Child Support for Military Dependents

Batson, Nolan, Pearson, Miller & Joiner
's attorneys routinely handle cases involving issues of child support for children of military personnel.  Specifically, our representation involves cases to:

1. Establish an original award of child support;

2. Actions to increase child support;

3. Actions to decrease/reduce current child support obligations;

4. Actions to calculate and collect past due child support owed but unpaid; and,

5. Actions to terminate child support.

Facts of Child Support for Military Dependents

Child support is each child's right to receive support and maintenance from his/her biological parents.  If you have custody of your child/children (or if you have been named as the primary residential parent of the child/children), pursuant to a valid court order, you may  receive child support from the other parent.  The amount of child support that you as the child/children's custodian (or primary residential parent) may be eligible to receive on the child/children's behalf has been determined by the state legislature.  The specific amount is tied to the number of children in issue and the net monthly income of the parent that will pay child support.  The parent that will pay the child support is known as the "obligor"  because they are obligated to pay child support.  (To view base income for military service members please click to following link or visit the 2006 Base pay chart and 2007 BAH pay chart  of this webpage).  2007 Military Base Pay; 2007 Military BAH

Once the net income available for child support calculations is determined for the "obligor," said income is weighed against income being earned by the custodial parent.  Additional calculations are made based upon the existence in each case of certain variables. For example, if the custodial parent is incurring day-care expenses for the children the same may be considered to increase the monthly child support award.  Similarly, if the obligor parent has other children that are being supported, the obligor may deduct the amount of support paid for the other children from his income available for child support calculation. (For analysis of all applicable variables, please consult one of our domestic attorneys).

To determine the "net" child support, "gross income available for the child support determination first must be determined.  In calculating gross income, the court generally, with certain exceptions, will consider all income received by the "obligor" from all sources, regardless of whether the sources of the income results from military or non-military sources.  Commissions, military and non-military bonuses, overtime pay, dividends, BAH, BAQ, etc., may be included in determining the "obligor's" income.

Gross income does not include child support payments received by the obligor parent for the benefit of other children; benefits received from means-tested public assistance programs otherwise exempt by federal law; or, regulation such as aid for families with dependent children (AFDC) and food stamps of Supplemental Security Income (SSI).

Once the amount of monthly income available for child support purposes has been calculated, "net income" is then determined by subtracting from the available "gross income" of the obligor, the amounts he or she pays each month for the following: FICA;  Medicare for regular wage earners; and, 12.4% Social Security plus 2.9% Medicare for self-employed, as of 1991, or any amount subsequently set by federal law as FICA tax; the amount of withholding tax deducted for a single wage earner claiming one withholding allowance. 

If the obligor has other children for whom he/she is ordered to pay child support pursuant to any court order, he/she may further reduce his/her child gross income by deducting the amount of such monthly child support payments.   Additionally, recent changes in the law allow the obligor to request that the court consider payments made for the support and maintenance of other children of the obligor whom the obligor maintains and/or pays support for even though no court order has been entered mandating such maintenance and/or support payments.  whether or not the court will consider these additional payments, depends of the facts and several factors that are not addressed here.

Once the net monthly income is determined and all applicable additions and subtractions calculated along with the income of the custodial parent, if any, the court will set child support.  The court may order child support payments to be made weekly, biweekly (every two weeks), semi-monthly, or monthly. 

If the child support obligor seeks to avoid child support by reducing his/her income earned, or by refusing to work, it may be argued that the obligor is "willfully and voluntarily unemployed or underemployed."  Where the same is subsequently proven, child support shall be calculated based on a determination of the "obligor's" potential income, as evidenced by his or her educational level and previous work experience and the average income earned by Tennesseans of the same gender.   A similar analysis will be made where the custodial parent does not work and/or quits working for the purpose of increasing the obligor's child support obligation.  In these cases, the courts will often impute income to the non-working obligor, or to the custodial parent that is intentionally trying to increase the obligor's child support award.   

Imputed income also comes into issue when an original child support order is being established and the "obligor" fails and/or refuses to produce evidence of his/her income, such as W-2's, tax returns, pay check stubs, or other information that could be utilized to determine the "obligor's current ability to support, gross income for the current and prior years can be determined by "imputing annual income to the obligor in the amount of of $25,761."  This figure represents an average of the median annual income for Tennessee families as provided by the 1990 U.S. Census of Income and Poverty data for Tennessee Counties.  Where certain facts exist child support in excess of the percentages listed above may be assessed by the court.

Finally, additional increases and/or decreases in the amount of the child support awarded may result by either the failure of the obligor parent to exercise visitation with the child as awarded and called for in any divorce decree, parenting plan, and/or final court order.  Specifically, in certain circumstances the obligor parent may reduce his child support obligation where he exercises visitation greater than he/she is awarded in any decree/order.  similarly, the custodial parent may seek to increase the child support obligation where the obligor spouse fails to exercise the visitation called for by the divorce decree, parenting plan, and/or final order.  Increases and decreases in the amount of child support required may only be accomplished by entry of an order of the court.  The parties may not unilaterally, nor jointly decide or agree to increase of to decrease the required child support.

Accordingly although the above noted summary is intended to provide general information regarding child support.  The are many exceptions to the information conveyed, and the specific facts of each case should be analyzed to avoid having child support obligations set both too low, and/or too high.   As such, you should not rely upon the information provided here to calculate the amount of child support that should be paid, or as a substitute for addressing your specific case with knowledgeable and  experienced legal counsel well versed in domestic litigation involving child support issues.   We invite you to discuss your specific case with any of our domestic attorneys and we hope that we may assist you in regard to any and all issues you may have involving initial child support determinations, and/or efforts to increase or decrease an existing child support obligation.  Batson, Nolan, Pearson, Miller & Joiner
's domestic litigation attorneys are also experienced in handling actions to address child support obligor's failure to pay child support as previously ordered and in determining and collecting child support arrearages that may be owed due to past non-payment of child support.

JMMiller@batsonnolan.com