This toolkit tells you about your options if you owe a lot of unpaid child support (called “arrears”). It also tells you about your options if your child’s other parent has arrears and asks the court for a payment plan and discharge of arrears. For general information about getting a payment plan and discharge of remaining arrears, read the Articles. Read the Common Questions if you have a specific question. If you want to ask the court for a payment plan and discharge of your child support arrears, use the Forms link to prepare your forms. The Checklist below has step-by-step instructions to ask the judge for a payment plan and discharge of arrears. Go to Courts & Agencies for information about the court or agency that will handle your case.
You'll find links to legal aid offices and lawyer referral services under Find A Lawyer. If there is a Self-Help Center in your area you can get more help there. If you need something other than legal help, look in Community Services. If you need a fee waiver, an interpreter, a court to accommodate your disability, or more information about going to court, visit Going to Court.
Common Questions
Past due child support is called “arrears.” It is a debt a child support payer owes to a person, the state, or both. The person the payer owes support to is usually the child’s other parent or guardian. A payer may owe money to the State of Michigan if the payee or the child gets public benefits now or got them when child support was charging.
Michigan law provides some debt-management options for people who can’t pay their arrears. Depending on your situation, you may qualify for a payment plan for your arrears and to have some of your arrears discharged (forgiven). If the judge allows it, this means that you would have the chance to pay a set amount towards your debt for a certain period of time. Then, if you complete the payment plan, the judge can discharge your remaining debt.
Request a Discharge of State-Owed Debt from the Friend of the Court
If you only owe arrears to the state, and not a person, you can complete a Request to Discharge State-Owed Debt and file it with the Friend of the Court (FOC) office in the county where your child support order comes from. Consider doing this if you think you have good reasons for the FOC to discharge your debt or if you can show it would be very difficult for you to pay the debt. If you owe arrears on court orders in more than one county, you must file the form with each FOC office where you are asking for a discharge of state-owed debt. The FOC will consider your request and decide whether to discharge any of the debt.
File a Motion with the Circuit Court
If you owe arrears to the state, a person, or both, you can file a motion with the circuit court asking the judge to set up a payment plan and discharge arrears. You can use our Do-It-Yourself Motion to Manage Child Support Debt tool to do this. If you owe arrears in more than one family court case, you must file a motion in each case where you are asking for a payment plan and discharge of debt.
By filing this motion, you are asking the judge to let you pay a set amount towards the arrears for a certain number of months, and then to discharge (forgive) the remaining arrears after you complete the plan.
For the judge to approve the payment plan, there are different standards you must meet depending on whether you owe arrears to the state, a person, or both. Read the article I Need Help Managing My Child Support Debt to learn more.