Normally there has to be a court order in place before they will begin collections. If there is not one, this is shocking. However, if there is one, this is perfectly normal. If a order has been put into place for the support, the are able to use various means to collect it. Examples would be wage garnishment or intercepting income tax refunds.

There should have been a letter stating that she was claiming the child was his. Then they would set a court date. In between the two, if he feels the child is not his, he can request a paternity test. This is the normal procedure.

It doesn't seem realistic that they just seized a bank account without a court order. With one, yes, they can leave him broke collecting it if he is in arrearages. If there is no court order, I would suggest skipping Child Support Enforcement and contacting your County Family Court directly. That is where these orders are kept. If it is at all possible, he should contact an attorney. An attorney will be the best bet in sorting this out quickly. I can tell you first hand, when you're dealing with the courts, expect things to move at a turtle's pace.

Good luck.

She obviously knew him well enough to name him as the father of her child. All the other details about her having other kids and a job are not really relevant to the situation.

If his bank account was garnished, it's because the state has an order of support already in effect. If he refused to cooperate with that court process by not appearing for a DNA test to establish paternity, it could very well be he was found to be the father by default. Ignoring the court and not appearing to challenge the mother's claim is not an effective way to get out of dealing with the issue or paying child support.

You may want to suggest to him to contact the child support enforcement agency to see just how much he still owes. It's possible he can petition the court for a reduction of current support to reflect his actual income or income potential, as the court may have simply assigned him an income based on her perception of his earnings. He can also petition the court for visitation with his child.

One does not necessarily need proof to issue a child support order, as he seems to have found out.

He has never gotten one single letter from them (Child Support Services). He took a test a long time ago, but did not get results. Usually no news is good news. How could he pay if he didn't know.

Hi, ak907, and welcome to WebAnswers.

Now, you know that no news is NOT necessarily good news. And, it is very likely that your boyfriend did not inform the court that he had moved in the meantime, which is solely his responsibility.

All child support enforcement needs is an order and SSN to collect past due child support. It would not mail a notice to say that it was taking his money.

He can go to the court and review the file about the matter. If there is any irregularities, he can file a motion for a hearing to seek to correct any inaccuracies.

I hope this clarifies the matter for you and your boyfriend. Thank you for choosing WebAnswers as your source™.

Well there was no court order and no other contact with the mother for almost 3 years.

How do you know that there was no court order? Child support enforcement could NOT act without one.

Thank you for an unbiased response....some people just jump to conclusions where you provide all the possibilities.

If "unbiased" means hoping there's no order, and he doesn't really owe this money, sorry sweetie. No bank would garnish an account without a court order. If he took a test, he now knows what the result was. He really should get in touch with the court and the child support office, the interest rates are compounding his problem.

What comes after garnishment can be an arrest warrant for non-support, so he really should not take this lightly.

Either your boyfriend is LYING to you or he tried to dodge it by moving away. If he took a test and they are taking his money he IS the father and no they don't have to tell you ahead of time, if they did that every dad trying to skip out on child support would drain their bank accounts before they could take it. Yes they can take as much or as little as they want and if you marry him know that he will be paying child support for the next however many years till the kid is of age and then b/c he wasn't paying all this time he's going to have to BACK PAY anything he owes after that. You got yourself a real winner there I hope your using birth control.

The FACT is, according to your own statement, your boyfriend DID already submit to a paternity test - which means he had NOTICE of the custody and child support matter - and did not bother to find out the results, nor did he seem to think it was important to find out what else the court undertook.

Child support enforcement just does not go thought the phone book to see from whom it can take money. It had to have an order and it had to have specific identifying information of your boyfriend in order to seize his money.

Further, there would NOT have to be any contact by the mother in order for child support to be eventually enforced, especially if the mother applied for social services benefits, such as food stamps or TANF, and considering that paternity had already been established, even if your boyfriend did not know of it.

So, here you and he are, wondering what happened, when it is patently clear what has occurred. Your boyfriend's only reasonable recourse, if any, is to see the court file and go from there.