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Chapter I Child Support Guidelines

In this chapter, I discuss some important aspects of the Child Support Guidelines. This will provide you with a much better idea of exactly what your legal rights and obligations are.

Child Support Amount

The big question on everyone’s mind is, “How much child support will I have to pay or will I receive?”

The amount of child support you are required to pay is based on tables that are a part of the Child Support Guidelines. These tables can be found at Justice.gc.ca.

The tables use a formula based on the cost of living and provincial income tax to determine the amount of child support a person must pay. Additionally, the amounts in the Child Support Guidelines are based on average amounts that families spend to care for their children nationally.

The two primary factors in determining the amount of child support you must pay is your annual income and the number of children you are paying child support for.

You are pretty much required to follow the tables. For instance, if you and the other parent agree on an amount significantly different from the table amount of child support, the other parent can simply go to court and get this changed. As well, a judge will not grant a divorce if the amount of child support varies from the table amount significantly without there being a good reason for this.

Calculating Income

The most controversial question in most child support cases is exactly how much income the person paying support is earning. In fact, I have devoted an entire chapter to this topic.

One confusing aspect of income when it comes to child support is whether net or gross income should be used – the answer is gross income. For most people, this will be the figure you entered on line 150 of your T1 General Tax Return.

Paying More

You may be required to pay more than the table amount of child support.

The amount of child support in the child support tables is just a base amount. In addition to the table amount, the court may add amounts for special expenses, such as day care or child care, special extra-curricular activities, special educational expenses, or medical, health, dental or orthodontal expenses not covered by health insurance plans.

The after-tax cost of these special expenses is shared between the two parents in proportion to their incomes. The after-tax aspect is important as many special expenses, such as child care expenses, are also tax deductible.