Collecting Alimony and Child Support from State of New Jersey Retirees

Is the payor of your New Jersey alimony or child support award retired and receiving his or her pension from the State of New Jersey and refusing to pay court-ordered support? Have the usual collection channels failed to succeed in garnishing those funds to collect the support/alimony due to you while the obligor continues to receive his or her monthly retirement/pension benefits?

If the pension the payor receives comes from the Public Employees Retirement System (PERS), the Police and Fire Retirement System (PFRS), or the Teachers Pension and Annuity Fund (TPAF), do not give up on your collection efforts until you have investigated the use of a Domestic Relations Order (often referred to incorrectly as a Qualified Domestic Relations Order) that orders the alimony or child support to be withheld directly from the retiree’s retirement benefits.

How does this work? Divorced people are sometimes familiar with the use of special court orders called Domestic Relations Orders (DRO’s) or Qualified Domestic Relations Orders (QDRO’s) that are used to equitably distribute an interest in one spouse’s pension to the other spouse upon divorce. QDRO is the name for orders that are used for ERISA-approved private pension plans. The court orders used for State of New Jersey plans are simply referred to as Domestic Relations Orders because ERISA does not govern the state plans. 

What many do not know is that DRO’s may be used to carve out an additional portion of the retirement benefit remaining with the retired former-spouse to pay for alimony and/or child support each month, including a payment on account of arrears. A separate DRO is required from the DRO used to equitably distribute pension benefits. Once submitted to the court and entered, a certified copy of the alimony or child support DRO is forwarded to the Division of Pensions for the State of New Jersey. Upon implementation, the monthly payment is withheld from the payor’s retirement/pension benefits and forwarded directly to you or through the state child support/alimony payment center and then to you. It works much like a wage execution does on the income of an employed obligor and provides for regular monthly payments from the retiree’s benefits – by action through the Division of Pensions. 

Is it that easy? It can be, especially if the court order that you presently have has been reviewed by the court since the payor has retired. Retirement may constitute a change in circumstances that would allow the court to review and change the amount of alimony or child support that was previously ordered. Each case is factually different than another. If you have already sought enforcement and the payor has asked the court to review the amount of alimony or child support that is ordered to be paid, then generally that amount could be readily implemented through a DRO. If the payor had a new change of circumstances since the last court review, the payor could ask the court for another review before the DRO is entered and implemented to be sure the alimony or child support amount is appropriate for the present circumstances.

What do you need before speaking with an attorney about this? You will need the most recent court order and/or agreement incorporated in a Final Judgment of Divorce that states how much is supposed to be paid. This is generally a copy of the court order and/or Final Judgment of Divorce. If there are arrears on alimony or child support that have accumulated, be sure to let your attorney know. A current status can usually be obtained online (with your consent) if your payments go through the New Jersey Support Payment Center. It is a good idea to review as much of the order history as possible to determine whether there might be potential claims the payor could raise to offset the amounts claimed as due or seek a reduction. Even if there is such a claim, if you are currently receiving no payment, a DRO that secures a regular monthly payment of a reduced amount is an improvement. 

How do you know if there might be a change in circumstances? Most of the time you can produce a good estimate if you can tell how much the court used for income for the payor and for you at the time the last order amount was determined. If the order was modified by a child support hearing officer, or judge in a summary hearing, it may be noted on the order itself, or you may have to go back to your records to gather some income information. If your determination was part of a divorce or post-divorce modification, you may have copies of multi-page case information statements that were filed with the court. For an alimony order, knowing your expenses and those of the payor at the time of that order is important, in addition to both incomes. Usually that information was provided to the hearing officer or to the court in some written form. If you do not have all this information, get what you can and your attorney should be able to guide you towards other helpful information.

What if the payor is newly retired? If there has been no court action on the order you are seeking to enforce since the payor has retired, the process may be more complicated. Retirement can be a complicated change of circumstances in New Jersey. If the court finds a payor’s retirement is not a good faith retirement given all the circumstances, and if there is no other change in circumstances warranting a change, even if he or she is age 65, then the payor’s obligations most likely would continue. In the absence of clear written provisions in an agreement, order, or final judgment of divorce to the contrary, payor obligations do not automatically terminate upon a good faith retirement. They are reviewed by the court on a case-by-case basis as to alimony and child support. Of course, if the parties wish to avoid enforcement litigation, payor and recipient are also permitted to reach agreement as to their future rights and obligations through mediation with a third party neutral and/or negotiation directly or through attorneys; they then advise the court in writing with a consent order containing the terms of their agreement.