How Should an Employer Handle Child Support Deductions and Income Withholding Orders
My question involves child support in the State of: Arkansas
Does an employer have to deduct child support from every paycheck as long as the amount deducted is correct? Our company has a bi-weekly payroll schedule. Because our Payroll department kept receiving warnings that our employees were in arrears because they were not meeting the monthly obligation when on a bi-weekly schedule, our company went to a semi-monthly deduction policy. In other words, in months when there are two paydays, both checks have child support deducted from them. In months when there are three paydays, the third check does not have a child support deduction.
The amount being deducted is the total annual child support owed, divided by 24. The custodial parent is receiving the total amount of child support owed. And she is actually receiving a larger deduction each time than she would if we made bi-weekly deductions. But she has now gone back to court and received an order changing her semi-monthly child support payments to bi-weekly payments.
Do we have to abandon our policy (which has worked for everyone else receiving child support with no issues), just because this one person does not understand that she is receiving all of her child support? Actually, the question our Payroll Department is asking is if there has been any precedent or case law that would back us up.
Re: How Should an Employer Handle Child Support Deductions and Income Withholding Ord
If a court order for income withholding directed to you says that you are to divide the annual support by 26 instead of 24, and to deduct and forward the same amount out of every paycheck, then that's what the court has ordered you to do. Whether or not your way 'makes sense', unless and until you get the order modified you are expected to obey it and can be held in contempt if you do not obey it.