Navigating Daycare Costs in Child Support: What Every Parent Needs to Know | Episode 216

Work-Related Childcare and Child Support in Colorado

In this “how-to” episode of Divorce at Altitude, Ryan Kalamaya explains how work-related daycare or childcare costs can affect the amount of child support in a Colorado divorce or parenting dispute. Using the podcast’s hypothetical clients, Eric and Melanie Wolf, Ryan walks listeners through the Colorado child support worksheet and shows how expenses such as preschool, daycare, after-school programs, or a nanny can significantly change the final child support calculation. Because many working parents rely on childcare to maintain employment, Colorado law allows these expenses to be factored into the child support formula.

Ryan also explains how childcare costs can be handled in two ways: they can either be included directly on the child support worksheet or divided separately based on each parent’s share of income. He highlights why these costs must be work-related, meaning they are necessary for a parent to work or earn income. The episode also explores common disputes that arise in practice, including whether summer camps qualify as childcare, how nanny or au pair costs are divided, and why personal babysitting expenses usually do not count toward the child support calculation.

Episode Highlights

How Work-Related Childcare Affects Child Support
Ryan explains how daycare, preschool, or after-school programs can change the child support calculation because these expenses are included in Colorado’s child support worksheet.

Using the Child Support Worksheet
The episode walks through an example using Eric and Melanie Wolf’s incomes to show how adding childcare expenses can significantly reduce or shift the amount of child support owed.

Two Ways to Divide Childcare Costs
Parents can either include childcare expenses directly on the worksheet or divide them separately based on each parent’s percentage share of income.

What Counts as Work-Related Childcare
Ryan clarifies that childcare must be necessary for a parent to work or generate income to be included in the calculation.

Common Disputes About Childcare Expenses
The episode discusses gray areas such as summer camps, sleepaway camps, nannies, and au pairs, and explains why personal babysitting for social events generally does not qualify.

What is Divorce at Altitude? 

Ryan Kalamaya and Amy Goscha provide tips and recommendations on issues related to divorce, separation, and co-parenting in Colorado. Ryan and Amy are the founding partners of an innovative and ambitious law firm, Kalamaya | Goscha, that pushes the boundaries to discover new frontiers in family law, personal injuries, and criminal defense in Colorado. 

To subscribe to Divorce at Altitude, click here and select your favorite podcast player. To subscribe to Kalamaya | Goscha's YouTube channel where many of the episodes will be posted as videos, click here.  If you have additional questions or would like to speak to one of our attorneys, give us a call at 970-429-5784 or email us at info@kalamaya.law.

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DISCLAIMER: THE COMMENTARY AND OPINIONS ON THIS PODCAST IS FOR ENTERTAINMENT AND INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES AND NOT FOR THE PURPOSE OF PROVIDING LEGAL ADVICE. CONTACT AN ATTORNEY IN YOUR STATE OR AREA TO OBTAIN LEGAL ADVICE ON ANY OF THESE ISSUES.

Transcript

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Ryan Kalamaya 0:01

Welcome to Divorce At Altittude, a podcast on Colorado family law. I'm Ryan Kalamaya. Each week, along with my business partner and co-host, Amy Goscha, or an expert, we discuss a particular topic related to Divorce or co-parenting in Colorado. In addition, we have created a short series of lessons that will take you through the legal process of Divorce and answer your questions from simple to complex. Divorce isn't easy. The end of a marriage, especially when children are involved, brings a great deal of loss and change. We hope these practical tips and insights will help you on your journey to a new. And better life.

Ryan Kalamay 0:43

Welcome back to another episode of Divorce at Altitude. I am Ryan Kalamaya. This is a how to episode on work related daycare or child care and how that can change or influence the amount of child support in Colorado. Divorce or parenting Dispute. So this is for working parents. If we take our hypothetical divorce clients, Eric, Melanie Wolf they have children. And let's say that the children are at an age where they need to go to preschool or daycare. Or another example might be that both Eric and Melanie work and they have some sort of afterschool program or nanny. That is required for the parties to work and generate income. How does that impact child support? If we go back to our previous episode in which I dealt, delve into the child support worksheet, and that's episode 207, the name of that episode is from numbers to answers, how to tackle the child support worksheet. Listeners will recall that I shared a screen on a video and went through the child support worksheet. I basically narrated the various things that I did and the inputs. I'm going to do that same thing here again. I have the child support worksheet from Family Law Software and I have our hypothetical divorce clients, Eric and Melanie Wolf. Now, in this scenario we have Eric making a 120, 000 a year. Melanie makes 70, 000 a year. And as listeners will recall, the incomes between the parties, they will change child support. So will the amount of overnights or parenting time between the respective parties. So that's not the point of this episode. Instead, we're really going to focus on the work related. Daycare. My children at one point were in preschool and it was like a second mortgage. It is very expensive. It continues to increase the cost of child care. And if Eric and Melanie. If both Adam and Eve they're hypothetical children, if they go to preschool or if Eve, the younger one she goes to preschool that's going to change the amount of child support. What you can do is the parties can either have this on the worksheet or they can deal with it ad hoc or off of the worksheet. Now, I'll explain what I mean by that. We have the child support worksheet up here. It suggests that there is a child support obligation of 307 by Eric paid to Melanie, and there is a zero for the work related child care costs, and these are under line item 10A on the Child Support Worksheet. And there's zero there. And so if we put the amount of work related daycare. And I'll, I keep on saying work related because I'll explain why that matters. Later on, but if we put 1, 000, so let's assume that Eve is 1, 000 for work related daycare. It's a preschool program. And then we go back, it reduces the child support down to 61. And that is because Melanie, in essence, is sharing the cost of preschool for Eve. Now that is assuming that Eric is the only one that is paying the work related daycare. And the alternative is to deal with it off of the worksheet. In this scenario we go to the percentage share of income and with Eric making 120, 000 and Melanie making 100, 000. 70, 000 per year. The share or the split between those is that Eric makes 63 percent and Melanie makes 37 percent of their overall combined income. So one option is that Eric makes 70, 000 per year. Eric goes to the preschool and he pays 63%, or the parties could agree to just a round number of a 60 40 split. So each and every month he pays 60 percent of the daycare for Eve. Now, parties can agree to a different allocation. There might be another factor, and that could be that they have a disproportionate schedule of parenting time. If Melanie has the children more, that might change the analysis. And if you deal with it on the worksheet, it will take that into consideration. What happens if Eric is the only one that needs work related daycare? It's still, nevertheless, going to be counted because his income is counted and he needs help from somebody to take care of Eve her. So in order for him to generate that income, there's a couple of things that I'll point out, and that is that you can get into arguments about what counts. Summer camps, they are the children are in school, do those count as work related? Daycare, and it really depends on how the parties address that. There could be another conflict, and that could be a sleepaway camp. Does that count? We'll get into other issues related to this in an episode on extracurricular activities. You can see on the child support worksheet that there's a subsection E under 10, and that is extraordinary expenses. I've heard it from judges that they just deal with this off the worksheet. So they'll say Erica, Melanie, you guys agree to divide this 50, 50 or 60, 40 and, or 80 20. And those percentages, it depends on the share of income really. But if you have spousal maintenance, if Eric is paying Melanie spousal maintenance, then generally the split is going to be 60, 40. 40, but it will change child support. Now this does not include or address babysitters. And that would be if Eric is remarried or he's out dating and he goes to the movies or goes out to dinner with his new significant other that having a babysitter during his parenting time is not going to be included because that is not work. Related child care. You also get into these other issues on, for example, an au pair and or a nanny, because some of that time is going to be addressed or for personal issues and some may not and so there's going to need to be an agreement between the parties on that work related daycare. Oftentimes, especially with young children, that decision has already been made, but there can be significant variances between the cost of preschool from one preschool to the other. And really it's going to come down to how the parties are best going to address the work related daycare. But really the point of this episode is that it will change how. Child support, how much child support is is ordered. And you can either put it on the worksheet or you can take it off. And the rationale behind all of this is that there are general expenses that are paid by people for children. In the previous episode, I talked about food or utilities or driving. Those. Expenses are baked into the amount of child support. There are significant one off or one or line items each and every month. If you compare my children who are not in preschool to Eric and Melanie Wolfs who would, have Eve in preschool. That's a big change in terms of that monthly cost and the Child Support Worksheet takes that in to consideration. So we'll get into other deductions or line items, differences between the normal child support scenario versus another scenario where there could be significant extracurricular expenses or extraordinary medical expenses and how that can change child support. But until then, thanks for joining us on Divorce at Altitude and I hope you have found this episode helpful when it comes to work related daycare and child support in a Colorado divorce.

Ryan Kalamaya 9:48

hey everyone. This is Ryan again. Thank you for joining us on Divorce at Altittude. If you found our tips, insight, or discussion helpful, please tell a friend about this podcast. For show notes, additional resources or links mentioned on today's episode, visit Divorce at Altittude dot com. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen in. Many of our episodes are also posted on YouTube. You can also find Amy and. Law or 9 7 0 3 1 5 2 3 6 5. That's K A L A M A Y A .