” outside of SDU. The end results may be that you have waived your right to payments from the other party, but the other party may still have recourse to chase after you for child support arrears.
So what SHOULD you do? Here are a few things you may want to consider doing even before the issue arrives.
File for modification immediately. So long as you fulfill the requirements to modify child support, you may petition the court to modify your child support orders. Under most circumstances, the court will retroactively apply the order to the date of filing of the petition for modification. Therefore, even if your arrears accumulate during the course of the proceeding, at least some of those will hopefully be readjusted at the end of the case when the court issues its new order.
Make at least some payments through SDU. Even if you cannot make a full payment, make at least a partial payment, or at least a payment every now and then. This may help show the Court that you are not maliciously trying to violate the court’s order, and that you are making an effort to pay.
A petition to modify child support can be a complex matter that may require attorney assistance. There is evidence that you have to present and strategies you may have to follow in order to properly show what your true new income should be, or to show that you have met the requirements for modification. It may be worth it to ask family members to help with hiring an attorney to assist you. Even if you cannot afford an attorney to represent you all the way, you should at least consult with an attorney about it.
The content provided in this blog is for informational purposes only. This is not legal advice, and your viewing of this blog does not form any attorney-client relationship.
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