Washington Child Support Calculator
Accessing Child Support. You access the child support calculator by selecting the case you want to work on and then clicking the Child Support button on the case dashboard. You will only see the child support button if you have added minor children to your case. You will see 5 tabs: Support Form, Worksheet, CSO (140), Deviations and Summary.
Support Form
Transfer Payment Window. You can see the standard Transfer Payment in the upper righthand corner of the support form. This automatically updates as you make changes in the support form so you can immediately see how changes impact the payment. Note that the Transfer Payment window does not show deviations or the joint custody calculation – these must be viewed on the Summary Page.
Variations. You can run different child support variations to show different scenarios. The first variation you will create will automatically be named “Original v.1” unless you give it a different name. To give it a different name, simply add (or update) the name in the "Save As:" text box and click save. To create subsequent variations, enter a different name in the next box and check “Save as new variation”. You can click back and forth between variations on each of the 4 different child support tabs. When you have your final variation, check "Use this variation in the Child Support Order (FL 130)." This will make sure the data from this variation carries over to the Child Support Order.
Import Data. You can import data from the Financial Declaration calculator if you filled that out first. To do this, select the dropdown, choose the scenario you want to import, and click “Import”. An asterisk will appear by the variation that you selected as your ‘final’ variation.
Custody. Begin by indicating who has custody. You can select either party or “Joint” for joint custody. You’ll also see an option to “Exclude” a child. You can select “Exclude” see what the child support will be when child support is no longer applicable for a particular child.
Taxes. MyPleadings can estimate taxes based on tax tables back to and including 2018. To estimate taxes, check the “Estimate taxes” button for either or both parties. Select the tax filing status for each party as well as how many Child Tax Credits each party receives.
Income. Enter the various forms of income for the parties. You will see that "Total Gross Monthly Income" and "Total Deductions from Gross Income" update automatically; "Income Taxes" and "FICA" will automatically update if you have checked Estimate Taxes. If you click the icon to the right of an income box you can add income amounts as hourly, weekly, monthly, etc.
Maintenance Income. By default, Maintenance is a non-taxable event. MyPleadings allows you to make it a taxable event by checking "Maintenance income is taxable". This can be useful if you are doing a modification and maintenance was taxable and deductible in the original decree.
Imputed Income. You will see a different icon to the right of imputed income. MyPleadings will autofill the applicable "Median Net Monthly Income" based on the age and gender of the applicable party. There is a question bubble on the left side of the screen; if you hover over this you will see the current Net Income table.
Extrapolated Income. You can check "Extrapolate Income" to extrapolate the Basic Child Support Obligation in cases where the parties’ combined net incomes exceed $12,000. You will see the Basic Support Obligation increase when checking this box.
Deductions. Income taxes and FICA will autofill if you have selected “Estimate taxes” or you can manually enter this information. All other deductions must be manually entered. The "Total Deductions from Gross Income" total automatically.
Maintenance Deduction. Maintenance is not tax-deductible by default. You can make maintenance tax-deductible by checking "Maintenance paid tax deductible".
Worksheet
You can access the Child Support Worksheet by clicking the Worksheet tab on the top of the page. You will see what the Worksheet will look like on the webpage. You can then download the Worksheet by clicking the Download button. The document will download as a editable Word document. Any options that you selected on the Support Form (e.g., Make maintenance taxable) will be noted in the Other section at the bottom of the document.
Deviations
You can add a Residential Credit Adjustment, Whole Family Adjustment and Manual Adjustments on the Deviations tab.
Residential Credit Adjustment. To add an RCA, input the threshold number of overnights, the actual number of overnights and click "Include for RCA". MyPleadings defaults to 90 as the threshold because that is a commonly used number, but you can set it to any number you want.
Whole Family Adjustment. To add a Whole Family Adjustment, add the additional child’s name, check the “Include” box and select which parent the child belongs to.
Manual Adjustments. You can manually increase or decrease a party’s child support obligation.
Summary
The Summary page provides an easy-to-understand summary of the relevant calculations, including the deviations. All calculations are shown and descriptions are provided. You can download this Summary page by clicking the Download button in the upper right of the screen. The Summary downloads as an editable Word document.
Child Support Order
You can access the Child Support Order by clicking the “CSO (140)” button at the top of the screen. The data from your chosen variation will appear in the CSO document, both on the website and in the document that you download. You can get back to the Child Support Calculator by clicking the "WA Child Support Schedule" button on the Child Support Order page.