How Child Support Calculator Works?

In the shared custody or split custody system, one of the parents needs to pay for the better development and everyday expenses of the child. A child support calculator gives you a proper figure of the amount to be paid for child support by anyone of the parents.

There are specific guidelines for the court to decide on an amount for the child maintenance and a few factors that influence this contribution in the calculator.

Things that Determine Child Support Calculator Amount

The court considers three factors that determine the amount to be paid for child support in a shared custody system.

It follows these parameters to calculate the figure:

1. The minimum income amount set by the provincial and territorial child support tables; this amount is calculated every year. So the yearly income of a parent is included
2. The cost of the shared custody arrangements and the living cost of the province or state
3. The parents’ and children’s means and needs

Calculating the Amount of Child Support with it

There are many online options where any parent can calculate the amount of child funding. These calculators are designed to put your information that the court uses as parameters and if the information match with the provincial table of child provision amount, you can be mentally prepared to pay child ailment and gain the shared custody of your child. 

The steps to calculate the amount are as follows:

• First, there is a box option to input your income without the tax amount paid. This amount needs to be the whole year’s income as the court guideline decides on custody’s yearly schedule.
• Next you have to enter the number of children. Make sure not to falsify the information as the number of children you have affects the amount to be paid as child assistance.
• Then you select the province you’re living in. The area must match where you applied for child custody. This is also important in the sense that the area you live in determines the cost of living, which then calculates the support amount in the child help.
• Finally, just click on the “lookup” or “calculate” button, and the web portal should show you the detailed information of the amount to be paid for child support.

Child Support Calculator Models

There are two basic models to calculate the child maintenance amount.

Income shares model

The combined monthly income of the parents and the number of children is used in this method. Then the court uses the parents’ relative contribution to the combined income amount to divide child support amount.

Percentage of income model

This method uses a percentage rate of the parents’ earning. Some state uses a flat rate too to determine the child funding amount.

Factors that Affect the Amount in Calculation

High access costs

In a situation where one parent has an unusual amount of access to the child, the child ailment amount can be altered by filing a petition in the court. This cost of high access should be determined to calculate the proper amount of child welfare. 

Many parents argue that the costs related to high access to one parent should decrease the child support amount for the other parent. In contrast, some complain that the amount should increase due to high access costs as the child is not getting enough time and care from one of the parents.

Low access costs

When one parent does not use his/her access to the child, the amount of child ailment will be compensated to an amount different than the usual amount. This affects the child support amount as the unused access may cause the parent to pay more amount due to the other parent taking care of the child more than he/she was supposed to.

Parenting time

While you may apply for 50-50 custody, the court might decide child custody of anything different than that. In situations like that, the amount alters according to the parenting time offered to each parent.

Parent’s income

In some cases, where both parents have equal parenting time as well as almost identical income, parents may not need to pay any child provision. This is a particular case scenario and usually occurs with a mutual agreement between the co-parents of the child.
Conclusion

Calculating the child support amount is not that complicated. Once an agreement is reached between the parents on the child custody system, the child support calculator can be used to determine the child ailment amount easily.