Related Information

return to Related Information

ARTICLE 1B. GUIDELINES FOR CHILD SUPPORT AWARDS.
§48A-1B-1. General provisions.
(a) This section establishes guidelines for child support award amounts so as to ensure greater uniformity by those persons who make child support
recommendations and enter child support orders and to increase predictability for parents, children and other persons who are directly affected by child
support orders. There shall be a rebuttable presumption, in any proceeding before a family law master or circuit court judge for the award of child support,
that the amount of the award which would result from the application of these guidelines is the correct amount of child support to be awarded.
(b) The Legislature recognizes that children have a right to share in their natural parents' level of living. Expenditures in families are not made in
accordance with subsistence level standards, but are made in proportion to household income, and as parental incomes increase or decrease, the actual dollar
expenditures for children also increase or decrease correspondingly. In order to ensure that children properly share in their parents' resources, regardless of
family structure, the guidelines are structured so as to provide that after a consideration of respective parental incomes, that child support will be related, to
the extent practicable, to the level of living that children would enjoy if they were living in a household with both parents present.
(c) The guidelines promulgated under the provisions of this section take into consideration the financial contributions of both parents. The Legislature
recognizes that expenditures in households are made in aggregate form and that total family income is pooled to determine the level at which the family can
live. The guidelines consider the financial contributions of both parents in relationship to total income, so as to establish and equitably apportion the child
support obligation.
(d) The provisions of this article which would create a new method of calculating child support obligations based on an income shares model shall not
become operative until the first day of July, one thousand nine hundred ninety-seven. The child support guidelines in effect on the first day of January, one
thousand nine hundred ninety-six, as promulgated by legislative rule, shall continue in effect, notwithstanding the repeal of section seventeen, article two of
this chapter during the regular session of the Legislature, one thousand nine hundred ninety-six. To the extent that any definition set forth in article one-a of
this chapter is inconsistent with the manner of calculating a support obligation under the legislative rule establishing child support guidelines that is in effect
on the first day of January, one thousand nine hundred ninety-six, such definition shall have no application until the first day of July, one thousand nine
hundred ninety-seven.
§48A-1B-2. Calculation of child support order.
(a) Both parents’ adjusted gross income, as defined in section two, article one-a of this chapter, is used to determine the amount of child support.
Unreimbursed child health care expenses, work-related child care expenses and any other extraordinary expenses agreed to by the parents or ordered by the
court or master less any extraordinary credits agreed to by the parents or ordered by the court or master are added to the basic child support obligation to
determine the total child support obligation. The child support order is determined by dividing the total child support obligation between the parents in
proportion to their income.
(b) The calculation of the support order amount requires the use of one of two worksheets which must be completed for each case. Worksheet A is used
for a sole physical custody arrangement. Worksheet B is used for a shared physical custody arrangement.
§48A-1B-3. Basic child support obligation.
(a) The basic child support obligation is determined from the following table of monthly basic child support obligations:

West Virginia Monthly Basic Child Support Obligations
(Adjusted for West Virginia's Income Relative to U.S. Averages)