Q: Daughter wants divorce and joint custody. 2 children. Husband refuses to work. Will she have to pay child support?
She wants the divorce due to his failure to provide for last several years. She has necessarily been the sole support of the household. What options does she have? Can she file for sole custody to avoid supporting this bum?
A:
Child support is for the child and the guidelines used to calculate it largely take into account the number of overnights each parent has with the child and the disparity in income. The number of overnights - mostly construed to be parenting time - are governed by a different set of factors. Suffice it to say that parenting time is different than custody.
This soon-to-be ex's refusal to work, alone, will not persuade a court to grant your daughter sole custody. If this man can work, the friend of the court will impute income to him - an amount of income he should be able to obtain based on his work history, education, ect. That will be used to calculate support.
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