How Much Child Support Should My Children Receive?

Judges use the Child Support Guidelines to figure out how much child support to order. The federal government says that states must review their guidelines every 4 years. The state Administrative Office of the Trial Court reviewed Massachusetts’ Child Support Guidelines in 2008 and issued new Child Support Guidelines. Starting January 1, 2009 judges will use the new Guidelines.

How do the Child Support Guidelines work?

When judges decide the amount of a child support order, they have to look at:

1. each parent's income;
2. certain expenses (child care payments, health insurance payments, dental and vision insurance payments, and other child support payments)
3. "available income" - how much of each parent’s income must be considered available to support their child(ren);
4. how many children that will be supported by the child support order;
5. how much of the parents’ combined incomes must be used for child support (“combined support amount”); and
6. what the Guidelines say is the correct amount for the child support order.

The parent who receives the child support is called the “Recipient,” and the parent who pays the child support is called the “Payor.”

Judges use the Child Support Guidelines Worksheet to figure out how much child support to order. When you ask a judge for a child support order, you should fill out a Child Support Guidelines Worksheet and give it to the judge. To complete a Worksheet you and the judge need to know the other parent’s income and certain expenses. The Worksheet is an official court form. There is also a Child Support Guidelines Chart to help with the math.

If you are using the Worksheet on a computer, when you fill in a section, the Worksheet does the calculations for you. If you only have a printed Worksheet, you will need the Child Support Guidelines Chart and should use a hand calculator.

To get the amount of the child support order, the first thing you do on the Worksheet is figure out the “available income” of each parent. Then you add up the two available income amounts to get “Combined Available Income.” Next, you use the Worksheet to figure out how much of the Combined Available Income is for supporting the children. That’s called the “combined support amount.” Then you use the Worksheet to figure out the Recipient’s share of the combined support amount. Next you subtract the Recipient’s share of the combined support from the total combined support amount. The result is the child support order.

You should use the same form judges use, the Child Support Guidelines Worksheet , to figure out the amount of child support that a judge will probably order.

How do you figure out “Combined Available Income”?

The first thing you do on the Worksheet is figure out the “Combined Available Income” of the two parents. “Available income” is the amount of each parent’s income that must be considered available to support the child(ren) covered by the order. You get “Combined Available Income” when you add up the “available income” of each parent. You figure out each parent's "available income" by subtracting each of the following from his or her gross weekly income:

• weekly child care payments,
• weekly health insurance payments,
• weekly dental and vision insurance payments, and
• weekly payments made for the support of other children.

When you subtract these payments from each parent’s gross weekly income, you get that parent’s “Available Income.” You add up the parents' available income to get the "Combined Available Income." If you are filling in the gross weekly income and the weekly payments on a computer Worksheet, the computer will figure out the available income and combined available income for you and put them in the Worksheet. If you are not using a computer, you subtract each weekly payment from the parent’s gross weekly income to get that parent’s “available income.” Put the result for the recipient in line 1f (under Recipient) and the result for the payor in line 1f (under Payor). Then to get the “combined available income” add the recipient’s available income and the payor’s available income and put the result in line 1g .

What is “combined support amount”?

The combined support amount is how much money from both parents will support the children covered by the order. The combined support amounts are percentages of combined available incomes that the Trial Court decided to use for supporting children and setting child support orders. The Trial Court chose percentages that would result in orders that at least meet children’s “survival needs,” but would also “to the extent that either parent enjoys a higher standard of living … entitle the child to enjoy the higher standard.”

The first thing you do to figure out the “combined support amount” is find the combined support amount for one child. To do this, go to the Child Support Guidelines Chart . Find your "Combined Available Income” (from line 1g on the Worksheet) on the Child Support Guidelines Chart. In the column next to your “Combined Available Income,” you can see the “Combined Support Amount” for one child. Put that number in line 2a on the Worksheet

The Worksheet works out what the combined support amount is for each family. The combined support amount will be different for each family. To get the combined support amount, you take into account the number of children. The combined support amount for your case will be the result you get on line 2c when you follow the instructions in the next section, “How do you take into account the number of children”?

How do you take into account the number of children?

The number of children that will be covered by the order makes a difference in how much child support the judge orders. Put the number of children that will be covered by the child support order in line 2b next to “Number of children.” The computer will look up the number and fill in the rest of the blanks for you.

If you are not using a computer, look at Table B on the Child Support Guidelines Worksheet . Find the number next to the number of children the child support order will be supporting. Put that number in the box on line 2b. Multiply line 2a by line 2b to get line 2c - the “combined support amount.”

How do you figure out the payor’s share?

The last step is to figure out how much of the combined support amount (on line 2c) the payor will pay towards supporting the children. In most cases that will be the child support order.

If you divide your available income on line 1f by the Combined Available Income on line 1g, the number you get is a percentage. That percentage is your share of the combined support amount. The Guidelines assume that the recipient parent will be spending this amount on the children; the payor parent pays his or her share to the recipient parent for child support.

If you are working on the computer, the Worksheet will figure out all the numbers for you except how many children will be covered by this child support order. If you are doing the math yourself:

Divide the recipient parent's available income by the combined available income. The recipient’s available income is on line 1f (under Recipient). The combined available income is on line 1g. Divide Recipient’s line 1f by line 1g, and put the result in the box on line 2d.

Multiply the combined support amount on line 2c by the percent in the box on line 2d: (line 2c x line 2d). The result is the recipient parent's share of child support. You put the recipient’s share of child support on line 2e.

Subtract the recipient parent's share of child support on line 2e from the combined support amount on line 2c. Put the result on line 2f. Line 2f is the payor parent’s share of child support. (line 2c – line 2e = line 2f). On the Worksheet this is called “Payor’s proportional weekly support amount.” In most cases this will be the amount of the child support order.

What are lines 2(g) and 2(h) for?

The Court added lines 2(g) and 2(h) to the Worksheet to adjust orders that were higher than they intended where the payor’s income is significantly less than the recipient’s.

Line 2g is a percentage comparison between the payor’s weekly share of child support (line 2f) and the recipient’s available income (on line 1f). To get the percentage in line 2g you divide line 2f by line 1f. (line 2f ÷ line 1f = line 2g)

As long as the payor’s weekly share of child support is 10% or more of the recipient’s available income line 1f, the payor’s share line 2f is the amount of the child support order. This is the “payor’s final weekly support amount” line 2h - the amount of money that goes in the Child Support Order. As long as line 2g is 10% or greater, put what is on line 2f in line 2h.

If the payor’s weekly share of child support is less than 10% of the recipient’s available income (if line 2g is less than 10%) then the payor’s final weekly order on line 2h will be :

• the payor’s share of the combined support amount line 2f

Or

• (line 2g + 10%) x payor’s line 1f

Whichever is smaller

Put whichever is smaller on line 2(h)