Enforcing Child Support in Texas

Unpaid Texas child support is not an ordinary debt left to the person owed to go collect. The Family Code builds collection into the order: one chapter sends the obligation to the paying parent's payroll department, one gives the court contempt and a money judgment, and one reaches licenses.

The payroll department is the first stop, not the last resort

Under section 158.001 of the Texas Family Code, in a proceeding in which periodic payments of child support are ordered, modified, or enforced, the court or the Title IV-D agency shall order that income be withheld from the obligor's disposable earnings. Shall, whether or not a payment has ever been late. Where the withheld figure itself comes from is a separate question, worked through in the guide to the Texas child support guidelines.

Two sections pull against that rule. Outside a Title IV-D case, section 158.002 lets the court provide, for good cause shown or on agreement of the parties, that the order need not issue or reach an employer until the obligor has been in arrears for an amount due for more than 30 days, the arrearage equals or exceeds one month's support, or any other violation of the support order occurs. Inside a Title IV-D case there is no such latitude: section 158.006 requires the order and forbids suspending, staying, or delaying issuance of it or of a judicial or administrative writ.

Fifty percent, and what has to fit under it

Section 158.009 states the ceiling in one sentence: the order or writ directs any employer of the obligor to withhold the amount specified up to a maximum amount of 50 percent of the obligor's disposable earnings. Arrears ride on top of current support and still inside that figure. Section 158.003(b) takes whichever of two amounts clears the arrearage in the least time: enough to discharge it in not more than two years, or an additional 20 percent added to the current monthly support order.

What the law asks of the employer

An employer is bound whether or not the order or writ names it, and section 158.201 gives it no notice of the proceedings beforehand. Withholding begins no later than the first pay period following the date the order or writ was delivered and continues as long as the obligor works there, under section 158.202. Section 158.203 then requires remittance on each pay date, obliges an employer with 50 or more employees to send it electronically no later than the second business day after the pay date, and routes the money directly to the state disbursement unit.

Getting it wrong costs in three directions at once. Under section 158.206(b), an employer that does not comply is liable to the obligee for the amount not paid in compliance, to the obligor for any amount withheld but not paid plus an amount equal to the interest accruing on it under section 157.265, and for the attorney's fees, court costs, and expenses that are reasonable and necessary. Under section 158.210, an employer who knowingly violates the chapter may be subject to a fine not to exceed $200 for each occurrence in which it fails to withhold as instructed or fails to remit on time. Retaliation is its own violation: section 158.209 bars using a withholding order as grounds in whole or part for firing or otherwise disciplining an employee, bars refusing to hire anyone because of one, and leaves an employer that intentionally discharges an employee liable for current wages and other benefits and for the fees and costs of enforcing that protection.

When the job ends, the reporting duty is shared and fast. Section 158.211 gives both the obligor and the employer until the seventh day after the date employment terminated to notify the court or the Title IV-D agency and the obligee, with the obligor's last known address and any new employer they know of.

When withholding is not enough

Chapter 157 handles the failures, and the money side has its own pleading rules. Section 157.002(b) requires a motion to enforce child support to state the amount owed as provided in the order, the amount paid, and the amount of arrearages, plus, where contempt is requested, the portion of the order allegedly violated and, for each date of alleged contempt, the amount due and the amount paid. Two clocks then run at different speeds. Under section 157.005(a), contempt jurisdiction survives only if the motion is filed by the second anniversary of the date the child becomes an adult or the support obligation ends under the order or by operation of law. Subsection (b) gives the money side until the 10th anniversary of those same dates to confirm the total arrearages for child, medical, and dental support and render cumulative money judgments for them, as provided by section 157.263, so long as a motion requesting a money judgment is filed by then. Possession and access run on a separate track in the same chapter, the subject of the guide to enforcing a visitation order.

Licenses, and the three findings that reach them

Chapter 232 answers which licenses are exposed in its definitions rather than anywhere later. Under section 232.001(1), a license is a license, certificate, registration, permit, or other authorization that is issued by a licensing authority, that is subject before expiration to renewal, suspension, revocation, forfeiture, or termination by a licensing authority, and that a person must obtain to practice or engage in a particular business, occupation, or profession, to operate a motor vehicle on a public highway in this state, or to engage in any other regulated activity, including hunting, fishing, or other recreational activity for which a license or permit is required. Section 232.002 only fixes scope: unless otherwise restricted or exempted, all licensing authorities are subject to the chapter. Vehicle registration has its own section, 232.0022, which makes the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles the licensing authority for suspending or refusing to renew one, without encumbering the vehicle's title.

The grounds are cumulative. Section 232.003(a) permits a suspension order only where the obligor owes overdue child support equal to or greater than the total support due for three months under a support order, has been provided an opportunity to make payments toward it under a court-ordered or agreed repayment schedule, and has failed to comply with that schedule. Subsection (b) reaches a parent or alleged parent who fails, after receiving appropriate notice, to comply with a subpoena, and subsection (c) reaches a person for whom a court has rendered a chapter 157 enforcement order finding a failure to comply with an order for possession of or access to a child.

1. Somebody files a petition

   Section 232.004(a) lets a child support agency or the obligee file against an obligor whose arrearage equals or exceeds three months of support. Where it is filed turns on whether the case is a Title IV-D case, under section 232.004(b) and (c).

2. Notice goes out

   On the filing, section 232.006(a) requires the clerk of the court or the Title IV-D agency to deliver notice of the individual's right to a hearing, notice of the deadline for requesting one, and, in a Title IV-D case, a hearing request form.

3. The response window runs

   Section 232.007(a) requires a request for a hearing and a motion to stay suspension to be filed not later than the 20th day after the date of service. If they are, section 232.007(b) obliges the court or agency to schedule a hearing promptly, notify each party of its date, time, and location, and stay the suspension meanwhile. If neither the request nor an appearance materializes, section 232.009 treats the allegations as admitted and suspends the license with no hearing.

4. The hearing, and the ways out of an order

   Once the section 232.003 findings are made, section 232.008(a) requires the suspension order unless the individual proves that all arrearages and the current month's support have been paid, shows good cause for failing to comply with the subpoena or the possession or access order, or establishes an affirmative defense under section 157.008(c). The court or agency may instead stay the order on the individual's compliance with one of the three conditions in subsection (b). Where that condition is a reasonable repayment schedule written into the order, subsection (b-1) allows the stay only if the individual makes an immediate partial payment of an amount specified, never under $200.

5. The licensing authority carries it out

   The clerk or agency forwards the final order, and from there the authority holds no discretion. Section 232.011(b) requires it to implement the order without additional review or hearing, and subsection (c) forbids it to modify, remand, reverse, vacate, or stay that order. Subsection (i) bars it from issuing or renewing any other license for that obligor until an order vacating or staying the suspension arrives.

One detail deserves care, because two provisions speak to the response window and they do not ask for the same thing. The operative filing rule is section 232.007(a): a request for a hearing and a motion to stay suspension, both filed not later than the 20th day after the date of service. The warning that section 232.006(c) requires the notice itself to display, in boldfaced type, capital letters, or underlining, speaks only of requesting a hearing, telling the recipient that an order suspending a license may be rendered if no hearing is requested before the 21st day after the date of service. Both sentences sit in the current chapter text.

Undoing a suspension is provided for, and it is not automatic. Section 232.013(a) says the court or the Title IV-D agency may vacate or stay the order where the individual has paid all delinquent child support or established a satisfactory payment record, has complied with a reissued subpoena, or has complied with an order for possession of or access to a child, or where good cause exists. May, not shall. On receiving that order the licensing authority must promptly issue the affected license if the individual is otherwise qualified.

What none of these chapters settles

They supply machinery, not outcomes. Whether an arrearage is the figure the movant says it is, whether a repayment schedule was reasonable, whether a stay should be granted or revoked: each is decided on evidence, case by case. Nor do these chapters displace the order that created the obligation, which fixes the amount, the start date, and the events that end it. The method this page followed is the one that works: read the signed order first, then the current text of chapters 158, 157, and 232 at the Legislature's own site. The system around them is mapped across the Texas family law guides, and each claim here is sourced the way every guide from our guides to Texas law is sourced, to the statute itself.