Q: Child support PA: 3 kids with different women and I was ordered to pay 1k for my youngest. Do my other kids count?
I have a multi family child support case. I was ordered to pay 20% of my income for my youngest child. I asked for consideration of my other kids hearing master said I had to show proof of child support payments. How am I supposed to show proof if they are in my custody? I asked to show me proof the child support payments were going to the care of our son. They said I couldn’t do that. If it’s not legal for me to ask what happens to the child support payment why is it legal for them to ask for proof how I spend my money on my kids but now how there mother spends child support money?
A:
In this question, the asker is arguing with himself, and as such cannot get a cogent response from us.
In general terms, multiple orders of child support are not enough to offset one another. Typically, an order of support must be actually paid to count as a deduction against another order of support. That is why the court asked the asker to show proof of actual payments which the asker did not.
Instead, the asker said his children are in his custody. If that is true, then at appears the asker failed to petition for a termination of the orders of support, and file for support against the other parents. As we do not know what happened in this instance, we cannot opine further.
Then, the asker goes on a tangent asking about an accounting of his support payments to the other parents. No accounting is required, and the other parents can spend the money as they see fit without explanation.
As for the asker's fundamental question, yes, the other kids and their orders of support count. However, perhaps in not retaining an attorney, the asker did not know to present paid receipts of his other support obligations. The money the asker saved on legal counsel he now is sending to other parents for years to come.
A: In PA 50% -60% of your disposal income can be taken for child support, depending on whether there's one or two families. So, as you can see, your second family was essentially take into account in your order.
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