“Mommy, I want to be a ballerina when I grow up,” your five-year-old asserts at the dinner table. “Can I go to ballet class?” she sweetly asks. “Yeah,” the three-year-old suddenly chimes in.  “I want to take gymnastics!” And just like that, you find yourself clicking your way through the internet looking for ballet and gymnastics classes in your area.

As the school year begins and morning routines and extracurricular schedules are established, the next important question becomes: who is paying for all of this? Depending on the nature of the relationship between the parents of the child or children, this question isn’t always the easiest to answer.

In those cases, allow our Atlanta attorneys to lend some friendly family law advice in order to help mitigate the stress in deciding how to divvy up payment for your child’s extracurriculars.

There are a number of ways to determine which parent pays for extracurricular activities, and how much they will pay. If the two parents are co-parenting easily but not in a relationship, determining payment schedules may be as easy as deciding which parent will pay for which activities. The parents may decide to take turns paying for activities, or split the cost down the middle, particularly if there are multiple children involved.

If the parents are creating a child support order, extracurricular activities can be included in the child support worksheet as an expense for the child or children. It is always a good idea to consider extracurricular activity expenses when involved in a child support case.

If parents are unsure of the total cost of future extracurricular activities, then the parents should request that the judge order that each child be allowed to participate in up to two activities per semester, with a $500 maximum per year for each parent. Using that example, a child could participate in extracurriculars totaling $1,000, with the non-custodial parent contributing a maximum of $500.

Even after a child support agreement is in place, there is nothing that bars the custodial parent from spending more than the agreed upon amount on extracurricular activities. However, any costs above the agreed upon maximum in the child support order would need to be covered solely by the custodial parent.

Finally, if a child support order is already in place and the extracurriculars have not been included in the child support agreement, then the custodial parent would be responsible for covering the cost of all extracurricular activities.

It is important to note that parents paying child support do not have a legal obligation to pay any more than the court-ordered amount.  So if you, as a parent, do not want to bear the full financial cost of your child’s extracurricular activities, you must tell your lawyer to request that extracurricular activities be included in the agreement (or in the mediation agreement, if you are going through mediation, instead of litigating in court).

When dealing with child support issues, such as payment for extracurricular activities, having an experienced attorney dedicated to handling your case is important. The Fairell Firm offers steadfast and skilled legal counsel and family law advice to the greater Atlanta area. Call us today at 678.973.2803 or contact us online  to schedule a consultation.

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