Daycare Costs for Child Support
Daycare expense can have an incredible impact on child support obligations. At lower income levels they can be devastating. If it is pushed to hard though, it can be a basis for completely reworking a parenting plan.
Suppose the father earns $1,732 a month ($10 an hour) and mother earns $1,385 a month ($8 an hour). Your basic support in this instance will be $_____ . Suppose further the parties’ daycare cost is $500 a month, not unusual for a young child, and that mom is the primary custodian of the child. Because the father has 55% of the total income (1732/(1732+1385)=55%) he will pay 55% of the daycare cost, or $275. Mother is responsible for the remaining $225 of the daycare cost. Father’s total monthly obligation then becomes $____ . At this point Father usually is not too happy and starts telling the judge that he cannot afford this and that his mother is available to watch the child for free. Accordingly, if you rework the Parenting Plan, giving father primary physical custody, then we will not have this unnecessary expense. This is by no means a slam dunk in father’s favor, but I have seen it happen.
One oddity with daycare expenses is the situation where the custodial parent is going back to school and wants to have the non-custodial parent contribute to the daycare costs. Even though this expense is not strictly work-related, the courts generally allow it. Daycare costs while the mother attended college were incurred “due to employment or job search” for child support purposes. G. Alverson v. Harris, 123 N.M. 153, 935 P.2d 1165 (Ct. App. 1996).