How to apply for child support through your state agency

Every state runs a child support program under Title IV-D of the Social Security Act, which is why caseworkers and forms often call it “IV-D services.” The program is federally funded and supervised, but each state, and many tribes, run their own agency. The agency can find the other parent, establish paternity, set up a support order under the state’s guidelines, collect and send payments, and review the order later.

Applying through the agency is a common way to get a child support order outside a divorce. This guide covers who can apply, what it costs, what to bring and what federal rules say about how fast the agency has to act. It is general information, not legal advice.

Who can apply

According to the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement’s explanation of how the program works, anyone with custody of a child can sign up: a mother, a father, a grandparent or a legal guardian. A parent whose child does not live with them can apply too, for example to establish legal parentage or to have an order on record so that payments are documented.

Families who receive Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Medicaid or federally assisted foster care may be referred to the agency automatically, and they generally must cooperate with it as a condition of those benefits. A parent who fears that pursuing support would put them or the children at risk should tell the caseworker. States have good-cause exceptions to cooperation and can flag a case for family violence so that personal information is not released.

You apply in the state or tribal office where you live, even if the other parent lives elsewhere, and service members can apply at the local office too (see child support for military parents). Your state then works with the agency in the other parent’s state; the guide to child support across state lines explains how.

What it costs

Federal law sets the fee structure in 42 U.S.C. § 654(6). For families who are not receiving public assistance, the state must charge an application fee of no more than $25. The state may collect it from the applicant, recover it from the other parent or pay it from state funds, and many states choose one of the last two.

There is also an annual fee of $35 per case for families who have never received TANF assistance, once the state has collected and paid out at least $550 of support in the federal fiscal year. The fee cannot come out of that first amount. Depending on the state, it is taken from collections, charged to the applicant, charged to the other parent or paid by the state.

Some states also recover costs such as genetic testing or legal work in cases that never received public assistance. Ask your local office for its fee schedule before you apply.

What to bring

The agency can only move as fast as the information it has. The federal guidance lists:

• birth certificates for the children;
• any existing child support order, divorce decree or separation agreement;
• records of support payments already made;
• information about your own income and assets;
• the children’s expenses, such as health care, child care or special needs.

About the other parent, bring whatever you have: full name and address, Social Security number, date of birth, current or recent employer, and information about income and assets. A Social Security number can often be found on a joint tax return, a marriage license or earlier court papers. A photo or physical description helps if the address is unknown.

Your own income matters too in most states, because the guidelines share the cost of raising the children between both parents. Pay stubs and last year’s tax return are the usual proof. If you are paid hourly, weekly or every two weeks, the income converter turns your pay into the annual figure most worksheets start from.

Establishing paternity

When the parents were not married at the birth, legal fatherhood has to be established before the agency can set a support order. There are two routes.

The simplest is a voluntary acknowledgment of paternity. Both parents sign a form, often at the hospital when the child is born or later through the state’s vital records office or the child support agency. Under federal law, a signed acknowledgment counts as a legal finding of paternity, subject to a short window in which either signer can withdraw it; after that, it can be challenged in court only for fraud, duress or a material mistake of fact.

If either parent is unsure or disagrees, the agency can arrange genetic testing. Either parent, or the agency, can ask for a test, and the state can charge for it in some cases. If an alleged father does not respond to a properly served notice, a court can establish paternity by default. Paternity also matters beyond support: it can give the child inheritance rights, Social Security and veterans’ benefits, and access to medical history. The guide to paternity and child support covers acknowledgments, genetic testing, rescission and support for past periods in more detail.

What happens after you apply

Federal regulations set the outer limits for how quickly an agency must act. When you ask for an application by phone or in writing, the agency must send one within 5 working days, and it must open a case within 20 calendar days of receiving your completed application (45 CFR 303.2). If the other parent has to be found, it must use all appropriate location sources within 75 calendar days (45 CFR 303.3). Within 90 calendar days of locating the other parent, it must either establish an order or complete service of process to start the case, including paternity if needed (45 CFR 303.4).

These are maximums for each step, not a promise about the whole case. Serving papers, scheduling hearings and contested paternity can each add time, so the whole process usually takes longer than any single deadline.

When the agency sets the amount, it uses the state’s child support guidelines and both parents’ income. For example, in Missouri, if the parent the children live with earns $40,000 a year and the other parent earns $60,000, the guideline amount for two children is about $996 a month. Agencies use the official state worksheet, so their figure can differ from an estimate once real deductions, health insurance and child care are added; the guide on how to read a child support worksheet walks through one line by line. The result is a guideline amount, and courts can deviate from it for reasons the state allows, as the guide to deviating from the guidelines explains. The child support calculator lets you see the estimate for your state before the agency’s figure arrives.

Finding your state’s agency

Each state page on this site links that state’s child support agency and its official worksheet; the list of states shows every state with a calculator page. For example, the Texas page links the Office of the Attorney General of Texas, Child Support Division; the Florida page, the Florida Department of Revenue, Child Support Program; and the Ohio page, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, Office of Child Support. The federal office also keeps a directory of state and tribal child support agencies with links to apply, pay or change an order.

Once an order is in place, the agency collects through income withholding, keeps the payment record and can use enforcement tools if payments stop. It can also review the order when circumstances change. The guides to child support enforcement and how to modify child support cover those later stages.