Q: Child support in MA with out of state father.
I recently had a baby while living in MA. I filed for child support giving as much information about the father as possible. It has been a week and the application still says "submitted".
The father moved out of state and won't supply me his new address so I could only provide what I knew.
How long does it take to hear back? How will this work with him being so far away and not able to come to the court date?
Will he have custody rights? I can't nor do I want to travel every time he has his visitation
A:
It could take anywhere from several weeks to several months. You could call DOR-CSE and ask them about the status if you haven't heard anything in a few more days.
DOR will work with the child support agency in his state to collect the payments once the MA court issues an order for child support. They should be able to perform a search for his address, but if he has not officially established an address in his new state it may take a while. There are other ways for the court to enter the child support order if you can't find him, usually by publishing notice of the case in the newspaper.
With regard to custody, as the mother, you will have sole legal and physical custody unless there is a court order that says something different. He would need to file something in MA in order to get that order. You would most likely not be responsible for traveling to him for visits, but sometimes his cost of travel can be factored into the amount of child support he pays.
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