Parenting Plan & Child Support
Our top priority is ensuring that the best interest of your children’s are represented. Child custody and support matters require sensitive handling and a thorough understanding of family dynamics. At Campbell Miller Law, we work diligently to create custody and parenting arrangements that serve the best interests of your children while also addressing your concerns. We aim to achieve fair and sustainable child support agreements that consider the needs of your family.
Parenting Plan
When parents divorce, it is often hard for many children to adjust to new family dynamics. Most parents profoundly love their children and want to protect and insulate them from their parents’ divorce process. Parents can do this by putting their children first, not talking about the divorce details, especially finances, around the children, and remembering that you will always be "mom and dad" even when your children are grown up and your divorce is a distant memory.
Caroline usually says that the best parenting plans are put in a drawer and never looked at because the parents can communicate well and work together. Nevertheless, the court requires parents to have a court ordered parenting plan that details the residential time that each parent will spend with the children. A parenting plan also specifies who can make decisions about education, non-emergency health care, work-related childcare, travel, and other matters important to parents. Caroline helps her clients create a thorough and detailed child-centered parenting plan that parents can reference if needed.
Child Support
If you have minor children and decide to divorce or legally separate, then the law requires you to obtain a Child Support Order. A Child Support Order sets forth the parents’ financial and support agreements for their children, which differs from a Parenting Plan that specifies where the children spend their time. A child support order establishes a monthly transfer payment from one parent to the other. The Order also specifies the percentage of other children’s expenses that each parent will pay for things like uninsured health care expenses, extracurricular activities, cell phones and other agreed children’s expenses. Who claims the children on their taxes, who provides health insurance for the children, and if and how the parents will contribute to their children’s post secondary education (college or vocational school) are all components of the child support order.
Caroline helps clients calculate their income and allowable deductions to determine each person’s net income, which is the basis for determining the monthly payment from one parent to the other and each parent’s proportional share for agreed children’s expenses. The monthly transfer payment is calculated based on each parent’s net income, but sometimes parents may agree to a different monthly amount or agree that neither parent will pay child support. Even if the parents agree, the court may not approve the agreement. Caroline advises her clients about whether their agreements are supported by the law so they can have confidence that the child support agreement presented to the court will be approved.
