Legal Question in Family Law in Canada

Re: child support

As noted on the LawGuru website, this lasfirm can only answer questions with reference to British Columbia; the law in other Provinces may vary.

Two parents may come to an agreement on child support and write it down without going to a lawyer, but in order to have the agreement hold up, there should be

(a) full disclosure of incomes. Specifically the non-custodial parent should provide a complete and total lisiting of all his or her assets together with fair market values

(b) the agreement should reflect the amount of child support which is mandated by the Child Support Guidelines. The amount is based on the payor parents gross, not net, income. Except in certain very limited and often complex situations, parents are not free to agree on an amount that is less than what the Guidelines specify; that is the parents can't simply decide to pay some lesser amount - if challenged later, the Court will almost always order the correct amount and will often make the amount retroactive. This may even occur in the event of a subsequent divorce - the Court simply won't grant a divorce until the child cupport order is proper.

(c) the agreement should reflect the actual financial disclosure that was made - not just say that disclosure was made

(d) financial disclosure should also include copies of the income tax returns for the 3 most recent years together with all atachments (T-4 slips, schedules of rental income, etc.)