Paying spousal support painlessly?

September 29, 2009 8:03 AM

How can I set up spousal support payments in the least painful way possible?

My ex-husband and I divorced recently after 20 years of marriage due to his infidelity. Because I am the one with the good job (he did not work for about 10 of our 20 years of marriage - I know, I know, big red flag but when you're committed, you overlook stuff for the sake of the relationship - sigh), I have to pay him spousal support of $1,000 a month. This just drives me nuts but I am dealing with the divorce by interacting with him as little as possible. One thing I would like to do is set up the SS payment as an automatic withdrawal from my checking account to his checking account (takes less thought, effort, and postage on my part) but my bank does not do this for payments to individuals, only to companies. Anyone have other ideas on how I can get this done? My priorities is to get it done easily/automatically so the only thought I need to give it is to subtract the $$ from my checking account each month. Any ideas would be helpful. My bank is not giving me any ideas other than, "No, we can't do that."

BTW, the no-fault divorce laws in California are evil, as far as I am concerned.

posted by eleslie to Human Relations (19 answers total)

Can he set up an LLC? Still an individual, but incorporated.
posted by nax at 8:05 AM on September 29, 2009

I am sorry for this situation for you. Is changing banks an option? My bank's bill-payer system can cut an automatic check to anyone or anything [person or business] and they seem to use a pretty standard bill-payer program. Alternately, perhaps you could set up an account at his bank that has only the $1000 in it each month and then have that bank do a transfer within it to his account and then have the $1000 go into it originally from your account somehow via direct deposit from your paycheck?
posted by jessamyn at 8:11 AM on September 29, 2009

What bank are you a customer of?

I know that Bank of America will, for free, cut a check to pretty much anyone, anywhere, if you have their name and address, and that the cutting of said check can be automated online. Basically, under "Bill Pay", you set them up as a "Pay To Account" with their address and phone number, then set up "Automatic Payments".

A couple potential problems with this method:

You will not have images of the canceled checks, so the only "proof" that the payment was sent is the electronic confirmation number given by BofA. But this is true of a direct transfer, as well.
posted by muddgirl at 8:13 AM on September 29, 2009

I am sure that there is a better solution than this, but PayPal will allow you to set up recurring payments. I have not used it myself so don't know how reliable it is, but wanted to put it out there.

I am not a USian but it does seem really odd that your bank won't let you do this - it's pretty normal elsewhere. Jessamyn's suggestion of changing banks would be a good one if that's an option for you.

Courage!
posted by different at 8:17 AM on September 29, 2009

Assuming that you receive a bi-weekly paycheck from work, couldn't you just set up your direct deposit to send $500/paycheck to his account, and then deposit the rest into yours? I do this for a savings and checking account with my paycheck and it works wonderfully.
posted by suburbanrobot at 8:25 AM on September 29, 2009

At my bank we use an on-line bill payment system. We can send a check to anyone on the planet as long as we have an address. And we can set it up to happen automatically. It's a nice trick. We use it for the homeowner's association payment.

There is also a transfer feature. Since our kids have accounts in the same bank we can make transfers to their accounts, individually or automatically.

We reserve automatic withdrawl for things like loan payments.

If you bank doesn't have these features then you might want to go with a commercial company such as CheckFree. You can set up automatic payments there as well. I used them for years (back when it was a phone service, before they were online) and only stopped when my bank started offering on-line bill payment. Never had a problem.

Miserable situation. Good luck with it.
posted by SLC Mom at 8:25 AM on September 29, 2009

Nthing - my bank allows me to do this. That is, they do not EFT the payment to my landlord, because they can only EFT to companies with account numbers and so on and so forth that are in their system. Still has the same advantage of you not having to write a check and put it in the mail, etc., which must be a miserably hard thing to do.

I pay my rent this way, which is a check to an individual person (the landlord's name). Each and every month - AND I get images of the check, which they mail a couple of days early to ensure receipt on time. I am with PNC Bank which I believe might be in my area only (east coast), but did so when with Bank of America as well.

So maybe call your bank again and clarify whether they can mail a paper check to an individual through your bill pay system? I think if you ask that way, they will say yes.
posted by bunnycup at 8:28 AM on September 29, 2009

More data points: Schwab Bank and Chase will also make recurring payments to anyone by check. You could open another bank account, just for this, and automatically fund it from your regular bank account.
posted by Methylviolet at 8:30 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]

Plenty of good suggestions above, but this one isn't:

Assuming that you receive a bi-weekly paycheck from work, couldn't you just set up your direct deposit to send $500/paycheck to his account, and then deposit the rest into yours?

Do not do this, or you'll wind up giving him an extra $1000 every year, as there are 26 2-week periods in a year.
posted by amelioration at 8:32 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]

Assuming that you receive a bi-weekly paycheck from work, couldn't you just set up your direct deposit to send $500/paycheck to his account, and then deposit the rest into yours?

I would recommend against doing this, because there are very specific tax details that may be involved. I am by no means a family law or alimony tax expert, but I bet your attorney from the divorce would say NO to this arrangement. Your employer also might balk at issuing your pay to a person other than you (or your IRA, 401K, etc.), again for tax reasons. I would think if they pay your ex-spouse directly, they might have some kind of mandatory reporting w/r/t him.

Also, it depends on the due date of your $1k/month. My gut reaction is that if it is due on the 1st of every month, you would be in violation of the support order (presuming you have one) to pay $500 on the first and $500 on the 15th.

/not legal advice, etc., just random thoughts from a nitpicky person
posted by bunnycup at 8:33 AM on September 29, 2009

Wells Fargo allows on-line transfers to other Wells Fargo customers. You need their account number. Don't know if there's a way to do it automatically.
posted by ClaudiaCenter at 9:18 AM on September 29, 2009

Data point: Citibank also has recurring, direct to individual check payments.
posted by phunniemee at 9:42 AM on September 29, 2009

ING Direct's Orange Checking allows immediate transfer to other ING users, or will mail paper checks for free. Plus, the scheduling feature is good. My brick-and-mortar banks also offer these services but they're a little more confusing and/or not free.
posted by catlet at 9:48 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]

catlet beat me to it, I came her to say if your bank won't let you do it, open an ING Orange account and they'll let you do it.
posted by jrishel at 9:52 AM on September 29, 2009

I used to automatically pay my brother his monthly allowance via Bank of America's website - he'd get a check in the mail every month. Switch banks.
posted by exhilaration at 12:09 PM on September 29, 2009

Response by poster: Many thanks, hive mates. What I asked my bank about was EFT, but we did not discuss online bill payment to an individual so I will go back and ask them that. Anything to keep from putting pen to check every month - I'd rather bite nails!
posted by eleslie at 12:12 PM on September 29, 2009

I've done this with my Mom for years, first with Bank of America and then with ING Direct. I just entered her into my online Bill Pay. She's been getting a check automatically sent to her on the 15th of the month for years. Also, if you have the same bank as him, EFT should also be pretty easy to set up. Bank of America, for example, allows its customers to send payments between accounts. I once transferred money from my Bank of America Account to another BOA customer.
posted by bananafish at 4:13 PM on September 29, 2009

If your bank account can't be set up to send out an automatic check payment every month then you need to change banks. I have WaMu (now Chase) and they do this just fine, for free.
posted by Jacqueline at 8:38 PM on September 29, 2009

I don't know how it works in your jurisdiction, but in most places I've lived support payments can/should be managed through the clerk of court's office. Having a 3rd party mediate the support transaction protects both of you. An added bonus--you write checks to the court, not to your ex, which depersonalizes it a bit.

This also gets you past the person/institution hurdle.
posted by Fezboy! at 4:14 PM on September 30, 2009