Single dad's who pay child support please help

In reply to SVreX:

Contacting a lawyer doesn't mean you have to drag anything to court. A lawyer will tell you what you need to do to prepare legally for anything that could come up I the future.

My friend had his wife leave him with two kids age 5 and 2. Didn't call, no note, just didn't come home from work. He never thought to call a lawyer and for several years about killed himself taking care of his girls. Three years later mom came back and wanted the kids and almost got them because he never documented what happened and protected his rights. Without that you are automatically the bad guy as courts generally favor the mother heavily. A few of us put up some money to hire a good lawyer that enabled him to keep his girls but she said had he done things sooner it would have been far easier.

In reply to Wall-e:

Agreed.

I wasn't suggesting avoiding a lawyer. I was just trying to help remember the priorities, which are often lost.

You have no court order to pay support, so there will be no back pay owed. How can they enforce how much you have to pay? That said, you should file something asap. That will prove that you were willing and ready and that she dragged her feet. She can ask all she wants, but won't get any back pay because you can prove it was her who delayed. Been there, done that. I even put money aside for months just in case, but she got nothing because it was her who delayed the paperwork.

Also, get 50/50 custody NOW! Ask for full custody now, and let the judge decide that 50/50 is a fair split. If you ask for 50/50, they can negotiate down and you get less. Your occasional time with your daughter may fit your schedule today, but you have 18 years to go and you are going to want as much time with that girl as possible. Yes there are financial benefits to shared custody, but that pales in comparison to spending time with her. You are going to blink and she will be off to college. Ask me how I know.

Spoke to an attorney. He didn't seem to think the courts would look at me poorly if her mother is the one who waited to file. He seem more concerned with if I wanted parental rights or just visitation. He said I want parental right I should make sure her mom knows this and agrees to it. I went to the bank to get copies if the check I've written so I have them if I need them.

In New Jersey it didn't matter that there was no court order and she was refusing support. When it wound up in court I was nailed for back payment of the court mandated support. Definitely speak to a lawyer for advice and as was suggested, put money in a dedicated account equal to what support might cost.

Buddy at work had the same deal. Had to pay back support even though mom waited to take him to court.

I dont have children but I am a domestic lawyer. First there may be a difference in the laws between children in a divorce situation and children in a "living together" situation. If nothing else, you may be in juvenile court rather than divorce court. Second, if nothing else the State will want reimbursement for any benefits paid/received and custodial parent is entitled to arrearage amount unless the court finds a reason not to award this payment. I had a Dad get nailed for 14 yrs of back support in one case. Third, each state has its own child support guidelines and you should be able to go online and use the calculator to determine within reason the amount of child support owed based upon coparenting schedule, family income, child related expenses, etc. Finally, do not ever pay cash for support and be very careful about making in-kind payments ie diapers or food, you may not get credit for either of those payments in court.
Generally, I advise my male clients to file a Legitimation/Establish Parenting Plan case as soon as possible and to begin paying a "reasonable" amount of support. You need to establish with the court that you are a responsible person. I find that the cooperation stuff lasts for a few months and then you will start getting jerked around on money and coparenting time. Mom wins by possession until you get a court order. Start now because you will need it eventually.

Consulting an attorney was the right thing to do. Consulting doesnt mean sending one to war for you, it just means that you have someone with more legal knowledge than you do advising you. You should really listen to them rather than the advice of random people like us on the internet who very well might be (and likely are) misinformed of how things work for your situation.

I can understand being concerned about the expenses of a lawyer, and you do need to be aware of it and ensure that things are proceeding in your best interest rather than your lawyers best interest.

As far as the money for now (if you arent sending it her way), I would say that you should take whatever you would be paying and set it aside in a savings account earmarked for your child's concerns so that it is there if you do have to pay. If you dont end up having to pay, its a good start on a college or rainy day fund for your child, so its a win-win with the only downside of you not spending the money on yourself in the here and now.

Basically,
TALK TO LAWYER
LISTEN TO LAWYER
BE PREPARED FOR FIGHT IF IT COMES, BUT AVOID STARTING THE FIGHT

Well guys , My daughter's mother finally filed in July and we had our hearing September 28th. Some of you were right. I'm having to pay too much. More than a third of my paycheck goes toward support. Paying my bills will be difficult to say the least. Worst part is up until this week everything has been verbal agreements between the mom and I and she's starting to make decisions for what's best for her and not what's fair.

I need to file with the courts to have my parenting rights documented and enforced. I also need the parenting schedule documented and requesting they allow me to claim my daughter on my taxes every other year.

Has anyone done this in ohio and can help me with what forms I need to file? Spoke to another attorney but he wants a $1500 retainer. He did make it sound like it was fairly easy to file this and that my request were fair.

Just don't know where to start.

Thanks!!!

In reply to dankspeed:

I'm really sorry to hear that.

$1500 is cheap. You'll get that back in your tax returns in just one year. Hire the right guy.

That's a retainer as well, you will need more than to just know which forms to file and the $1500 is going to cover more time for future consults.

Id have to borrow the $1500. I was hoping the filing fees would come out of that. Id really like to find out how to file on my own.

Well it cost my friend almost a bit over 3k in lawyer fee's to get his parental rights and that was at a discounted rate because the lawyer was a family friend.

On the other side my bosses daughter managed to beat her ex into what she wanted for about 800 bucks. The system in this corner of ohio is biased towards the woman heavily.

I'm gearing up for this battle too. Only im swinging for the fences. Ex swmbo did some lying to the courts and because I was 1600 miles away, they listened.

dankspeed wrote: I need to file with the courts to have my parenting rights documented and enforced. I also need the parenting schedule documented and requesting they allow me to claim my daughter on my taxes every other year.

At least here in MD only one person can claim the child as dependent on taxes, and it is the parent that has the higher % of custody. I don't think you can alternate but I could be wrong.

Child support here is really just a formula, based on both parents income, amount of time spent with each parent and then child care expenses. You don't need a lawyer for that. If you agree to the other pieces, such as visitation, then you can file everything yourself and not pay a lawyer. In fact, there should be state agencies that help walk you through how to fill everything out. In MD it is the Child Support Enforcement Agency.

Again, if you and your ex are on good terms, try to work through everything together and have the state help with the paperwork. Lawyers should only be involved if there are big disagreements. Otherwise it is just wasted $$$.

Just to add validity to my post, My son is almost 12, and his mom and I broke up before he turned 1.

I thought I saw that you were in Ohio. Start here, office of child support:

http://jfs.ohio.gov/ocs/

Called attorney again and he was nice enough to tell me where to go to get the forms. Paid my $2 and got what I needed. Now just have them to fill out and pay $165 to file.

Zombie thread, canoe deleted. Hope all is going well for you dankspeed.

This is such a fun thread.  

In reply to EastCoastMojo :

Thanks EastCoast!

Filed my documents and went to court. Didn't have to pay back child support but judge let my daughters mother claim her in 2016 even though she claimed her in 2015. Didn't agree that was fair but accepted it and moved on.

Been doing some side hustles and OT at work to get by and try to save some coin.

Some good info in this thread hopefully it will be helpful to others.

KyAllroad said:

This is such a fun thread.  

I'm surprised you didn't start shaking from PTSD. 

I'm glad it's working out for the better for you Dankspeed.

In reply to Appleseed :

Eh, i'm mellowing in my old age.  Also Karma seems to finally be kicking in.  Just 2 weeks ago as I was dropping off my spawn on Sunday the ex and her hubby were out in the yard shutting off the water main because the basement was flooding (a few inches of water apparently).  I just smiled and waved and drove away.  "Not my circus, not my monkeys".

Another plea to get a lawyer. It all seems civil now, but a phonecall in anger can change it all in an instant. If you care for your kid, seek counsel. 

This does not mean be adversarial, it does mean cover your, and your childs ass, for the next 20 odd years. Its worth it.

It's a state by state thing, but if you are getting along amicably I'd try and keep the lawyers out of it.  Do you have a fried of the court system in your state?  If so you can go through them without lawyers, honestly it's the best bet.  Lawyers can suck up so much money it isn't true, and while they are theoretically working for their client (you or your ex), they are the ones getting paid and the more hours they book, the more money they get and the two of you don't get.  HAving said that keep a paper trail and what Seth listed on page one sounds to be a golden plan.

Also I know it's common on car forums being predominantly patronized by males to point out how the system is rigged against guys and how the woman always wins out and takes them for everything, but honestly that's not what I've seen.  I'm about to be 49, honestly I probably know 20 fiends who have been divorced with kids in the mix and while yes there are cases where the guy gets screwed over, on average I honestly feel that women tend to come out worse.  

Try being military and to add to that, from California. A few years after my divorce I found out that my ex's hubby at the time (she's currently on #5) had just been busted (2nd time) for illegal substances and was going to do some time (again). Checked with lawyer and court about getting my son out of that mess. They just laughed at me. It seems my foreign national wife is good enough to raise our kids but not good enough to raise my kid from a previous marriage. Compounded by the unstable environment of a military household makes it impossible. They said it was better to leave the kid in California with mom and the drug dealing jail bird step-father than a home with a military father and Asian step-mother out of state. Was told to go away and not to file any papers as it would just end up costing me a lot for a guaranteed lose in court. Now this was years ago but still relevant to current time.