Collection of Child Support in Alberta

The experiences of parties collecting spousal support and child support in Alberta range from those who receive voluntary payments, on time and in full each month to those who have never received regular payments of support, who are owed significant arrears and have continuous difficulty collecting. There are a number of steps recipients of support can take to try to ensure that they are among those who successfully collect support.

In 1985, Alberta established the Maintenance Enforcement Program (MEP) to help Albertans collect support payments. All Provinces of Canada have similar legislation and will enforce Alberta support payments. While it is possible to enforce the payment of child support without MEP, for most people, MEP provides the most cost effective, long term method of enforcing support.

The first step required to enforce support is to distill the terms of child support and spousal support into a Court Order or written agreement, (agreements must be in the format prescribed by the MEP regulations.) While not all parties will need to use MEP to collect support, it is advisable to describe the terms of support payments in a format which is acceptable to MEP so that the recipient always has the option to use MEP, should it become necessary.

Orders or MEP agreements must clearly identify who pays support, who receives it, the amount and frequency of payments, whether the payment is for spousal or child support, the start date and, often, the end date. If the wording is poor it may result in the Order being unenforceable by MEP or MEP adopting an interpretation which was not intended by the parties. MEP has no power to vary the language in an Order or MEP agreement, so they must be very clearly worded.

Once an Order has been granted by a judge and filed with the Court or an MEP agreement has been properly executed, the recipient may apply to have MEP enforce payments. It is usually advisable to suggest the payor make voluntary payments in the form of post-dated cheques or direct deposit before registering with MEP. This allows the parties the opportunity to establish or maintain goodwill and voluntary payments may be received faster than MEP enforced payments.

If payment becomes a problem, a recipient should call or write to MEP to enroll. Once enrolled, MEP will contact the payor, ask for payments to be made to MEP and for financial information. The payor may pay by direct deposit or post-dated cheques. MEP will keep track of arrears and ongoing payments. The recipient will receive payments about 10 days after the payor forwards money to MEP.

When a payor fails to pay MEP, MEP has tools of enforcement available. The most common include payroll garnishee, a Federal garnishee (MEP collects the payor's tax refund), registration at Land Titles or the Personal Property registry, denial of Federal licenses (passports), motor vehicle restrictions and driver's licence cancellations. MEP is getting more aggressive with enforcement. They began charging some payors interest in August 2004 and are currently seeking legislative changes to enable the charging of penalties.

Where MEP's enforcement measures are successful, the payor will probably find themselves contacting MEP to work out a payment plan, so that enforcement will stop. Where a payor cannot afford to work out a payment plan, they must seek a variation of their support obligation from a judge. Payors who qualify for a reduction of support should not delay in applying because our Courts are highly reluctant to reduce arrears of support, even if arrears accumulated while the payor was unable to pay.

MEP is a busy agency and often takes time to act. This can be frustrating to recipients and may give payors a false sense that they have gotten away with non-payment. Generally, MEP does catch up to payors and, in most cases, will get money for the recipient. This is good for spouses and children who require the support. With arrears being difficult to reduce and the introduction of interest and penalties, it is good for the payors to begin paying. Of course, it would usually be better for everyone if support was paid on time and in full in the first place.