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→The law about child support
Child support is usually paid to support children who are under the age of 19, or who are 19 or older but are unable to support themselves for some reason, usually because they are ill or disabled, or are going to college or university. Under section 147(1) of the ''[[Family Law Act]]'', children who are younger than age 19 can stop being entitled to child support if:
Child support is usually paid to the person whom the child mostly lives with. Child support can sometimes be paid directly to the child, usually if the child is 19 or older and living away from home and going to college or university.
In certain circumstances, stepparents can also be required to pay child support. A ''stepparent'' is the married or unmarried spouse of a parent, as long as:
Under the ''[[Divorce Act]]'', a stepparent is someone who is married to a parent and "stands in the place of a parent" to the child. This is a much different legal test. The test under the ''[[Family Law Act]]'' looks at the fact of a stepparent's contributions and the date of their last contribution. The ''Divorce Act'' looks at the nature of the relationship between the stepparent and the child.
Child support is determined by the [[Child Support Guidelines]], which you read about in the [[Child Support]] chapter of this resource. Most of the time, child support is easy to figure out: you just look up the amount payable in the tables attached to the Guidelines based on the income of the ''payor'', the person paying child support, and the number of children support is being paid for. Calculating child support can get more complicated when:
More information about how child support is calculated is available in the [[Child Support]] chapter, particularly in the sections on the [[Child Support Guidelines|Guidelines]] and the [[Exceptions to the Child Support Guidelines]].
Under section 152 of the ''[[Family Law Act]]'', the court can change an order for child support if:
====When both parties live in British Columbia====
If the application is heard by a court, the court may decide to:
More information about how child support orders are changed when one of the spouses lives outside British Columbia is available in the [[Child Support]] chapter.