Korea Gets Serious About Child Support Order Enforcement

by Brendon Carr

It’s not business law, but I think this is an interesting tidbit. Today’s Law Times, Korea’s legal-industry newspaper, carries an article headlined “Child Support Orders Ineffective”—over a story telling us, well, how ineffective are the child-support orders issued by the Korean court in divorce cases. But there is good news: Legal reforms being proposed by the government will strengthen (commence) enforcement of these orders, which previously were widely disregarded. According to the Law Times, almost 2/3 of spouses weren’t paying properly:

현행 가사소송법은 부부가 재판상 이혼을 하면서 조정이나 판결에 의해 양육비 지급의무를 부담하고서도 이를 제대로 이행하지 않을 경우 법원이 당사자의 신청에 의해 ‘이행명령’을 내릴 수 있도록 하고 있다. 또 당사자가 이행명령에 정당한 이유없이 불응하면서 양육비를 계속 지급하지 않는 경우에는 100만원 이하의 과태료를 부과하고, 3기 이상 의무를 이행하지 않는 경우에는 30일의 범위 안에서 감치에 처하도록 하고 있다.

Now where a party subject to a child-support obligation pursuant to a divorce decree or agreement does not pay support as required, the other party may request the court to issue an “enforcement order”. If a party fails to respond to a court enforcement order without justifiable reasons, and persistently does not pay support, an administrative penalty of up to W1 million (about US$1025) may by imposed. In the case of three or more failures, detention of up to 30 days may be imposed.

그러나 이혼한 여성 상당수는 전 남편으로부터 자녀양육비를 제대로 받지 못하고 있는 것으로 나타났다. 지난 2001년 가정법률상담소가 실시한 설문조사에서 이혼하고 자녀를 혼자 양육하고 있는 여성 91명의 41.9%가 약정이나 판결대로 양육비를 지급받지 못하고 있으며, 19.4%가 불규칙하게 지급받고 있다고 응답했다. 응답자의 61.3%가 양육비를 제대로 지급받지 못하고 있는 셈이다.

It’s emerging that divorced women don’t receive proper child-support payments from their former husbands. According to a 2001 survey by the Family Law Counseling Center of 91 divorced women raising children along, 41.9% weren’t receiving the child support payments according to their divorce decree or support agreement; 19.4% responded that they received payments irregularly. This means that 61.3% of respondents reported not receiving proper support payments.

The 30 days’ detention looks interesting, as ordinarily the court hasn’t had a contempt power. Now it appears some form of contempt power is being implemented.

This is a proposal currently being raised to solicit public comment. The statute would be passed in the autumn for effectiveness probably in the new year, if not killed during the comment period.

May 8, 2008 | Filed Under Criminal Law

Comments

4 Responses to This Entry

  1. Richard Blake on

    I found this guidebook for foreign spouses of Korean nationals, published by the government, to be helpful.

  2. Jee on

    This is great news to hear that South Korean Family Law recognizes this issue and it will hopefully pass.  Fathers should be held financially responsible for their children.  The message must be clear that “fatherhood” is a “responsibility” not an “option”.

  3. Steve on

    This is really encouraging. Do you know if Korea has provisions to enforce support orders from the US court if the Korean father returns to Korea to avoid responsibility for a child in the US?

  4. Brendon Carr on

    Unfortunately, Korea has not joined any multilateral or bilateral agreements on custody and enforcement. Thus, this place remains a wonderland for child-abducting parents.

Comments Policy: Comments to Korea Law Blog are moderated. This means abusive, or just plain stupid comments will be deleted. So don't be a jerk. It also means there may be some delay from the time you post a comment to the time it shows up here. If your comment wasn't against the policy, it will show up in a little bit.




XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>

Please enter the word you see in the image below: