In today’s tough job market more and more people find are laid off from their long time jobs, trying to make ends meet for themselves and their families through the benefits system. Amongst them are single parents who are obliged to pay child support for their children through a Court child support order. The consequences of failing to meet the monthly payments can often be jail time and it is increasingly becoming a huge cause of concern to them. There seems to be a myth that when someone is unemployed it can be used as an excuse by them not to pay child support or reduce the child support by the amount they used to be paid by their last job. Nevertheless, the obligation to make maintenance payments is a very strict one and considered by society non negotiable since it concerns the farewell of the child and the Court will not accept as a ground for reduction or even termination of the maintenance order an allegation or even a finding on the evidence of unemployment on its own. The reason for this is that unemployment is not a legal ground for reducing or terminating ( if the obligor leaves bellow subsistence levels ) if it is voluntary. There have been countless cases where the obligor remained voluntarily unemployed while he chose to pursue a lifestyle living on unemployment benefits. What the Courts really assess when they make a decision on child support payment is the obligor’s earning capacity. Earning Capacity in law means a person’s capability or power to acquire money by contributing a person’s talent, skills, training, and experience. Thus someone who is voluntarily unemployed, meaning he has not made any genuine efforts to find alternative work according to his skills will be presumed by the Court that he is capable of earning as much as he used to earn while he was working or work he could take up based on his skills. Thus, it is very important that the obligor provides the Court with evidence of efforts to sought of any kind and still fails to be hired, or that he either has tried to pursue a clientele in running his own enterprise and was unsuccessful and therefore he is considered involuntarily unemployed meaning he does not have an earning capacity. Of Course the more evidence the easier it will be for the court reduce the child support instead of having a blank picture as to what the earning capacity of the obligor is and thus just imputing an imaginary earning based on the above factors which is not exhaustive. Do not forget that the obligor has to prove his case and not the other way round. So it is important to consider these things and play the unemployment card correctly.
