Child Support

Generally, the UCCJEA applies to child custody cases, while the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act (UIFSA) applies to child support cases. UIFSA follows a one court, one order rule generally favors the court that issued the original order maintaining continuing exclusive jurisdiction. That being said, the state that has jurisdiction can change if the circumstances change, like if the parties both move out of state. UIFSA does establish rules for when and how jurisdiction can move from one state to another. Generally, when neither party nor the subject child reside in a state, the jurisdiction can transfer to one of the states where the parties reside. According to the rule in UIFSA § 611, the parent that wants to modify the order would have to register the order and file for modification in the state where the other parent resides. As with most rules, there are exceptions to this. One of the exceptions is that the original state can maintain jurisdiction if both parents consent to jurisdiction in the former state (which might happen unwittingly), or if the parties agree to jurisdiction in the state where the petitioner resides. You can read more in this Continuing Exclusive Jurisdiction memo that I found. Please know that WomensLaw cannot vouch for the information in this memo. We provide it for your information only – you may want to verify with a lawyer in your state.