How Rhode Island calculates child support
- Each parent’s monthly gross income is reduced by child support they pay under earlier orders, by what they pay for the children’s health insurance (or the medical cash contribution), by a deduction for other minor children they support, and by their share of work-related child care.
- The combined adjusted income is always rounded up to the next $50 and gives the basic obligation from the 2023 schedule (effective July 1, 2023). The schedule has a self-support reserve of $1,333 a month built in.
- Child care is added, and the parent the children do not live with pays their percentage share (whole percents) of the total. When the paying parent does not provide the children’s health insurance, they also pay a medical cash contribution of 5% of gross income.
- With shared placement (each parent has at least 49% of the time), each parent’s share is computed and the parent with the higher share pays the difference. With split placement, each parent’s share for the children living with the other parent is offset.
What the calculator asks
- How many children is the support for?
- Where do the children live?
- How many of the children live with you?
- Your monthly gross income
- Child support you actually pay each month under an earlier court order for other children
- How many other minor children do you support who are not children of both of you?
- Monthly gross income of those children’s other parent
- The other parent’s monthly gross income
- Child support the other parent actually pays each month under an earlier court order for other children
- How many other minor children does the other parent support who are not children of both of you?
- How are the children covered for health insurance?
- What does that plan cost each month for the children?
- How many earlier orders already require the paying parent to pay a medical cash contribution for other children?
- Work-related child care for these children, per month, after the federal child care tax credit
It never asks for names, Social Security numbers or account numbers, and your answers are not saved.
What the estimate leaves out
- The optional adjustments in the court’s discretion (worksheet line 3: retirement payments, life insurance, a parent’s extraordinary medical expenses, tax exemptions, assigned marital debts)
- The children’s extraordinary medical expenses, which the court orders outside the guidelines
- The extended visitation adjustment (AO 2012-05 IV(B)(14)) and deviations the court may make
- Combined incomes above $40,000 a month (the court decides case by case, Exhibit 9)
When a situation is outside what the calculator covers, it says so and points you to the official worksheet instead of guessing.
Official sources
- Administrative Order 2023-02, Schedule of Basic Child Support Obligations and Exhibits 1-9 (effective July 1, 2023)
- Administrative Order 2012-05, consolidated Child Support Formula and Guidelines and worksheet instructions
- Administrative Order 2017-01, work-related child care deduction (effective September 1, 2017)
- Administrative Order 2018-01, calculating child support for shared placement (effective February 15, 2018)
- Administrative Order 2018-02, guideline worksheet examples with child care
- Child Support Guideline Worksheet, Form FC-78 (revised July 2023)
- Office of Child Support Services: Child Support Guidelines (effective July 1, 2023)
Ready to estimate? The calculator shows each worksheet line so you can check it against the official form.
Open the Rhode Island calculator →An estimate from the published guideline formula, not a prediction of a court order. The official court worksheet and the court’s decision control. General information, not legal advice. LawCat is not a law firm.