What’s A Good Deal on Child Support in Your Separation or Divorce in Ontario?

What’s A Good Deal on Child Support in Your Separation or Divorce in Ontario?

If you’re like most spouses getting separated or divorced, you probably want a fair and reasonable separation agreement or divorce settlement.

Who wouldn’t want that?

I will discuss some more important details on how to make sure you get a fair and reasonable settlement in your separation or divorce in this video.

Hi, my name is Thomas O’Malley.  I’m an experienced family lawyer in Durham Region and the GTA.

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You want to make sure you have to make sure you get a fair deal on the payment of child support.  Child support really follows the actual living arrangements that you and your spouse have established for your children.

If your children are living on a full-time basis with one parent, then the other parent would have to pay the full child support monthly amount set out in the Ontario Child Support Guidelines based on their annual gross income.

If your children are living with each parent on for half or 50% of the time, then child support is set up on a set-off basis.  This means that you determine how much child support you would pay for your child if you had to pay the full amount of child support.  Your spouse must make the same calculation. 

Then you simply subtract the lower monthly amount of child support for one parent from the higher monthly amount of child support for the other parent.  The higher-income  parent pays the difference in these amounts to the lower-income parent.

For example, if you had to pay $850 a month in child support and your spouse has to pay $500 a month in child support based on their annual gross income, you would pay $350 a month in child support to the other parent (the difference between $850 a month in child support and $500 a month in child support).

You have to make sure that the child support amount is fair since many parents have their children for half of the time or more on a monthly basis.  Why would you pay the full amount of child support when you have your children for 50% of the time or more?

You must also make sure that you have a fair deal on section 7 or extraordinary expenses.  These are expenses that you and your spouse must share in addition to the child support payments.

Section 7 expenses include daycare costs, costs for college and university for your kids, and sports activities.

Make sure you have a paragraph in your written settlement that you and your spouse must agree in writing before you are obligated to pay for any section 7 expenses. 

You don’t want to suddenly find out that your spouse has put your children in some really expensive program or activity that simply does not make sense in your particular situation.

As well, you share these section 7 expenses on a proportionate-to-income basis.  This means that you would pay, for example, 67% of these costs if you made $150,000 a year and your spouse would pay 33% of these costs if they earned $75,000 a year.

If you can negotiate a deal in which each spouse pays 50% of these costs and you make more than your spouse, then this is a great deal for you.

I will discuss even more details on how to get a fair and reasonable separation or divorce settlement in the next video.

If you have any questions about your separation, divorce or family law case and you would like our help, feel free to contact on my Facebook law office page, that’s O’Malley Family Law, or call me at 905-434-8837 and I’ll point in you in the right direction. 

Click here to join my free Facebook GTA and Durham Region separation and divorce support group: GTA and Durham Region Separation and Divorce Support Group

Please make sure to share this important information and video with your friends, family members and co-workers so that it helps more people avoid serious problems in their separation or divorce before it’s too late.