I am ordered to pay child support to my ex. My ex and I are both ordered to share the cost of our child’s health, medical, dental, and hospital care insurance equally. Is there anything I can do to ensure that I am reimbursed without it costing me more than the value of the reimbursement itself?
Question: I am ordered to pay child support to my ex. My ex and I are both ordered to share the cost of our child’s health, medical, dental, and hospital care insurance equally.
The amount of money that my ex owes me each month for half of the cost of the children’s insurance is less than a hundred dollars each month.
The problem is that I end up paying all of the children’s insurance costs each month, and my ex never reimburses me.
While I pay child support consistently on time and in full each month, my ex does not reimburse me for half the cost of our children’s insurance coverage each month. This is no accident or oversight on my ex as part. My ex is doing this deliberately.
It would cost me more in attorney’s fees and court costs to go after my ex for reimbursement than it would be just to eat that cost myself. Is there anything I can do to ensure that I am reimbursed without it costing me more than the value of the reimbursement itself?
Answer: Yes.
For those of you reading this who are going through a Utah divorce or child custody case, don’t have a final order yet, and know that this issue is going to arise, you can prevent it by incorporating into the child support order this provision from Utah Code § 78B-12-212:
(6)(a) The parent who provides insurance may receive credit against the base child support award or recover the other parent’s share of the child’s portion of the premium.
This subsection of the Code is what allows the court to reduce the amount of child support you pay to your ex each month by that portion of the children’s health insurance premium cost that your ex owes you. So, if you owed your ex $472 per month in child support, and your ex owed you $55 per month for your ex is half of the children’s insurance premium costs, you would end up paying your ex a total of $417 each month instead of $472 ($472 – $55 = $417).
If you didn’t have the presence of mind to include such a provision in the final decree or order of the court, you can still obtain this benefit after the fact by either filing a motion or petition with the court to have this ordered.
Or you can work through the Office of Recovery Services (ORS) to have ORS handle the collection and payment of child support, and in that process, adjust the amount of child support your ex is paid by reducing it by your ex’s half of what your ex owes you for child insurance cost reimbursement.
To request the assistance of ORS to obtain credit against child support for your ex’s half of the children’s monthly health insurance premium costs, I’ve provided a link to ORS’s website on the subject and a link to the contact information for ORS:
Asking for a Credit for the Child’s Portion of Health Insurance
Contact Child Support – State of Utah Office of Recovery Services
Utah Family Law, LC | divorceutah.com | 801-466-9277
Tags: Child Support, children, insurance, ORS, repayment