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Easing the tension surrounding divorce and family law issues with high-level service in a stress-free environment.

Los Angeles County child support system has made some changes

On Behalf of | Jun 20, 2019 | Child Support |

When a California family law judge issues an order stating a parent must provide financial support to help in his or her children’s upbringing, both parents must adhere to the terms of the court order. Such orders are often issues in conjunction with child custody proceedings in divorce. However, not every parent paying child support was, at one time, married to his or her co-parent.

In the past, Los Angeles County has had a backlog of cases regarding parents who have not made good on their child support payments. Any number of issues might cause a parent to miss a payment. For some, unexpected financial crisis may be a causal factor. Others may simply disregard existing court orders. If a financial problem or other issue has arisen, a parent must petition the court for modification of the court order but must continue paying until such modification is granted.

Los Angeles County made some changes in the way its child support system is run. Using predictive analytics and behavioral economics, it has boasted an increase of approximately 5 percent in successful collections of unpaid child support monies. Behavioral economics explores how economic status and other life issues affect a person’s financial decisions. Predictive analytics studies issues such as marital status, income level and other demographics to estimate probability of whether a parent will keep up with court-ordered payments.

Child support officials in say the system is working well. It has reportedly helped reorganize worker caseloads so that if a parent is predicted as someone who might not meet payment requirements, the case can be assigned to a worker with a lighter case load so as to avoid potential backlogs in the system. An experienced California family law attorney can also be of service to help a concerned parent bring a particular problem of nonpayment to the court’s attention.