Arizona Child Support
In Arizona, the legislature has indicated that the goal of the Arizona child support statute is to ensure that the amount of child support ordered approximates what would have been spent on a child if the family remained intact and were living together. The Arizona child support guidelines were created to establish a standard and uniform method for calculating child support. The Guidelines apply to all children and parents in Arizona and are only deviated from under special circumstances.
If you would like more information on Arizona child support, please contact Nirenstein Garnice Soderquist PLC.
The Arizona Court of Appeals recently rendered a decision dealing with the issue of Arizona child support. In East v. Matthews, the Arizona Court of Appeals reaffirmed that the standard of living that the child would have enjoyed had the family remained intact and lived together applies to all children, whether the parents were married at one time or were never married (paternity cases). The court also held that a parent seeking a monetary award greater that what would be presumtively correct under the Arizona Child Support Guidelines must prove to the trial court why an increase in the child support award would be in the child's best interests. One way for a parent to do this would be to establish what standard of living the child would have enjoyed if the parents relationship remained intact and both the parents and the child resided together.
Other factors can also impact the child support calculation in Arizona. For example, the definition of gross income and adjusted gross income as used in the Guidelines do not have the same meaning as when they are used for tax purposes. Gross income for child support calculation purposes includes income from any source and may include but is not limited to income from salaries, wages, commissions, bonuses, dividends, severance pay, pensions, interest, trust income, annuities, capital gains, social security benefits, workers compensation benefits, unemployment insurance benefits, disability insurance benefits, recurring gifts, prizes and spousal maintenance (alimony). Also, cash value shall be assigned to in-kind or other non-cash benefits. Normally, the Court will not attribute income greater than that which would have been earned from full time employment. Each parent shall have the right to choose to work additional hours through overtime or at a second job without increasing the child support award.
Defining income is not always easy. In the case of Hetherington v. Hetherington, the trial court was instructed that it must consider the amount an employer contributes toward a party's benefits in determining a party's income for purposes of computing child support. Benefits that must be considered include contributions to retirement income and health insurance. Workers compensation insurance contributions do not need to be considered. The trial court may consider a deviation from the child support guidelines if the inclusion of the benefits would artificially inflate a parent's income. One particular element of the child support calculation formula concerns a situation in which child support is paid for two children and the oldest child is emancipated. Does the child support amount automatically decrease in light of a parent's continuing duty to pay child support for the remaining minor child? The answer is no. In the case of Guerra v. Bejarano, the appellate court determined that in such a situation the parent was required to make a written request to the Court for modification of child support and in so doing, allow the Court to apply the child support guidelines to calculate a new child support obligation. Statutes prohibiting retroactive modification of child support to a date prior to the date in which a written request for modification is filed, means in effect that a parent paying child support should not simply assume that child support will automatically be decreased when the oldest child is emancipated. The support payor must be proactive in filing the request to recalculate child support.
