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Hello everyone, I’m Dr. Michael Mantell with another edition of Family Law Matters with Bonnie Rabinovitch-Mantel, the owner and managing partner of the highly esteemed Primus Family Law Group. Hi, Bonnie. Hi, Michael.

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How are you doing? Doing great. Bonnie, there’s a lot of change that’s been going on. It’s only February and boy, oh boy, it seems like the world is spinning.

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Lots of change going on, isn’t there? Yeah, there’s a lot of change and yet it seems like nothing unfortunately is changing enough. We’re still dealing with the pandemic and even though we’re slowly chugging along, we’re still dealing with the pandemic which has affected a lot of people. A lot of people who are already in established routines with school and things that they had planned so that they could work and maybe they’re unemployed and kids are still home or home part time depending where you live, it’s very difficult still.

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People have this idea that life must be different, that things have to change, that it’s horrible if I can’t change it, that I can’t tolerate the fact that I can’t change it. But the fact is when it comes to family law matters, particularly going through a divorce or separation perhaps, modifications can be made. People do have control over modifications.

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Talk a little bit about how you and your wonderful team of attorneys at Primus Family Law can help couples going through turmoil can make modifications in their lives. Well, unfortunately when people get divorced and have children and they get their final judgment, it’s not necessarily the end of the case because depending how old your kids are, over time they may need different things from either parent and that may require modifications to your visitation plan. Hopefully parties after their judgment is done can work out some way to the co-parent and so that way they don’t necessarily find themselves back in court.

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They can, if they can agree, they can always get an attorney to draft a stipulation for them, lot less expensive, file it with the court so that everybody knows what the new orders are. During COVID, we’ve seen that with children at home, parents are having to play teacher and not everybody’s equipped to play teacher. Not everybody can do seventh grade math.

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So you have either one parent is more capable of doing it and may have a more flexible schedule. And again, you hope that people work together to do what’s best for the kids and put them with the parent that has more time and more skillset. But often people disagree because in our system, how much you have the children can also affect what support you receive.

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So sometimes people don’t wanna change their visitation schedule because that may impact the financial side of things. And that may lead them back to court because there needs to be a modification if in the best interest of the children, one party isn’t equipped to deal with the current situation. You also have when people losing their jobs, Michael, left, right and center.

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And not everybody’s been able to find new or get their old job back. So when support was ordered, it was based on mom and dad or mom and mom or dad and dad making X dollars. Now one or both are not.

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What happens to the support order? Guess what? It stays in effect. And if you’re going through the county to get your wages are garnished, it’s accruing interest every time you can’t pay. And the legal rate of interest is 10% per year.

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So my goodness. So Bonnie, if a couple understands a divorce and the issue is let’s say financial, he or she or both have had a loss of income. They come together and they say, look, I can’t afford to pay the alimony and child support that we were paying or I can’t have the kids as much or whatever it might be.

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And they do not agree. Now, what happens? Well, they come to us and we’ll file a motion for them. It’s called a request for order.

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And we will ask the judge to say, look, these circumstances have changed and we need to modify the order. And the judge will, because we’re a guideline state for child support, the judge will put in the input, the new input numbers and come up with a new child support amount. So it sounds so simple.

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It sounds so clean. Yet couples just are so full of friction about it. It’s gonna, you’re gonna go to court.

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You’re paying the attorney. You’re gonna spend time. The court’s gonna look at this formula and out of the formula is gonna come a number.

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What happens if a couple still doesn’t agree and they’re still fighting about it? What do you mean? In other words, she says, no, I don’t care what the court says. I want this much alimony. It doesn’t happen.

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Doesn’t happen. It doesn’t happen that way. Once the judge makes a decision on that, it goes into effect.

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He or she can want more, but unless they prove that there is another change in circumstances, the payor is only going to have to pay the new amount. So it comes back to when in doubt, contact the attorney and be guided by what the attorney suggests to you, even if it means having to go back to court. Most attorneys have the same program that the court uses.

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So we’re not, any good attorney is not going to say, sure, retain me when I see that there is no change or it’s going to go or don’t do this if it’s not going to help you or the children. But if there is a needed modification and you guys can’t agree, yes, call us and we can help you get through the system. And if people want to be in touch with you, how can they do that? They can call us at 619-574-8000.

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That’s our direct line. And you will get put on our calendar for a free 30 minute phone consultation. And then you can reach us on our website, which is www.PrimusFamilyLaw.com. And you can reach us through email as well, info at PrimusFamilyLaw.com. Terrific.

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Thanks for another very informative edition of Family Law Matters with Bonnie Rabinovitch-Mantell of Primus Family Law Group. See you next time, Bonnie. Thanks, Michael.

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Have a great one. Thank you.