Ex is acting up

[grgr]

If she doesn't want to abide by the original agreement then why not file for child support with your local cs enforcement agency?

[mddivorce2007]

If she doesn't want to abide by the original agreement then why not file for child support with your local cs enforcement agency?

I would prefer not to go through a long protracted(costly) CS court case. She would fight this all the way to the end. If this thing head to court, maybe that could be looked into. However, I would prefer not to deal with that currently however.

[mddivorce2007]

Personally there is no way I would contact my attorney over this issue until there are bigger issues on the table, or the money owed grew into the thousands. Your attorney can easily surpass the amount owed by charging for reading your email, dictating a response etc. In addition it can be valuable to have a rock solid contempt issue in your pocket for the next potential round of court. It provides leverage for a settlement on your terms.

I would continue to build up the paper trail over the issue sending periodic emails, R3 correspondence etc documenting the details of the money owed and save her responses.

I am just having a quick informational session with him and I will be verifying if I am on the clock. In the past, he has not necessarily charged me for these quick “informational” sessions. I will just quickly discuss(via phone) what is going on and discuss the options available. One thing that holds true that he mentioned during my divorce trial is that one side will not do anything until a “match” is lit under them. When my ex didn’t want to take over the timeshare, threats to take her to court didn’t budge her. It wasn’t until the sheriff showed up at her house to give her the subpeoana for court and that was when she acted.

My ex could just love for me to contact to lawyer because then she will joke about all this money I am spending. Again her trying to stick it to me. She has done it in the past.

[Trevor]

a) one side will not do anything until a “match” is lit under them
b) threats to take her to court didn’t budge her...it wasn't until the sheriff showed up at her house...that was when she acted
c) she will joke about all this money I am spending

Evidence that $250 isn't gonna do it.

[mddivorce2007]

a) one side will not do anything until a “match” is lit under them
b) threats to take her to court didn’t budge her...it wasn't until the sheriff showed up at her house...that was when she acted
c) she will joke about all this money I am spending

Evidence that $250 isn't gonna do it.

Isn't going to do what?

[minuette]

If you open a child support case with MD, your only cost would be $25. The state would then take over the establishment and enforcement of the case, earning revenue from the federal government based upon how much child support they collect and how effective they are at collecting it. You really should consider having the state do your legal heavy lifting for you, it's what they are designed to do.

Otherwise, keep a nice, neat file with all the bills she's failed to pay, your correspondence requesting payment (sent certified, return receipt requested) and her responses. Also, build yourself a spreadsheet with her record of reimbursements prior to throwing a hissy fit; the prior 6-12 months of records of reimbursements should demonstrate her prior pattern. When your lawyer says you have built up enough documentation of her failure to pay, dollar-wise and/or time-wise, file the contempt motion and ask for attorney fees.

Getting served may be enough to make her pay, but she will probably dig in her heels and refuse to pay after that, unless you keep serving her with contempt motions or until she cowgirls up and starts paying again. Long term, you have to expend a lot of time and hassle to get reimbursed.

With child support established and enforced by the state, on the other hand, you can be effectively reimbursed by her, without having to deal with her directly. Since you pay the medical and it seems that you will be paying for afterschool care and other fees, you'll want to add all those payments you make to your side of the equation when you provide the state with your information to start the case. Even if it works out that $0 in basic CS is owed, she should still have half of those additional expenses added to her support obligation and the state will collect that half for you.

If you haven't done so, you should visit your state's child support enforcement website and run some calculations.

[Trevor]

Isn't going to do what?

$250 isn't a big enough "match" to budge her into action as she is laughing at you for blowing more money on legal action in 1/2 hour than is at stake in your complaint. It's also not going to, on its own, impress a judge to do much more than wag a finger in her general direction.

[mddivorce2007]

Isn't going to do what?

$250 isn't a big enough "match" to budge her into action as she is laughing at you for blowing more money on legal action in 1/2 hour than is at stake in your complaint. It's also not going to, on its own, impress a judge to do much more than wag a finger in her general direction.

As I said earlier, I am just in the information gathering stage.

[mddivorce2007]

I spoke to my lawyer today for a few minutes. When I told him if the clock started right now, he laughed because I also told him I was going to talk as fast as I can. He said there is no charge for today’s consultation.

Basically in a nutshell, he is advising that
1. Continue to monitor and document the situation at hand. She is already behind in reimbursing me for insurance(June, July and not sure what she will do next month for August) as well as the balance of the summer fees that are unreimbursed.

2. Aftercare fees begin next months so I will see what she does.

3. If her non-payment comes to a certain threshold, we can take it to court. Issue is slam dunk. Judges do not like parents who don’t pay.

4. Also, we could definitely file for a change in circumstance(he sees it everyday) and file for child support since her combined income should be significantly higher than mine(wages, book royalties, rental income)

Before all of the above is done though, he could write a letter to her detailing the issues at hand and threatening all of the above. He says that alone might work but I should be willing to go through it however.
It is now a wait and see game.