Child support in Charlotte, North Carolina

Within North Carolina, Child Support may be filed on behalf of a minor child by any parent, person, agency, or institution having or seeking custody. The parents of a child are primarily liable for the child support of that child and under normal circumstances, the amount of support is based on statutory guidelines known as the North Carolina Fair Share Guidelines.

The North Carolina Fair Share Guidelines is a mathematical formula that considers multiple variables in the calculation of a child support obligation. There are three Guideline worksheets used in the calculation; the determining factors for each worksheet are the number of nights a child stays with each parent.

Once a parent is obligated to pay child support, it may be paid directly from one parent to another, through wage withholding, or through centralized collections in Raleigh. Sheehan today.

What this covers

• How is Child Support Determined?
• How Long Is Child Support Paid?
• Should I include Child Support in a Separation Agreement?
• What Factors are Used in NC to Calculate Child Support?
• Does a Judge Have to Use the Guidelines?

Child support is decided in District Court

In North Carolina, child support is a District Court matter. G.S. 7A-244 makes the district court division “the proper division without regard to the amount in controversy” for the trial of civil actions and proceedings for annulment, divorce, equitable distribution of property, alimony, child support and child custody. A Mecklenburg County case is heard in Charlotte, before a district court judge sitting without a jury.

Venue comes from G.S. 50-13.5(f). An action or proceeding for custody and support of a minor child “may be maintained in the county where the child resides or is physically present or in a county where a parent resides”. The same subsection then takes the choice away in one common situation. Where an action for annulment, for absolute divorce or divorce from bed and board, or for alimony without divorce has already been instituted in this State, then until there is a final judgment in that case any proceeding for custody and support of the children of the marriage “shall be joined with such action or be by motion in the cause”. That is a direction, not a convention. Where the support case came first and the divorce or alimony action was filed afterwards, the position is different again: the court holding the earlier case may in its discretion order the two consolidated and decide which court hears the consolidated matter.

A parent may instead apply to the county child support agency, which establishes and enforces orders under Title IV-D of the Social Security Act and Article 9 of Chapter 110. The route matters later than most people realize, because several of the enforcement rules — income withholding above all — turn on whether the order is a IV-D order or a private one.

The Guidelines apply as a rebuttable presumption, not as guidance

Under G.S. 50-13.4(c) a North Carolina court “shall determine the amount of child support payments by applying the presumptive guidelines established pursuant to subsection (c1) of this section”. G.S. 50-13.4(c1) directs the Conference of Chief District Judges to prescribe uniform statewide presumptive guidelines for the computation of child support obligations, including retroactive support obligations, and to review them periodically and at least once every four years. The Guidelines now in force took effect on 1 January 2023 and state that the next review would be carried out during 2026. The figures inside them move when they are revised. The method does not.

The presumption reaches further than most people expect. The Guidelines apply as a rebuttable presumption in all legal proceedings involving the child support obligation of a parent — including orders entered in criminal and juvenile proceedings, orders entered in interstate proceedings under Chapter 52C, orders entered in civil domestic violence proceedings under Chapter 50B, and voluntary support agreements and consent orders approved by the court — and they must be used whether the order is temporary or permanent and whether the case is contested or uncontested. They do not apply to child support orders entered against stepparents or other persons or agencies who are secondarily liable, which sits with G.S. 50-13.4(b): in the absence of pleading and proof that the circumstances otherwise warrant, the mother and father are primarily liable for the support of a minor child.

Support for a period before the action was filed is dealt with separately. For claims of retroactive support or prior maintenance the Guidelines give the court two routes: the amount that would have been required had the Guidelines been applied at the beginning of the period for which support is sought, or the parent’s fair share of the actual expenditures made for the child’s care during it.

Which worksheet applies turns on the number of overnights

In North Carolina the three Guideline worksheets are selected by counting where the child sleeps across the year. The label on the custody order does not decide it, and legal custody — sole, joint or shared — is irrelevant to the choice.

• Worksheet A, where one parent or a third party has primary physical custody of all the children for whom support is being determined, meaning the child lives with that person for 243 nights or more during the year
• Worksheet B, where the parents share custody of all the children — the child lives with each parent for at least 123 nights during the year and each parent assumes financial responsibility for the child’s expenses during the time the child lives with that parent — or where one parent has primary physical custody of one or more of the children and the parents share custody of another child
• Worksheet C, where primary physical custody of two or more children is split between the parents, one parent having primary custody of at least one child and the other primary custody of the rest

The mixed case belongs on Worksheet B

The arrangement that is most often put on the wrong worksheet is the mixed one, where a parent has primary physical custody of one child and the parents share custody of another. The Guidelines answer it twice over. Worksheet A is not to be used where a parent has primary custody of one or more children and the parents share custody of one or more others, and Worksheet C is not to be used where the parents share custody of one or more of the children and have primary or split custody of another. Both instructions point to the same place, and Worksheet B is drawn to cover it.

Under Worksheet B the parents’ combined basic support obligation is increased by fifty per cent — multiplied by 1.5 — before anything is allocated, because two primary homes are being maintained for the same children. The result is then allocated between the parents on their respective incomes and on the amount of time the children live with the other parent, an obligation is calculated for each parent, and the parent with the higher figure is ordered to pay the difference between the two. A parent whose schedule produces fewer than 123 nights does not have shared custody for this purpose, however the arrangement is described in the order, which is why the difference between a schedule of 120 nights and one of 125 can matter more than almost any other fact in the case. One further point of detail: the self-sufficiency reserve built into the shaded area of the schedule is not applied on Worksheet B or on Worksheet C.

What counts as income under the Guidelines

The Guidelines work from gross income — income before deductions for federal or State income taxes, Social Security or Medicare taxes, health insurance premiums, retirement contributions or other amounts withheld. Income means a parent’s actual gross income from any source: salaries, wages, commissions, bonuses, severance pay, dividends, the ownership or operation of a business, partnership or corporation, rental of property, retirement or pensions, interest, trusts, annuities, capital gains, Social Security benefits, workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance, disability pay and insurance benefits, gifts, prizes, and alimony or maintenance received from someone other than the other party to the action. Where income arrives on an irregular, non-recurring or one-off basis the court may average or prorate it over a period, or order a percentage of it paid as support.

Some receipts are excluded by name. Adoption assistance benefits and benefits from means-tested public assistance programs — Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, Supplemental Security Income, Electronic Food and Nutrition Benefits, General Assistance — are not income. Neither is child support received for a different child, nor an employer’s contributions toward future Social Security and Medicare payments, nor amounts an employer pays directly to a third party for insurance or retirement benefits that are never withheld from the parent’s pay. For a self-employed parent, gross income means gross receipts less the ordinary and necessary expenses required to run the business, with the accelerated component of depreciation and investment tax credits expressly not deductible. Expense reimbursements and in-kind payments — a company car, free housing — count as income where they are significant and reduce personal living expenses. The income of a person who is not a parent of the child is not counted, whether or not that person is married to or lives with the parent.

Income may be imputed, but only on a finding that a parent’s voluntary unemployment or underemployment “is the result of the parent’s bad faith or deliberate suppression of income to avoid or minimize his or her child support obligation”. A fall in earnings on its own is not enough. In deciding the bad faith question the court is directed to consider the parent’s specific circumstances, including the presence in that parent’s home of a young child or a child with a physical or mental disability affecting the parent’s ability to work. Potential income may not be imputed to a parent who is physically or mentally incapacitated, and incarceration may not be treated as voluntary unemployment when an order is established or modified.

Two deductions come off gross income before the schedule is consulted. Current child support actually being paid by a parent under an existing court order, separation agreement or voluntary support arrangement is deducted, whether the other children were born before or after the children in the present case; payments on arrears are not. So is the parent’s financial responsibility for his or her own natural or adopted children who live in the household and are not part of the pending action. Alimony paid to anyone is not deducted from gross income, although the Guidelines allow it to be weighed as a reason to vary from the presumptive figure.

Child care and health insurance are added; extraordinary expenses may be

Two categories are added to the basic schedule figure and allocated between the parents in proportion to their incomes. The first is reasonable child care costs that are or will be paid by a parent because of employment or a job search — child care while a parent attends school is not in this category, though it can support a deviation. The second is the amount paid by a parent, or by a parent’s spouse, for health insurance for the children whose support is being determined, counting only the premium actually attributable to those children; where an employer pays for the cover and nothing is deducted from the parent’s wages, nothing is added.

The third category is discretionary, and the difference matters. Other extraordinary child-related expenses — the cost of special or private elementary or secondary schooling to meet a child’s particular educational need, and the cost of transporting the child between the parents’ homes — may be added to the basic obligation and ordered paid in proportion to income, but only if the court determines that they are reasonable, necessary and in the child’s best interest. Nothing obliges the court to add them.

Uninsured medical costs sit outside that structure altogether. The basic guideline obligation already builds in $250 per child for the child’s annual uninsured medical or dental expenses. Above that figure the court may order uninsured health care costs — medical and dental care, orthodontia, vision care, asthma treatment, physical therapy, treatment of chronic health problems, counseling or psychiatric therapy for a diagnosed mental disorder — paid by either parent or by both in whatever proportion it considers appropriate.

Cover itself is a duty, but a conditional one. Under G.S. 50-13.11(a1) the court shall order the parent of a minor child or other responsible party to maintain health insurance for the benefit of the child when health insurance is available at a reasonable cost; and if it is not available at a reasonable cost when the order is made, the court is to order the parent to maintain it if and when it does become available at a reasonable cost. The same subsection fixes the test: cover for the child available at a cost to the parent that does not exceed “five percent (5%) of the parent’s gross income”, measured as the cost of adding the child to the parent’s existing cover, of child-only cover, or, where new cover must be obtained, the difference between self-only and family cover. Dental insurance is treated differently — G.S. 50-13.11(a1) provides that the court may require one or both parties to maintain it. G.S. 50-13.11(a) is permissive in the same way as to medical support generally: the court may order it, or the parties may agree it in writing.

A judge may vary from the Guidelines, but must say why in writing

G.S. 50-13.4(c) allows a North Carolina court to depart from the presumptive figure where it finds by the greater weight of the evidence that applying the guidelines “would not meet or would exceed the reasonable needs of the child considering the relative ability of each parent to provide support or would be otherwise unjust or inappropriate”. Either party may move for a deviation and the court may raise it on its own motion, but in each case the court must first hear evidence and make findings about the reasonable needs of the child and the relative ability of each parent to provide support.

Deviation is not free-form. Where the court orders an amount other than the presumptive one it must make written findings stating the presumptive obligation calculated under the Guidelines, determining the reasonable needs of the child and the relative ability of each parent to provide support, supporting its conclusion that the presumptive amount is inadequate or excessive or that applying the Guidelines would otherwise be unjust or inappropriate, and stating the basis on which it fixed the amount ordered. Where the court does not deviate, none of that is required: an order in the guideline amount is conclusively presumed to meet the reasonable needs of the child considering the relative ability of each parent to provide support, and specific findings on those questions are not needed.

Two situations fall outside the schedule by design. Above a combined income ceiling the schedule stops producing a figure — in the Guidelines now in force that ceiling is combined adjusted gross income of more than $40,000 per month — and support is then set under the first sentence of G.S. 50-13.4(c), in an amount meeting “the reasonable needs of the child for health, education, and maintenance, having due regard to the estates, earnings, conditions, accustomed standard of living of the child and the parties”, with the schedule available as a guide to a minimum. At the other end a self-support reserve keeps an obligor above a minimum standard of living: under the Guidelines now in force an obligor whose adjusted gross income falls below a stated threshold is subject, absent a deviation, to a minimum order of $50, and above that threshold the schedule itself carries an adjustment that protects the reserve.

When the obligation ends

Under G.S. 50-13.4(c), payments ordered for the support of a child terminate when the child reaches the age of 18, subject to three exceptions written into the same subsection. The first is emancipation: if the child is otherwise emancipated, payments terminate at that time. Emancipation before 18 occurs by marriage or by decree under the Juvenile Code, and G.S. 7B-3500 allows a juvenile of 16 or older who has lived in the same North Carolina county, or on federal territory within the State, for the six months preceding the petition to ask the court in that county for a decree of emancipation.

The second exception is school. If the child is still in primary or secondary school when the child reaches 18, payments continue until the child graduates, otherwise ceases to attend school on a regular basis, fails to make satisfactory academic progress toward graduation, or reaches the age of 20 — whichever comes first — unless the court in its discretion orders that payments cease at 18 or before graduation. The third covers a child enrolled in a cooperative innovative high school program authorized under Part 9 of Article 16 of Chapter 115C: there, payments terminate when the child completes a fourth year of enrollment or reaches 18, whichever occurs later. On graduation or at 20 the payments terminate without an order of the court, subject to the right of the party receiving support to show that the child has not in fact graduated or reached that age.

G.S. 50-13.8 is a separate provision and is often misread as extending support for an adult child. By its own words it says that “for the purposes of custody”, the rights of a person who is mentally or physically incapable of self-support on reaching majority are the same as those of a minor child for so long as the incapacity lasts. It is a custody provision, not a support one. And the end of the ongoing obligation clears nothing already owed: where an arrearage exists when the current obligation ends, G.S. 50-13.4(c) has payments continue in the same total amount as before until the arrears are satisfied.

Modifying an order requires a showing of changed circumstances

G.S. 50-13.7(a) provides that an order of a court of this State for the support of a minor child “may be modified or vacated at any time, upon motion in the cause and a showing of changed circumstances by either party or anyone interested”, subject to the limitations of G.S. 50-13.10. The motion is filed in the existing case, not as a fresh action. Where the existing order came from another state, G.S. 50-13.7(b) allows a North Carolina court that has gained jurisdiction to enter a new order on the same showing.

The Guidelines supply one route to that showing. In a proceeding to modify an order that was entered at least three years before the motion to modify was filed, a difference of fifteen per cent or more between the amount payable under the existing order and the amount produced by applying the Guidelines to the parents’ current incomes and circumstances is presumed to constitute a substantial change of circumstances warranting modification. Separately, the need to provide for the child’s health care needs in a support order, through insurance or other means, is a substantial change of circumstances whether or not the support figure itself moves.

Past-due payments vest as they accrue

G.S. 50-13.10(a) provides that each past due child support payment “is vested when it accrues and may not thereafter be vacated, reduced, or otherwise modified in any way for any reason, in this State or any other state”. The subsection then allows divestment, but only where a written motion is filed and due notice given to all parties on one of two alternative bases: before the payment is due, or — where the moving party was precluded from filing before then by physical disability, mental incapacity, indigency, misrepresentation of another party or other compelling reason — promptly after that party is no longer so precluded. The second branch is easy to overlook and is the one that matters to a parent who was in hospital, in custody or unrepresented while the arrears built.

The practical effect is that modification runs forward from the motion rather than backwards over the arrears. An informal arrangement between parents to reduce or pause payments does not change the order. The payments keep accruing and keep vesting, and the sum can be enforced years afterwards.

How North Carolina enforces a child support order

G.S. 50-13.4(f) makes a list of remedies available for the enforcement of support of minor children and closes by providing that “the specific enumeration of remedies in this section shall not constitute a bar to remedies otherwise available”. Under that subsection the court may require the paying parent to secure the payments by bond, mortgage or deed of trust, by any other means ordinarily used to secure an obligation, or by an assignment of wages, salary or other income, and may enter an order transferring title to property. The enumerated remedies are arrest and bail under Article 34 of Chapter 1; attachment and garnishment under Article 35, with the child or person bringing the action deemed a creditor of the defendant; injunction under Article 37; receivers under Article 38; creditor status under Article 3A of Chapter 39 for voidable transactions; civil and criminal contempt under Chapter 5A; and execution, execution sales and supplemental proceedings under Articles 28, 29B and 31. Past-due periodic payments may be reduced to judgment by motion in the cause or by separate action, and — except as provided in Article 15 of Chapter 44, which creates a lien on the real and personal property of an obligor whose arrears equal three months of payments or $3,000, whichever occurs first — a judgment for child support is not a lien on real property unless it expressly says so, sets out the amount in a sum certain and describes the property.

Income withholding is not on that list. It is a Chapter 110 remedy, and the rule differs according to whether the case is a IV-D case or not.

• IV-D cases — G.S. 110-136.3(a) requires that “all child support orders, civil or criminal, entered or modified in the State in IV-D cases shall include a provision ordering income withholding to take effect immediately”. G.S. 110-136.4(b) sets out the narrow circumstances in which immediate withholding does not apply to such an order: information is unavailable regarding the obligor’s disposable income, the obligor is unemployed, or an agreement is reached between both parties providing for an alternative arrangement. Even then the obligor remains subject to the withholding procedure in G.S. 110-136.4(a)
• Non-IV-D cases — G.S. 110-136.5(c1) provides that where a child support order is initially entered on or after 1 January 1994, the obligor is subject to income withholding immediately on entry of the order unless one of the parties demonstrates and the court finds good cause not to require it, or a written agreement between the parties provides for an alternative arrangement. Good cause is defined in the subsection to include “a reasonable and workable plan for consistent and timely payments by some means other than income withholding”, and G.S. 50-13.4(d1) points back to the same provision. Outside immediate withholding, G.S. 110-136.5(a) lets an obligee apply for a withholding order where the obligor is delinquent or has been erratic in making payments
• Civil contempt under Chapter 5A — G.S. 5A-21(a) makes a failure to comply a continuing civil contempt only while the order remains in force, the purpose of the order may still be served by compliance, the non-compliance is wilful, and the person is able to comply or is able to take reasonable measures that would enable compliance
• Revocation of licensing privileges — on a finding that an obligor is wilfully delinquent in child support in an amount equal to at least one month’s support, or that a person has wilfully failed to comply with a subpoena issued in a child support or paternity establishment proceeding, G.S. 50-13.12 provides that the court may revoke some or all of that person’s hunting, fishing, trapping, driving or occupational licensing privileges. It is discretionary, not a consequence that follows automatically from the delinquency. Where revocation is ordered the clerk of superior court notifies the licensing board; an obligor who pays the delinquency in full may obtain the clerk’s certification, on receipt of which the board reinstates the privilege, and the district court may alternatively order reinstatement on conditions, including payment of the delinquency over time while keeping current
• Setoff of a State income tax refund under the Setoff Debt Collection Act, Chapter 105A, where the child support enforcement agency acts as the claimant agency; the debtor is entitled to written notice and may contest the setoff
• Criminal prosecution under G.S. 14-322 of a parent who wilfully neglects or refuses to provide adequate support for that parent’s child; G.S. 14-322(f) makes a first offense under the section a Class 2 misdemeanor and a second or subsequent offense a Class 1 misdemeanor

Support written into a separation agreement

G.S. 52-10.1 authorizes any married couple to execute a separation agreement “not inconsistent with public policy”, which is legal, valid and binding provided it is in writing and acknowledged by both parties before a certifying officer who is not a party to it. Parents can fix a support figure in such an agreement. What they cannot do is put that figure beyond the reach of the court, because the obligation belongs to the child.

Where the parents executed a valid, unincorporated separation agreement determining a parent’s child support obligation and an action for support is later brought against that parent, the Guidelines direct the court to base the obligation on the amount provided under the agreement rather than the amount payable under the Guidelines — unless it determines, by the greater weight of the evidence and taking into account the child’s needs and the factors enumerated in the first sentence of G.S. 50-13.4(c), that the agreed amount is unreasonable. The rule is firmer still as to the past: where the unincorporated agreement determined the obligation for the period before the action was filed, the court is not to enter an order for retroactive support or prior maintenance in an amount different from the one the agreement required.

Incorporation changes the character of the document. An agreement incorporated into a judgment stops being only a contract and becomes an order of the court, enforceable by contempt and modifiable under G.S. 50-13.7 on a showing of changed circumstances. An unincorporated agreement is enforced as a contract, by an action for breach. That single choice governs both enforcement and modification for as long as the obligation lasts, and it is worth making deliberately rather than discovering afterwards.

Common questions

Written for North Carolina law and reviewed by David P. Sheehan, attorney, Charlotte. General information, not legal advice — see the disclaimer.