What the payment amount is

The payment can be any amount, but both parties must agree.

Payments can be periodic or non-periodic items, such as school fees or health insurance.

Lump sum payments

A lump sum payment can be either:

  • cash
  • the value of a transferred asset.

You must have a child support assessment before we’ll accept a binding agreement for a lump sum payment. The amount must be equal to or greater than the annual child support rate payable in your child support assessment.

If you make a lump sum payment, we’ll credit the amount against your child support rate each year. We’ll do this until the credit runs out. We can credit 100% or you can set a lower percentage.

At the end of each year’s assessment, we’ll:

  • credit the payment against the amount that was payable for the previous year
  • index the amount left over using the Consumer Price Index.

Once the lump sum payment is all gone, the paying parent will need to pay their regular child support payments. These payments must be in line with the child support assessment or agreement that’s in place at that time

Page last updated: 3 March 2022.
QC 51874