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In 2004 my DH took BM to court for a CS modification. The judge ordered both parties to submit financial information- DH did- BM refused. The modification came through with a 50% reduction in the CS (BM voluntarily quit a $40,000 a year job)- and the judge ordered that my DH had the right to claim child as a tax deduction (as long as he was less than 30 days behind on CS.
In 2004 we were slightly more than 1 month behind on 12/31, so we didn't claim her. In 2005 we were only $200 behind and intended to claim her, however BM threw a fit and wouldn't cooperate with giving us the child's correct SSN. So my DH and I decided that we would agree to her claiming child, so long an she "signed off" on all of the CS arrears ( my DH was unemployed at the time and they had started to rack up again). She did so (after a couple of months, of course) and since then we have over paid the support by more than $400 and it has been a big mess.
Fast forward to yesterday. BM and DH had a meeting at child's school. Afterward BM starts begging DH to let her claim child as a deduction. He tells her she should have been claiming 1 or 0 all year (she says she will owe $1500 if she claims single)...she cries that she couldn't afford it, blah,blah,blah...anyway- he tells her that he will discuss it with me and get back to her.
Here's my dilema. He says that he will break a deal with her- so long as she agrees to not go for any more CS modifications- he will sign the form for her to claim the child on taxes. I know they can't really legally enter into that kind of agreement- but do you thinnk if we should even try? I don't mind her claiming child- we have two children at home and we get to claim OSD every other year- so it's not that bad......but are we being fools?
I know she doesn't have the money for an attorney and if she stays at her current job- she never will. The most she would ever have the potential of earning in her area is probably $12-13/hr and that doesn't go far toward getting an attorney.
My thought is- if we went to court today- she would get the right to claim the child back- so it is technically the right thing to do- plus- what can she say to us after we do her this kind of favor?
I told my DH to break the CS situation down to her like this...
We pay $300 a month now. If you claim her on taxes you will likely get about $2400 back- broken down that's $200 a month- so you are, in reality getting $500 a month in child support when we let you claim her. Does that sound like a reasonable argument? (She actually can be very reasonable when she wants to be).
Tell me if I'm nuts....

My husband and his ex have joint physical/legal custody of thier daughter.

In the order we agreed to keep the chid support at the same set amount, as long as she paid for the school lunches (2.25 per day) and we alternated tax exemption.

she came to me last night and said that she was thinking of taking the order to the school and seeing if the lunch price could be based on her income, so that thier daughter would  qualify for free lunch.

We are so appaled. She wants full child support and not to have to pay for anything during the month- but only keep her 2 weeks out of the month.

Do you think the school will go for it? My husband is the residential parent for school purposes. I don't know what trumps what here. Is it more important that he is the "residential parent" or that she is financially responsible for the school lunches?

If she gets away with this, we plan to file for a modification of the shared parenting agreement to adress the child support issue.

I just can't believe the greed.

Soc-
All parites in Ohio. Child in joint legal and physical custody of parents. I have residential parent status for the purpose of school placement.

Child was tested by school and found to have learning disabilities. She was founf by testing to have an IQ of 71. While no one necessarily thinks it's true- it helps her to get services that she would otherwise not get in the school.

Child constantly struggles and mother refuses to help her with school work. Mother states that child is "lazy".

Multi-factored evaluation is done. Child is deemed elligible for an IEP for cognitive delays. School schedules a meeting to write and sign IEP goals today.

Parents and step-parent attend meeting- an hour into the meeting, mother pulls out a "letter of disagreement" and states that she disagrees with the multi-factored evaluation and will not sign an IEP.

School officials and other parent are totally unprepared, since she had signed the multi-factored evaluation as a participant being in agreement and let the IEP meeting go on for an hour.

Mother states she wants a "second opinion".

Since we have joint legal custody, can I sign the IEP without her?

I thought joint legal meant I have 100% and she has 100%- so I can 100% agree and have it implemented and she can 100% disagree- but it's moot, because I signed it- valid assumption?

All parties in Ohio.

Mom and Dad have shared physical and legal custody of 11 year od child. Mom has on-going relationship issues, has child staying in bedroom with 7 year old brother.

Mother formerly married to man who physically and emotionally abused child. Mom divorced this man. Has 2 other children with him, one lives with her (7 year old boy) and one lives with dad, however mom retains legal custody of him.

Mom meets new boyfriend. New boyfriened doesn't want/like kids, but mom has him move in with her. Mom ends up pregnant with by new boyfriend. Now mom has herself, dad#3, 12 year old, 7 year old and infant in her 2 bedroom apartment.

Child goes back and forth between mom and dad weekly. Dad and step-mom initiate testing through the school (child is struggling). Dad and Mom attend meeting and child is given an IEP (individualized educational plan for students with disabilities). Mom disagrees, but is not residential parent, so doesn't matter.

After the meeting, school counselor approaches dad and compels him to file for sole custody, based on childs performance issues when she is with mother.

School has documented all issues during "mom's" weeks and tells dad that it is imperitive that she not stay with mom during the week, because she doesn't turn in homework or come at all prepared.

I am willing to file for full custody, however, would it be best to file in an emergent way, or just file for a modification of curent custody order? All custody has been done pro-se by both sides and will continue to be until one or the other hire an attorney (duh).

If I file emergently- are school performance issues a good enough reason- or should all of the abuse (documented by counselor) and space issues important to include?

OHIO

I worked for the State of Ohio for 5 years in the early 90's. I resigned and went back to get my Master's degree (also worked to pay my CS while doing this). During this time I decided to withdraw my retirement to live on.

I put in for the money- they held it for appx. 30 days and then sent it to me. No child support was taken out.

2-3 years later, during a review of my older child's CS, the CSEA found out that I had been paid this money. They went after the State of Ohio to pay them the money that was owed on arrears at the time I withdrew it.

The State paid both CS cases all of the arrears owed on their cases at the time that I withdrew the money.

Fast forwad to today. An attorney's office for the State calls and states that I now owe them $3400 (money paid plus interest)- because they paid this money to the CSEA.

NOTE: Both CS orders are in the State of Ohio and were active and being paid by my employment at that time- no question they existed.

1. Does this not fall under the "if you didn't pay it when you had plenty of time to find the Orders during the 30 waiting period- then you are liable" clause? (just like if your employer doesn't send the money when they know they are supposed to)

2. If the CSEA felt that I was in the wrong, wouldn't they have come after ME in the first place and not the State?

I am undergoing medical treatment for what may or may not be MS. My father has not been a part of my life since I was about 15 years old ( I am 28). I am concerned that there are some things in his medical history that I need to know, or that may be of some value to me, on top of the fact that it is mortifying to tell my doctor "I don't know", when asked about my paternal family.

I know that I can find out where he lives and how to get in touch with him, but I have the following questions:

1. Do adult children have any rights to their parents medical records?    (limited of course to whatever questions my physician has).

2. Can an adult "sue" another adult to compel them to release this information- if they are their biological child and have a VERY good reason to want to know?

Ohio- Scioto County

2 years ago when my childs mother and I went to court for a downward modification of the child support we were ordered to submit financial affidavit's. I submitted mine, through my counsel and she never submitted one ( she was pro se).  The judge didn't take very kindly to that....

The child support went down by nearly 50% and because she didn't show proof of any child care expenditures and claimed to be unemployed at the time- the judge imputed income to her and wrote in the order the following:

" Due to the mother's willfull failure to provide the financial affidavit the information provided is necessarily limited. Based on the relative financial situations of the parites, the Court finds that it is in the best interests of the child to allocate the tax exemption to the Father".

At the time it went on to talk about how the mother could claim the earned income credit regardless of whether or not she claimed the child and that the father would benefit more from the tax examption financially.

Fast forward two years- the first year, I had arrears on my child support, (it stated an amount that I could be in arrears and I exceeded that by a couple of hundered dollars), so she claimed her, last year I was caught up, but she claimed her anyway- fiegning ignorance about me being able to claim her- and as a "payback"- she went and signed off on the remaining arrears.

So now we reach this year- she has already mentioned that since I my wife and I have another child on the way and the "tax laws" have changed that she thinks she should be able to claim her and wants to just do it- without, in her words "going back to court and paying out money".

In other words, she is convinced the judge would give it back to her if we went to court.

QUESTIONS:
1. I know that you don't know every child support law, but doesn't there have to be a material change in circumstances for her to get a review of the child support case?

2. Would this fall under a review, or would she be required to file a motion?(this case is now handled through the courts, rather than the CSEA, at her request many years ago)

3. Under what circumstances do you think I would lose this exemption? (I don't think I should be "punished" for having an additional child)?

4. Would you suggest coming to some sort of agreement with her and filing it with the court (ie. she agrees to a lower child support amount in order to get the exemption back)?

5. Can parties come to such an agreement- or is it forbidden when it concerns child support ( we were never married)?

No specific case to ask about- jsut in general:

1. Is there ever a time when the step-parent is considered the legal guardian?


2. Can the step-parent present the child for medical treatment?

3. Can the step-parent sign any forms?


Just curious.

I have joint legal/physical of my daughter. All parties are in Ohio.

I still pay child support for her and the joint cusotdy agreement that we wrote states that we split "everything" 50/50, except school lunches (she pays) and extra-curriculars (I pay).

I went to the school for "book pick-up day" and had to buy all of the required texts and supplies that day for my daughter to start school next week. Other parent did not attend.

I wrote out checks totalling almost $200.

Questions:

What is the best way to "prove" that I have asked the other parent to reimburse for their half?

I guess what I'm asking is: What form of "mailing" should I use that will both prove that I sent it and not send her into a frenzy (ie- if I send it certified, she will likely throw a fit)?

Have you heard of a certificate of mailing? If so- What is it and how does it work?

Ohio
I have a child support order for $295.07 for my youngest daughter. I am completely current and have been for months. I recently lost my job to downsizing and went on unemployment. I immediately notified child support- so that an order could be sent to garnish the unemployment as soon as the checks started coming. As it turned out- there was no lag in payments and there was no accumulation of arrears. There was a proper amount of child support taken out of the very first unemployment check.

At my old employer, they decided to pay my severance according to their payroll, so I have been recieving "regular" paychecks from them. Today I recieved a check with the child support still taken out. My case worker had already sent an order to unemployment  (which I received a copy of), so I didn't understand why they continued to take money out from my former employer.

As it turns out- not only are they getting money from both sources, but my order has been overpaid by $367, just since July 14th. I called my former employer to ask if they had ever recieved a termination notice, and they hadn't. My caseworker simply sent them a new order without arrears payment included- which is not what he sent to unemployment.

What this boils down to is the worker:
1. Never terminated the wage witholding to my former employer
2. Sent unemployment a wage witholding that included payment on arrears that I don't owe
3. Has lied to me repeatedly about taking care of these things, and as a result, overpaid my order by nearly $400, just in the last 2 weeks. This will only continue, since I receive unemployment every week and it will automatically come out until he stops it.

What can I do to recoup this money- or is it just a lost cause?

Will they just consider it an overpayment and I will always be ahead, or do they return overpayments to obligors when they are this far ahead?

Are there any legal remedies that will "encourage" this case worker to do his job?

Can you tell I'm frustrated? I mean I don't mind the child support coming out and going towards the care and maintenance of my child, I feel like her mother does spend most of it on her...but this is insane.

Thanks Soc

Ex and I have shared parenting/custody in Ohio

We wrote the agreement ourselves. Ex is getting ready to take a voluntary pay cut and I would like to look into adjusting the CS.

The exact wording is, "Father will continue to pay child support at the current set amount, through ____county Child Support".


My thought was- yes the current amount is what it is- but if we were to go for an adjustment and it was less...wouldn't that then become the current amount?


1. Does this wording leave it open to adjustment?

My ex and I have joint physical/legalcustody. In the agreement that we wrote up, I agreed to continue paying her child support in the same amount, and she was to pay for all school lunches. This amount pretty much made the child support what it would be, if we had it modified (I figured it up to be about $50-60 less per month than what I currently pay, according to the Ohio Child Support Guidelines).


She now wants to go to the school with the court document and have the child's lunch cost based on her income since she is the "responsible party"( it is currently based on mine, as the residential parent), so that our daughter will qualify for free lunch.

1. Can she do this?
2. Doesn't it have to be based on my income, since she is enrolled in     the school in my name?
3. If she does this, what do I file to modify the Child support in the Shared Parenting agreement?

I'd hate to go back to court, but she wants to have her cake and eat it too- I know, big surprise.

My ex and I have joint physical/legal custody of my daughter. I am the residential parent for the purpose of school placement ( which I think is a nice way of saying...residential parent w/o pissing off the other party). We are in Ohio and we drew up the "Shared Parenting Plan" ourselves and filed and had it ordered. It is a 50% split.

QUESTIONS:
1. Who is the "legal guardian"?
2. Who is the non-custodial parent?
3. Does residential parent status make you the "legal guardian"?

Thanks

I recently gained joint custody of my oldest child via shared parenting agreement with her mother. In this order we drew up together, we were made (by the magistrate) to include CS and financial issues. Both of those original orders were in the same court- no problem.

We did this- the agreement was approved and ordered.

I would now like to have a similar agreement with my younger duaghters mother, and beleive she too will agree,however, the CS order is in one county and the parenting time order is in another. We currently have a "normal" parenting time plan in Franklin County.We all live in Ohio.

1.How do I draw up a shared parenting plan that includes financial issues and child support if the orders are in different counties?

2. Do I start with the court that has the current parenting time order for modification and then they have the power to order a modification of CS to comply with the new shared parenting plan?

Thanks in advance