Alabama: Manutención de Menores

If your child lives with you the majority of the time, you can apply for child support against the other parent. The amount that a non-custodial parent will be ordered to pay generally follows certain child support guidelines, unless the judge believes that the guidelines would be unfair or inappropriate in your situation.¹ To look at the Alabama child support guidelines, go to the Alabama Courts website.

The judge can stray from the guidelines and order a different amount of child support for many reasons, such as:

• the parent paying support has physical custody of the child for much longer periods of time than is normally seen by the court due to a shared physical custody or visitation agreement;
• one parent has extremely high transportation costs for purposes of visitation;
• there are college education expenses;
• the child has assets or gets unearned income;
• the custodial parent will not be claiming the child on his/her income taxes;
• due to either parent being unemployed or searching for a job, the childcare costs are at least 20% higher than the amount included in the guidelines developed by the Alabama Department of Human Resources; and
• other facts or circumstances that the court finds contribute to the best interest of the child that is receiving the child support.²

You can find the forms needed to file for child support on the Alabama Courts website.

¹ Alabama Rules of Judicial Administration, Rule 32(A)
² Alabama Rules of Judicial Administration, Rule 32(A)(1), (B)(8)