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How to File to Abate Child Support

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  • 10-12-2011, 01:10 PM
    Chrisrich
    How to File to Abate Child Support
    My question involves child support in the State of: Florida

    My husband was given custody of his minor daughter in November2004. We had papers filed through the court and the proceedings were done by a hired attorney in which we paid $2500 to. Before he was given custody he had a court ordered obligation to pay child support for his minor child which he paid through payroll deduction. After we were granted temporary custody we decided to move to the state of Tennessee. We contatcted our attorney to inform him of this move and get the custody issue permanent in the court. Our attorney told us that all we needed to do was notify his ex wife of the move and after we moved and lived in the state of Tennessee for 6 months that the state of TN would take over jusrisdiction and his my husbands ex-wife ever wanted to fight for custody to be changed back to her she would have to come to TN. We knew that would never happen so we left it at that. During the time we had custody of his daughter we didn not continue to pay his ex wife child support nor did we ask her to pay child support! In November of 2009 his minor child decided she wanted to go back to FL to live with her mother this was 6 months prior to her 18th birthday and when she would also graduate from high school. We let her go back to FL and about 10 days later we received a letter in the mail from FL child support office stateing we were approximately $74,000 in arrears for child support, we immediately contacted the child support office and our attorney in FL to have this situation resolved. After talking to our attorney we assumed he had handled it because we stopped receiving notifications. Then in December of 2010 we received a letter from the IRS stating they were going to intercept our tax return due to unpaid child support, I immediately contatcted our attorney again who assured me he would get it fixed. To be safe we filed taxes seperately. In April of 2011 we received a letter from FL child support office stating that they have records indicating that we had custody of the minor child but not court order stopping the child support. I gave the letter to my husband to call them and find out what we had to do t o get this handled once and for all! Yesterday I went to go use my debit card and my card was declined! I had just enough cash on me to pay for the transaction so I paid cash and left. I got online and checked my bank account to find it overdrawn almost $78,000! I figured it was some sort of mistake and called my bank immediately to find that there was a garnishment attached to our account and our account was frozen! First thing this morning I called our attorney in FL and told them what was going on and was told that they would do some research and get back to us! In the meantime my husband got on the phone with the dept of revenue, child support office and anyone else he could. We found out that our attorney never filed papers to have the child support abated since custody changed hands.We had no idea this was something that needed to be done that is what we were paying an attorney for! We are finding out that we could possibly have the freeze lifted if these papers are filed! I called our attorney back and explained to them what the dept of revenue has told us and they said they "are working on it"! They had 7 years to work on it and now I can't wait another minute for them to work on it! This is our only bank account in which our paychecks are direct deposited into and even though we have stopped our direct deposits that won't help us for 2 weeks since we get paid this week! In the meantime we have NO access to ANY money, we have no credit cards or anything. Our utility bills were paid out of that account and they had not cleared the bank yet so I'm afraid that they will cut our utilities off in the next day or so and we have 3 children under the age of 11.

    My question is how can we file these abatement papers ourselves to try and get this resolved??? I don't know that we can trust that this attorney will get it done for us since he didn't do it in the first place.
  • 10-12-2011, 01:22 PM
    Dogmatique
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    I don't think you're going to like my response, but it does look like your husband might actually be on the hook for the entire amount.

    He may have recourse with the attorney though if the attorney was instructed to file to modify the CS order.

    Even if the papers are filed now, this doesn't mean the amount will go away.
  • 10-12-2011, 01:49 PM
    Chrisrich
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    I don't know how he could be on the hook if #1 he had custody of his child that was filed through the court system and #2 because of obvious attorney error!

    He/we shouldn't be responsible for paying this child support when we tried for 2 years to get things straightened out and sent them all required paper work it wasn't until today that the dept of revenue said anything about filing an abatement.

    I think it should be a no brainer if there is a court order for child support and then there is a court order changing custody of the child the child support order is null and void!

    But either way my question wasn't answered on how we can file for this abatement ourselves??
  • 10-12-2011, 02:05 PM
    Dogmatique
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    You're not understanding how it works.

    A change in custody does NOT automatically void a child support order - it is up to the parent/s to request a modification themselves. Hence he could be on the hook because nothing was filed at the time. He may have to find a way to negotiate with the State regarding a payment schedule (they're usually pretty good that way actually) and then seek recourse from the attorney (not that the attorney will be ordered to pay - but there might be recourse).

    And a quick question - does he owe Mom, or the State? If he owes Mom, SHE can forgive the arrears very easily.
  • 10-12-2011, 09:25 PM
    Chrisrich
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    I understand now that change of custody does not automatically cancel the child support order but thats why we hired an attorney because we didn't know all the laws and assumed he was doing everything that needed to be done.

    As his wife does this leave me responsilbe for this debt too?

    He "owes" his ex-wife and I seriously doubt she would ever "forgive" the arrears! I talked to his daughter and told her what was going on and she said she would talk to her but I don't have high hopes for that! If she were to decide to do it how would she go about doing it?
  • 10-12-2011, 09:47 PM
    Dogmatique
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    Please don't involve the daughter - that's really not fair on her. Child support is between her parents. It's not fair to put her in the middle though I do understand why you talked to her.

    You, as his wife, will never be responsible for the debt personally. However anything you own with his name attached - joint bank accounts, assets, etc., - can be attached.

    And I'm truly sorry to have to say this, too, but if you do have jointly owned property and try to transfer that property or any jointly owned assets you could both be accused of fraud if the State thinks you're (both) doing it to avoid paying the child support.

    You're in a bit of a bind - and while it's not necessarily fair, I think it's going to take an attorney to help fix it. I'm sorry it's not better news.

    Can you remember exactly what your husband's attorney promised to do? Do you have anything in writing? It does sound as if the attorney may have messed up but it also depends on what your husband asked him to do, too.
  • 10-12-2011, 10:06 PM
    Chrisrich
    Re: How to File to Abate Child Support
    His daughter is 19 almost 20 now shes a smart girl. I told her she didn't have to do anything if she didn't want to and that I hated even have to talk to her.

    We don't own much the only jointly owned property we have besides our checking account is our home...can they take our home??? I have 3 children!

    I did most of the dealing with the attorney so I know what the attorney said...Once we got custody and the papers were signed by the judge I asked him about the child support and he told me since we had custody we didn't have to pay it anymore. We chose not to go after his ex wife for child support because we didn't want or need her money

    When we decided to move to TN I called him again because we only had temporary custody and told him we needed to get this to permanent custody before we left the state he told me not to worry about it just to send the ex a certified letter with our intentions and where we would be living and the school the daughter would be attending and once we were in TN for 6 months TN would take over jurisdiction and she would have to come to TN to make any changes.


    I also called the attorney 2 years ago when we got the first letter in the mail about owing arrears and asked him how this was possible if we had custody for the past 5 years and he told me then he would take care of it.

    I know it will take an attorney to get this straightend out but unfortunately we live in TN now its going to be hard to hire a FL attorney when wer are over 700 miles away and we have NO money cause it was ALL in the now frozen bank account!
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