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"User Friendly" Support Orders Act

It's been a long time coming but it's finally here!!  The Interjurisdictional Support Orders (I.S.O.) Act came into force in Alberta on January 31, 2003.  It is the culmination of a lot of hard work between the Provinces and Territories of Canada and also other participating jurisdictions outside of Canada.  The main purpose of the I.S.O. Act is to reduce the delay and cost in varying or obtaining support orders where one of the spouses has moved from the jurisdiction where they had a relationship with the other spouse.

Under the previous legislation (the Reciprocal Enforcement of Maintenance Orders Act), individuals seeking to obtain or vary a support order had to proceed through a two-tiered process.  The person seeking the order would have to proceed through a hearing in their jurisdiction and the resulting Order (known as a Provisional Order), transcript of the evidence given at the hearing together with all materials provided to the Court during the hearing had to be forwarded to the Clerk of the Court in the jurisdiction where the other spouse is thought to be.  Another hearing was held there so the other spouse could present his side of the case and the Court in their jurisdiction could confirm, vary or send the matter back to the original jurisdiction for more information to be provided.  This was a frustrating, time consuming and very expensive procedure.  Our office was involved in a case that bounced back and forth between two jurisdictions on at least three occasions!!

Part of the problem was that different jurisdictions required different information or applied different tests for the obtaining of the support order.  The Federal Government went a long way in standardizing the process for obtaining child support under the Divorce Act when it passed into law the Federal Child Support Guidelines in 1997.  Unfortunately the Provincial and Territorial legislation was not consistent, although many jurisdictions adopted the Guidelines in an informal way.

The I.S.O. Act streamlines the procedure.  All of the jurisdictions have agreed upon a standard set of forms that will be consistently used and revised between them.  The person wanting an order or to vary an order now simply has to complete the forms and submit the application to the court in the jurisdiction in which they reside.  There is no hearing.  The application is then immediately forwarded to the Court in the jurisdiction in which the respondent resides and a hearing occurs.  A court can still send the matter back to the originating jurisdiction for more information but certain time frames are set to keep the process moving.  Once an Order is granted, it is returned to the originating jurisdiction and registered as an order of that jurisdiction.  Appeal periods are established to provide a party who is unhappy with an order to have it reviewed. 

Currently the I.S.O. Act does not apply to applications covered by the Divorce Act, however, the federal government has introduced a bill to amend the Divorce Act to bring interjurisdictional variation procedures closely in line with the procedures outlined in the I.S.O. Act.

Only Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan have their I.S.O. Acts in force.  The balance of the country is expected to have their Acts in force in the Spring of this year.

By Jim Glass
March 5, 2003