Child Custody Agreement

What is Child Custody Agreement?

A Child Custody Agreement (also known as a Parenting Plan) a legal arrangement between two parents regarding upbringing and co-parenting in the course of divorce or separation proceeding.

The agreement defines the following important considerations:

• the type of a custody over a child;
• visitation schedule for one or both parents;
• financial support of a child;
• medical and daily care;
• education.

A Child Custody Agreement will be suitable for:

• a couple who is in the course of divorce or separation process and who wants amicably to define co-parenting of their kids;
• two adults who co-parent, though are not in a formal relationship (e.g. marriage or partnership) at the moment; or
• a case when a child custody agreement is requested by a court/other state authority to finalize a divorce process.

What does ‘custody’ mean?

A Custody means a right of parents to decide important decisions related to their child’s life, health, education and general upbringing.

While a couple is married or live together, usually they have a joint custody over the children. However, once a divorce or separation is started, it is essential determine how the custody will be subsequently split between two parents.

The custody over children could be classified in few ways:

• by custody’s type: legal and physical;
• by parent’s role: sole, joint and split.

Legal Custody

The legal custody is meant to determine a parent who will be responsible for adopting the most important decisions related to health, education, religion etc.

A legal custody could be assigned to one parent or to both parents at the same time. Some courts may appoint first a temporary legal custody of one parent for the whole period of divorce procedure, and another parent for a permanent legal custody after the divorce is finalized.

If both parents plan to exercise a legal custody jointly, it means that all important decisions regarding a child’s life and development should be decided together. Those decisions may include, for instance:

• which school to attend;
• which extracurricular activities to participate it;
• which dental insurance to choose;
• which medical insurance is suitable for a child;
• if a child is sick, which medical treatment to take or which doctors to contact?

Physical Custody

The physical custody determines a parent with whom a child will be residing permanently. In most of the cases a physical custody is being assigned to one parent only.

A court is always acting in the best interest of a child while determining a permanent place of residence. Thus, a court may take into consideration opinion of a child or their siblings, the state of relationships between a child and a parent, as well as how such a decision will affect a child’s wellbeing.

Sole Custody

A sole (or full) custody means that either of the parents receives a full custody over a child. It means that one parent is being given only sole legal custody, only sole physical custody or both.
In practice courts may offer various hybrid solutions, when both parents exercise joint legal custody, while one parent has a sole physical custody.

Both mother and father could be granted with a sole custody over a child.

Joint Custody

A joint custody means that both parents are given a right to participates in a child’s life by exercising their custody together.

A joint custody is usually being given when a court sees that both parents can duly perform their parenting obligations towards a child. The schedule of work is closely taken into consideration to assess how effectively each of the parents is able to execute a custody.

Split Custody

A split custody is typical for a divorce of a couple with two and more kids, and means that either of parents receives a sole custody over a specific child. Practically speaking, one parent will obtain full legal and physical custody over one kid, while other parent will obtain full custody over another kids.

How to make a Child Custody Agreement template legally binding?

Identify all Children Involved

A Child Custody Agreement should be concluded with regards to all children a couple has. It is not acceptable to make a custody arrangement with regards to one child, while excluding another.

A custody agreement is suitable only for children under 18 years of age. A custody could be established as well with regards to children above 18 years of age, provided they are mentally or physically challenged.

Clarify all parenting arrangement

There are a lot of important things parents have to consider while filling in a child custody agreement template:

Financial Support and Maintenance

This is the most important part of all custody agreements involving children. Parents need to decide how the payments for essential and non-essential child’s monthly expenses should be allocated.

It is required that parents need to disclose all source of incomes they have, including wages, rental income, social benefits etc.

The amount of a child support paid by either of the parents should be reasonable with regards to the amount of income they have. Financial support payments should be paid regularly – biweekly or by-montly.

Parents can define their financial support payments directly in the child custody agreement, or use a separate child support agreement.

Visitation Schedule

The type of selected custody significantly influences visitation arrangements. If one parent gets a solo physical custody, the other parent should seek to establish the following:

• Exact dates of the week when a child could be picked up;
• Pick up and drop off location;
• Time for pick up and drop off;
• Places for meeting (e.g. park, shopping mall etc.)

If parents share a joint physical custody, in that case parents have to work together to select the best visitation schedule. The visitation schedule should consider school/daycare timetable, as well as child’s preferences and could be organized as follows:

• Weekly visitation (according to which one week a child resides with one parent, while the other week a child is being transferred to the other parent);
• Monthly visitation (according to which one moth a child resides with one parent, while during the next month a child will live with another parent).

Holiday Schedule

A Child Custody Agreement template allows to determine with whom child should spend the most important holidays through the year, including Christmas, Mother and Father’s Day, Independence Day and so on.

Other Arrangements

Parents have to decide regarding expenses related to scheduled and emergency medical care for their children, dental insurance and other out pocket expenses.
The expenses mentioned above should not be confused with regular financial support payments mentioned above.

Make both parents to sign a document

Once the document is ready, parties have to read it carefully to make sure all their intentions are well fixed on the paper. After printing out the document it should be signed in person by both parents.

It is highly advisable for both parties to review a child custody agreement prior to its signing.

A child custody agreement becomes binding after its signing by both parties. After its signing, the law does not require to notarize a document. If parties wish so, they can ask two individuals to witness signing a document. A witnesses’ signature should be on the document as well.