If you have recently received a letter from DOR stating that the department is seeking to establish child support pursuant to a Proposed Administrative Support Order, do not hesitate: bring that letter to your lawyer immediately. There are very specific guidelines for what you can do when you receive such a letter, and all of your options are on a strict deadline. Most often the proper course of action, depending on your circumstances, may be to file a more appropriate case in circuit court. After doing so, your attorney may request that the department terminate the administrative proceedings, which may help to save time and money. For some men, they are about to go through a divorce, or maybe they need to establish their paternity. Either way, cases like those include additional issues that need to be resolved, such as timesharing, parental responsibility, equitable distribution, and/or alimony, etc.
Filing cases such as those in circuit court is the appropriate forum and may be the most cost effective way of resolving those issues. If you wait too long to respond to that letter, or ignore it altogether, a Final Administrative Support Order may be entered against you. On the other hand, if you wait too long, but eventually reach out to your lawyer, your lawyer may not be able to terminate the administrative proceedings pursuant to the letter’s time limits. In those cases, depending on the time limits, you may be able to request a hearing before the administrative law judge. If this is the case, you would have the opportunity to present evidence and testimony to better help the child support calculation, as opposed to being subject to the default numeric calculation that Department of Revenue (DOR) lists in the Proposed Administrative Support Order originally sent to you in the mail.
A lot of men ask, “Why is DOR coming after me now?” Often times, it is because the other party in the case has requested some sort of government assistance, and now the department is seeking to find support from the other parent. If this situation happens to you, take some solace in knowing that although it may be redundant in terms of time and money, it may not be permanent. In fact, if you file in circuit court later, you may be able to receive an order and/or final judgment that supersedes the administrative order, all while getting credit for the child support you’ve been paying. So, in essence you are not completely locked in. No matter the outcome though, it is most important to understand that if you receive correspondence from DOR that you do not hesitate to contact a family law professional. The quicker you react, the better the opportunity your lawyer will have to take the proper course of action, which may hopefully save you time and money, while getting you and your family closer to your ultimate goals.