42 U.S.C. § 666 — Requirement of statutorily prescribed procedures to improve effectiveness of child support enforcement

(a) Types of procedures required. To meet section 654(20)(A), every State^* must have laws requiring the procedures below, consistent with this section and the Secretary's regulations, to make the State's child-support program more effective.

(1)(A) The State must use the income-withholding procedures in subsection (b) for support owed in cases enforced under the State plan. (B) If a support order^* issued or changed in the State before January 1, 1994 is not otherwise covered by subsection (b), the person's income must become subject to that withholding when arrears occur, without a court or administrative hearing.

(2) The State must have fast administrative and court procedures to establish paternity and to establish, change, and enforce support obligations, including subsection (c)'s procedures. The Secretary^* may waive this requirement for one or more political subdivisions if support orders are issued and enforced, or paternity is established, effectively and promptly there. The general exemption rule in subsection (d) applies.

(3) For enforcing a support order under an approved State plan, the State child-support agency must request, and the State must provide, that—(A) a State income-tax refund otherwise payable to a noncustodial parent is reduced, after notice of the proposed reduction and challenge procedures and compliance with State due process, by that parent's overdue support; (B) the reduced amount is distributed under section 657 when the overdue support was assigned to the State under sections 608(a)(3) or 671(a)(17), and otherwise, after any State collection fee, to the child or parent owed the support; and (C) the noncustodial parent's Social Security account number or numbers and home address are provided to the agency requesting the offset and the agency enforcing the order.

(4) Liens. (A) Liens must arise by law against real and personal property for overdue support owed by a noncustodial parent who lives or owns property in the State. (B) The State must give full faith and credit to such a lien arising in another State when the enforcing agency, party, or entity follows the State's recording or service rules. Those rules may not require a court notice or hearing before the lien is enforced.

(5) Paternity procedures. (A)(i) Paternity may be established at any time before the child turns 18. (ii) This also applies, as of August 16, 1984, to a child whose paternity was not established or whose paternity case was dismissed because the State then had a limitation period shorter than 18 years.

(B) Genetic testing. (i) In a contested paternity case, unless State law bars it, the State must require the child and all other parties to submit to genetic testing when a party requests it and supports the request with a sworn statement. The statement must either (I) claim paternity and state facts showing a reasonable possibility of the required sexual contact, or (II) deny paternity and state facts showing a reasonable possibility that there was no sexual contact. This does not apply to a person^* found under section 654(29) to have good cause, or to another exception for refusing to cooperate. (ii) When the State agency orders testing, it must (I) pay the cost, subject to recovery from the alleged father if paternity is established when the State chooses to recover it, and (II) obtain additional testing if the original result is challenged, when the challenger requests it and pays in advance.

(C) Voluntary acknowledgment. (i) The State must provide a simple civil process. Before the mother and putative father sign an acknowledgment, both must receive oral notice, including through video or audio equipment, and written notice of alternatives, legal consequences, rights—including minority rights if a parent is a minor—and responsibilities. (ii) The process must include a hospital program focused on the period immediately before or after birth. (iii)(I) The State agency maintaining birth records must offer voluntary paternity services. (II)(aa) The Secretary must regulate services offered by hospitals and birth-record agencies. (bb) The Secretary must identify and regulate other entities that may offer them. Such entities must use the same notices and materials, give their personnel the same training, and evaluate their services in the same way as hospital and birth-record programs. (iv) The State must develop and use a paternity affidavit meeting the Secretary's minimum requirements under section 652(a)(7), and must give full faith and credit to an affidavit signed in another State under that State's procedures.

(D) Effect of a signed acknowledgment. (i) For a child of unmarried parents, the father's name may be put on the birth record only if (I) both parents signed a voluntary acknowledgment or (II) a court or competent administrative agency adjudicated paternity. A State agency may still obtain the father's admission for a court or administrative case, and an order may base paternity on that admission plus any further showing State law requires. (ii) A signed acknowledgment is a legal finding of paternity. A signer may rescind it until the earlier of 60 days or the date of a proceeding about the child, including a support-order proceeding, in which the signer is a party. (iii) After that period, a court challenge is allowed only for fraud, duress, or material mistake of fact, and the challenger bears the burden of proof. The signer's legal duties, including child support, continue during the challenge unless good cause is shown.

(E) A court or administrative proceeding may not be required or allowed merely to ratify an acknowledgment that has not been challenged.

(F) Genetic-test results. (i) Results must be admitted to establish paternity if the test type is generally recognized as reliable by an accreditation body designated by the Secretary and the test was performed by a laboratory approved by that body. (ii) An objection must be written by the specified number of days before the hearing, or, if the State chooses, by the specified number of days after receiving the result. (iii) Unless objected to, results are admissible without foundation testimony or other proof of authenticity or accuracy. (G) The State must create a rebuttable presumption of paternity, or a conclusive one if it chooses, when testing shows the required threshold probability. (H) A default order must be entered when service on the defendant and any additional State-law showing are shown. (I) Parties have no right to a jury trial in a paternity action. (J) On a party's motion, a temporary child-support order must issue while parentage is being decided if clear and convincing evidence of paternity exists from genetic tests or other evidence. (K) Bills for pregnancy, childbirth, and genetic testing are admissible without third-party foundation testimony and are prima facie evidence of the amounts incurred for the services or testing for the child. (L) A putative father must have a reasonable chance to start a paternity case. (M) Voluntary acknowledgments and court or administrative adjudications must be filed in the State birth-record registry so they can be compared with the State case registry.

(6) After notice of the proposed action, challenge procedures, and full State due process, the State must be able to require a noncustodial parent to give security, a bond, or another guarantee for overdue support.

(7) Credit reporting. (A) Subject to (B)'s safeguards, the State must periodically report to consumer reporting agencies (the term is defined in 15 U.S.C. 1681a(f)) the name of each noncustodial parent delinquent in support and the overdue amount. (B) It may report only after the parent received all State-law due process, including notice and a reasonable chance to dispute accuracy, and only to an entity that gave the State satisfactory proof that it is a consumer reporting agency.

(8)(A) All child-support orders not covered by (B) must provide for income withholding so it is available if arrears arise without an application for services under this part. (B) Orders first issued in the State on or after January 1, 1994 that are not enforced under this part must require: (i) withholding on the order's effective date whether or not payments are late, unless a party proves and the court or process finds good cause not to withhold immediately, or both parties make a written alternative agreement; (ii) subsection (b)(1)'s requirements for every noncustodial parent against whom the State issued or changed an order, whether or not the State plan enforces it; (iii) where applicable, subsection (b) paragraphs (2), (5), (6), (7), (8), (9), and (10); and (iv) full State procedural due process.

(9) Each support payment or installment becomes, when due, (A) a judgment by operation of law with the force and attributes of a State judgment and enforceable, (B) entitled to full faith and credit in that State and every other State, and (C) not retroactively changeable by either State. A State may change a period covered by a pending modification petition, but only from the date notice was given directly or through the proper agent to the person owed support, or, if that person filed the petition, to the person owing it.

(10) Review and adjustment. (A)(i) Every 3 years, or sooner under a State cycle, upon either parent's request or when part A has an assignment, the State must review an order enforced under this part, considering the child's best interests, and must either (I) adjust it under section 667(a)'s guidelines if its award differs from the guideline amount, (II) apply a State cost-of-living formula, or (III) use automated methods, including wage or State income-tax comparisons, to find orders for review, review them, find orders for adjustment, and apply the proper adjustment under any State threshold. (ii) If the State uses (II) or (III), either party may contest the adjustment within 30 days after notice by requesting review and, if proper, adjustment under the guidelines. (iii) A three-year-cycle adjustment needs no proof of changed circumstances. (B) Outside that cycle, the State reviews on request and adjusts under the guidelines if the requester shows a substantial change in circumstances. (C) At least once every 3 years, the State must tell the parents about their right to request review and adjustment; the notice may be in the order.

(11) The State must give full faith and credit to another State's paternity determination, whether voluntary, administrative, or judicial. (12) Federal and State agencies working under this part must have access to every State system used to locate people for motor-vehicle or law-enforcement purposes.

(13) Social Security numbers. The State must require the number of (A) each applicant for a professional, driver, occupational, recreational, or marriage license to be recorded on the application; (B) each person subject to a divorce decree, support order, or paternity determination or acknowledgment to be placed in the related records; and (C) each deceased person to be placed in death records and on the death certificate. If the State lets another number appear on the document while retaining the Social Security number at the agency, it must tell applicants.

(14) Interstate high-volume enforcement. (A)(i) The State must use automated administrative enforcement for another State's request to the same extent it uses it in in-State cases and promptly report the result. (ii) It may electronically send another State a request that includes information allowing database comparisons and certifies (aa) the arrears under the order and (bb) compliance with applicable due process. (iii) Assistance does not transfer the case to the assisting State, though that State may create a corresponding case. (iv) The State must record requests received, cases in which it collected support, and the amount collected. (B) This term means that, on another State's request, a State uses automated matches with financial institutions and other places assets may be found to identify assets of people owing support in other States and seizes them by levy or another proper process.

(15) Work or payment plan. For an individual owing overdue support for a child receiving assistance under a part A State program, the State may order, or ask a court or State-law administrative process to order, the individual to (A) pay under a court-approved plan or, if the State chooses, an agency-approved plan, or (B) if covered by a plan and not incapacitated, take appropriate work activities defined in section 607(d), as the court or agency decides.

(16) The State must have and use, when appropriate, authority to withhold, suspend, or restrict the use of driver, professional, occupational, recreational, and sporting licenses of people who owe overdue support or who, after proper notice, do not comply with subpoenas or warrants concerning paternity or support.

(17) Financial-institution matches. (A) The State agency must agree with in-State financial institutions—and, for institutions doing business in two or more States, coordinate with the Federal Parent Locator Service—to create an automated data-match system. Each institution must quarterly provide the name, record address, Social Security number or taxpayer number, and other identifying information for each identified noncustodial parent with an account and past-due support^*. When the agency issues a lien or levy notice, the institution must encumber or surrender the person's assets as applicable. (B) The agency may pay a reasonable fee, no more than the institution's actual cost. (C) The institution is not liable under Federal or State law for disclosures, encumbering or surrendering assets in response to a notice, or other good-faith compliance. (D)(i) “Financial institution” has the meaning in section 669A(d)(1). (ii) “Account” means a demand-deposit, checking, negotiable-withdrawal-order, savings, time-deposit, or money-market-mutual-fund account.

(18) At the State's option, an order enforced under this part for a child of minor parents, when the custodial parent receives part A assistance, may be enforced jointly and severally against the noncustodial parent's parents.

(19) Health coverage. (A) Effective as provided in section 401(c)(3) of the Child Support Performance and Incentive Act of 1998, every order enforced under this part must provide medical support by either or both parents and, when appropriate, use the National Medical Support Notice described in section 401(b) of that Act and referenced for the listed ERISA plans. (B) Unless the order allows alternative coverage, when a parent must provide coverage and the State knows the employer: (i) the agency must send the Notice to the employer; (ii) within 20 business days, the employer must send it, excluding the severable employer withholding notice, to the eligible plan; (iii) for a newly hired employee entered in the State Directory of New Hires, the agency must, when appropriate, send the Notice with an income-withholding notice within 2 days; and (iv) an employer receiving the Notice must tell the agency when employment ends. (C) The parent's required employee contributions for the child's enrollment must be enforceable unless the parent contests enforcement for mistake of fact. The procedures in paragraphs (3), (4), (6), (7), and (15) need not be used when the State's generally available guidelines, considering the payment record, other remedies, and relevant factors, show that using them would not serve this part or would be inappropriate.

(b) Withholding from income of support amounts. The procedures in (a)(1)(A) must provide:
(1) For each noncustodial parent against whom the State issued or changed an order and is enforcing it under the State plan, the State must withhold enough income to meet the order and any employer fee under (6)(A), up to 15 U.S.C. 1673(b)'s maximum. With arrears, current support, arrears, and the fee together may not exceed that maximum, but the State need not withhold the maximum to collect arrears.
(2) For a child already receiving services under the State plan, withholding requires no application, whether or not the child receives part A assistance. For any other child for whom the State issued or changed an order, it follows an application for State-plan services. In either case no order amendment or further action by the issuing court or entity is needed except actions required by this part.
(3)(A) For an order issued or changed and enforced under this part on or after the first day of the 25th month beginning after October 13, 1988, income is withheld on the effective date whether or not payments are late, unless good cause is found after a party's showing or both parties make a written alternative agreement. (B) Otherwise withholding begins when missed payments equal one month's support, or earlier on the earliest of (i) the noncustodial parent's request, (ii) the custodial parent's approved request under State standards, or (iii) an earlier State-selected date.
(4)(A) Withholding must meet State due process. The State must notify each affected noncustodial parent that it began and explain how to contest it or its amount for mistake of fact. (B) The notice must include the employer information under (6)(A).
(5) The State must administer withholding through the section 654b State disbursement unit.
(6)(A)(i) After the standard notice, an employer must withhold the stated amount, including any State-set employer fee unless waived, and send it after the fee deduction to the State disbursement unit within 7 business days after it would have paid or credited the employee. For an order from another State, the law of the obligor's principal-workplace State controls the employer fee, maximum withholding, implementation and forwarding deadlines, priorities among obligees, and unspecified terms. An employer following a facially regular notice is not civilly liable for compliant conduct. (ii) The Secretary prescribes the standard notice, containing only needed information. (iii) “Business day” means a day State offices are open for regular business. (B) The State must simplify employer withholding, including allowing one combined payment to each agency while separately identifying each employee's share. (C) An employer is liable to the State for amounts it fails to withhold after proper notice, but need not change normal pay cycles. (D) The State must fine an employer that, because of withholding, fires, refuses to hire, or disciplines a covered parent, or fails to withhold or send support as required.
(7) This collection has priority over every other State-law process against the same income. (8) “Income” means any periodic payment due to a person, from any source, including wages, salary, commissions, bonuses, workers' compensation, disability payments, pension or retirement payments, and interest. (9) The State must withhold from income earned there under orders from other States, so collection does not depend on where the child or custodial parent lives. (10) The State must provide for ending withholding. (11) The administering agency may issue an order without advance notice to the obligor, including electronically.

(c) Expedited procedures. (1) State-agency action. The State agency may, without another tribunal's order, and may recognize and enforce another State agency's authority to: (A) order genetic testing as in (a)(5); (B) subpoena financial or other needed information and penalize nonresponse; (C) require every in-State entity, including employers, to promptly provide requested employment, compensation, and benefits information about an employee or contractor and sanction nonresponse; (D) access, with privacy and security safeguards and protection for entities providing access, including automated access, (i) other State and local agencies' vital, tax and revenue, real and titled personal property, license and business-ownership, employment-security, public-assistance, motor-vehicle, and corrections records, and (ii) private utility and cable customer names and addresses of support debtors or creditors and their employers under a (B) subpoena, plus financial-institution information including assets and liabilities; (E) after notice to obligor and obligee, direct a payor to change the payee to the proper government entity when assignment or State-disbursement-unit payment is required; (F) order income withholding under (a)(1)(A) and (b); (G) when arrears exist, secure current support and arrears by (i) intercepting or seizing periodic or lump-sum State or local benefits, judgments, settlements, and lotteries, (ii) attaching financial-institution assets, (iii) attaching public or private retirement funds, and (iv) liens under (a)(4), including forced sale and distribution when appropriate; and (H) increase monthly payments for arrears, subject to State limits. These actions must include appropriate due-process notice, a chance to contest, and an appeal on the record to an independent tribunal.
(2) Rules for all paternity and support proceedings. (A)(i) Each party must file and update, subject to privacy safeguards, location and identity information in the State case registry when an order is entered, including Social Security number, home and mailing addresses, telephone number, driver's-license number, and employer's name, address, and telephone number. (ii) In a later enforcement action, after diligent efforts to locate a party are shown, written notice sent to the latest registry home or employer address satisfies State notice and service-of-process due process. (B)(i) The agency and every authorized court or administrative tribunal must have statewide jurisdiction. (ii) Where courts or tribunals issue orders, a case may move between local jurisdictions without a new petitioner filing or service on the respondent to retain jurisdiction. (3) ERISA coordination. Despite section 514(d) of ERISA, this subsection does not alter, amend, modify, invalidate, impair, or supersede ERISA section 514(a)–(c) for these procedures, except to the extent the procedure would be consistent with ERISA section 206(d)(3)'s qualified domestic-relations-order rules or section 609(a)'s qualified-medical-child-support-order rules if the referenced orders covered the support orders in paragraphs (1) and (2).

(d) State exemptions. If a State satisfies the Secretary, with caseload, processing-time, administrative-cost, average-collection, and other specified data or estimates, that a required law or procedure will not improve its program's effectiveness and efficiency, the Secretary may exempt it. The exemption remains subject to review and ends if circumstances change.

(e) “Overdue support” defined. Here, “overdue support” means a delinquency under a court order or State-law administrative order for support and maintenance of a minor child, owed to or for the child, or for the noncustodial parent's spouse or former spouse living with the child, to the extent that spousal support would count under section 654(4). A State may also include otherwise qualifying support owed to or for a nonminor child. That choice applies separately to each procedure in this section. This section does not define “noncustodial parent,” “support order,” or other quoted terms it uses.

(f) Uniform Interstate Family Support Act. Each State must have the Uniform Interstate Family Support Act approved by the American Bar Association on February 9, 1993, including amendments officially adopted by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws through September 30, 2008.

(g) Laws voiding fraudulent transfers. Each State must have (1) (A) the Uniform Fraudulent Conveyance Act of 1981, (B) the Uniform Fraudulent Transfer Act of 1984, or (C) another law identifying fraud indicators that make a prima facie case that a debtor transferred income or property to avoid paying a child-support creditor, if the Secretary finds it gives comparable rights; and (2) procedures requiring the State, when it knows of a debtor's transfer for which that prima facie case exists, to (A) seek to void it or (B) obtain a settlement in the creditor's best interests.