Your Child Custody Arrangement: Making Your Minutes Count

In your child custody situation, every minute counts. You want to maximize the time you spend with your child and you also want to keep track of the correct time-share percentage so that you're paying or receiving fair child support. If you're not already doing so, it's time to start micro-managing your child custody time.

Let's begin with a question no one seems to ask--but that you probably should. Why do all child exchange times seem to be on the hour? 5 pm to 8 pm on a Wednesday night, Friday afternoon at 3 to Monday morning at 8, etc. But why are the visitation plans set up this way?

What if your kid has an afterschool activity and you don't pick him up until 3:30? What if you get out of work early and can pick up your kids at 5:30 instead of 6? What if instead of having your kids 5-8 on Wednesday you could have them from 4:30-8:30? The answer is actually pretty simple. Visitation plans have always been set up by the hour because that has always been the easy way to do it.

But, if you really think about it, it actually isn't that much more work to create a custom custody schedule that can give you more time with your child--and a schedule that more accurately reflects the time you spend with your child. All it takes is a little more calculating--and there are even ways to simplify that.

The first step is to schedule in the accurate times that you are picking up your child. What time does school let out? If you are picking up your child at 2:45 pm but the schedule says 3:00 pm, you need to change that. Sure, it's just 15 min on the one day--but 15 minutes once a week adds up to 13 hours a year. So, you're either paying child support on those 13 hours, or not receiving child support for those hours (because child support is based on time-share percentages). Be nit-picky about pick-up and drop-off times. Make sure you're agreement accurately reflects them.

This idea can also be used to get some extra time with your child. Extend your weekly visits by picking up your child 15 minutes earlier and dropping him off 15 minutes later. Or add some minutes to your weekend time. It really isn't hard to do. If you're worried that it will take a lot of extra time to calculate the time, look into purchasing some child custody calendar software. There are some great programs out there that allow you to put in exact times and that will also figure out the time-share as you create your schedule.

As a good parent, you want to make sure that you are doing everything possible for you child. You also want to see your child as much as possible and create a workable, accurate, beneficial child custody agreement. So, don't agree to set exchanges on the hour just because it seems easy. It's just as easy to set them up on the half hour, on the 15's, etc., if that's the reality. Doing the small things now will pay off big in the end.

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