Nebraska Child Support Calculator Documentation

Transcription

1 Nebraska Child Support Calculator Documentation Welcome to the Nebraska Child Support Calculator. This instruction manual is intended to be a quick reference to answer the most common questions that may arise as you use the product. If you have additional questions that are not covered in this manual, if you run into problems, or if you have suggestions for improvement, please contact the author. About the Calculator The Nebraska Child Support Calculator is a web-based application. The application collects data from the end user, and processes that data on a server. The Calculator is compatible with all modern web bowsers, including relatively recent versions of Internet Explorer, Firefox, Safari, and their derivatives. It is also compatible with the web browser software that is included on many Smart Phone devices, tablet and slate computers, and other PDA s which have a WiFi connection. The Calculator is sold on a per account, per year basis. The annual licensing fee is due at the beginning of the year, regardless of how long, or how often the Calculator is used. A free 30-day trial is available. Navigating the Site Each page, including the front page, contains a navigation column on the left-hand side. The top of the navigation column describes your current location. Below are links to the pages which the user is most likely to need based upon their current location. To navigate to a page using the navigation column, just click on the desired link. The example to the Right shows the navigation column from the login page. Creating an Account To create an account, go to the main page ( and click Subscribe on the navigation column. You need only enter your first name, last name, address, firm name, and a password. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 1 of 15

2 Please use an address that you can access from your office, or wherever you will use the Calculator. If you forget your password, the Calculator will send a replacement to the address that you provide. The law firm name that you provide will be printed verbatim on all calculation worksheets that you generate. You are welcome to use your firm s shorthand name if you wish. There are no formal requirements for your password. You should use a password that is easy for you to remember, but difficult to guess. The password is hashed in the Calculator s database, meaning that it cannot be read by a human after you submit it. If you forget your password, the Calculator will generate a new random password for you, and it to the address that you provide. After you enter your name, , and password, the Calculator will create a trial account that is valid for thirty (30) days. The trial account will give you full access to all features of the Calculator. You can extend the trial account to a one-year subscription at any time by clicking on the My Account link in the navigation column. A credit card is required to pay the annual license fee. The Calculator will re-direct you to PayPal, which will collect the information necessary to process your credit card. Please use the same address with PayPal as you used to create your trial account. This will help track down your payment in the event of a problem, and it will ease implementation of a more robust payment processing system in the future. After the PayPal transaction is complete, you must click on the yellow button Return to Advanced Legal Software, LLC to return to the Child Support Calculator (see the graphic to the right). This will cause PayPal to immediately transmit your updated subscription to the Calculator. If you forget to click the yellow button, you will have to contact the author to make arrangements to have your payment data entered manually. Sharing Your Account You are welcome to share the Calculator with all attorneys and staff in your law firm. Please do not share your account with anyone outside of your firm; doing so is prohibited by the license agreement. If someone outside of your firm wishes to use the Calculator, they are welcome to create their own 30-day trial account. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 2 of 15

3 Logging In To login, enter your address and password. Your password is case sensitive, meaning that capital letters and lower-case letters are not interchangeable. After you login, you will be forwarded to the Calculator form. Forgotten Passwords If you forget your password, click Password Help on the login page. Since passwords are hashed, it is not possible to send you an with your existing password. Instead, the Calculator will generate a random replacement and the replacement to you. Enter the address that you used when you created your account. Then check your . After resetting your password, you can use the Change Password page, which is accessible from the main menu, to set your password to something you can remember. Running a Calculation The Calculator supports traditional calculations, joint physical custody, split custody, and subsequent children calculations. The basic input form remains the same, regardless of the calculation that you select. Below are specific line-by-line instructions for each of the form fields. Most of the fields are pre-populated with zero s. You do not need to fill in all of the fields to run a calculation - only fill in the fields which are applicable to you. You can also use the tab key (or the Next button on certain smart phones or wireless devices) to quickly switch between fields. The only value which is required is the number of children. This value is set to one (1) by default, but can be set anywhere between one (1) and six (6). If you leave the number of children blank or set it to zero, you will receive an error message. Custody Doesn t Matter Unlike other calculators, this program does not ask which parent has custody of the children. The outcome will be the same regardless of the party receiving custody. In a traditional calculation, if the Mother receives custody, then the Father would pay the amount of support shown in the Father s column on Line 12 (Each Parent s Final Share). The reverse would be true if the Father received custody. Income Income can be entered either on a Monthly basis, or based upon the party s pay period. If you select a Pay Period other than Monthly, the pay will be adjusted to a v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 3 of 15

4 Monthly amount, assuming full-time employment. The Calculator uses the following conversion formulas to convert each party s income from the pay period specified to a monthly total: Pay Period Conversion Factor Example Annually Input 12 $100, = $8, Monthly No Conversion $5, = $5, Bi-Monthly Input x 2 $2, x 2 = $4, Bi-Weekly Input x $1,500 x = $3, Weekly Input x $700 x = $3, Hourly Input x 2, $10.00 x 2, = $1, If you choose a pay period other than Monthly, you must enter Tax-Exempt Income, Retirement, and Other Deductions based upon the paid in the pay period you selected. This will allow you to enter all information from the party s pay stub, without having to adjust from the pay period to a monthly basis. You can enter the cost of health insurance based on the pay period or based on the monthly amount. Filing Status Select the filing status that is most appropriate for each party. Federal and State income tax will be computed based upon the IRS and Nebraska Department of Revenue Employer Withholding Tables for the filing status and number of exemptions selected. The Employer Withholding Tables assume that the taxpayer takes the standard deduction and receives an additional $3,650 annual federal deduction for each exemption claimed. Nebraska tax is calculated based on a reduction in their annual tax of $118 per exemption claimed. Note: Taxpayers who itemize deductions might have substantially lower tax liability than the amount assumed by the withholding tables. In those cases, you may wish to calculate the additional tax savings, and include that amount (adjusted for the pay period) as non-taxable income. Self Employed Indicate whether either parent is self employed. Self employed individuals are responsible for more than double the FICA taxes that W-2 employees pay, as they function as both the employer and the employee. Selecting this will double the employee s Medicare withholdings, and will increase the Social Security withholdings to 10.4% (6.2% Employer-side and 4.2% Employee-side), subject to the statutory cap. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 4 of 15

5 FICA By default, the Calculator will deduct FICA taxes for each party. FICA taxes consist of Social Security Taxes (4.2% of the first $106,800 for 2011 only; 6.2% of the first $106,800 for all other years) and Medicare/Medicaid Taxes consisting of 1.45% of all income. The ceiling in Social Security withholding is automatically calculated, and the deduction will cap at the statutory maximum, adjusted to a monthly basis. Social Security and Medicare taxes are separately itemized on the calculation worksheet. FICA can be over-ridden for any party who is exempt from the FICA system, such as police officers, fire fighters, certain railroad employees, etc. State Income Tax By default, Nebraska state income tax is deducted based upon the filing status and number of exemptions for each parent. State income tax can be over-ridden for individuals who are exempt, such as certain active duty military servicemembers who have declared residence in a state without income tax. Exemptions Enter the total number of exemptions that each party is entitled to claim, including the exemption for the party themselves. The Calculator will accept a partial exemption for each party. This can be useful if the parties alternate an exemption annually. For example, if the parties have one child, enter 1.5 exemptions per party. This will allow you to present only one calculation to the Court, instead of preparing two calculations to demonstrate the effect of alternating the exemption. You may enter more or fewer exemptions than the total number of parties and children. If you do this, you will be warned of the exemption mis-match. You can override the warning, however, the final calculation will acknowledge that the warning has been over-ridden. Health Insurance Enter the cost of the health insurance premium for the minor children in this row. By default, health insurance is entered per pay period. You can override this setting if you want to enter the monthly amount. If you use the default setting (per pay period), the Calculator will adjust your number to a monthly value. For instance, if you enter income of $100,000 annually, and v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 5 of 15

6 100 under health insurance, the Calculator will adjust your number to $8.33 per month. In other words, be sure to select per month if that s what you want. Retirement By default, the Calculator will deduct 4% of gross income for retirement (the 4% box is checked by automatically). Entering a number in this field will have no effect if the box is checked. Therefore, to over-ride the default setting, you must un-check the 4% box. Previously Ordered Support Enter Previously Ordered Support on a monthly basis, regardless of the pay period that you have selected. Regular Support for Other Children This program contains an excellent implementation of the method endorsed by the Nebraska Court of Appeals in Prochaska v. Prochaska, 6 Neb.App. 302 (1998). If you want to use the built-in Prochaska calculation, leave this field blank, and see the heading Subsequent Children (Prochaska), below. This field is included only to allow you to run your own type of subsequent children calculation, should you choose to do so. Other Deductions This field can be used to deduct other taxes, fees, or expenses that you contend should be considered by the Court. Examples of such expenses could include student loan payments, union dues, etc. The author of this program takes no position as to whether these deductions are supported by the law. Rather, this field permits you to present your evidence to the Court in order to show the effect of these deductions, if the Court determines that they are appropriate. Child Tax Credit Starting in version 1.1, the Calculator provides an explicit field to enter the number of children that each parent will claim for the Child Tax Credit. The credit is currently $1,000 per child per year. The Calculator will automatically include the appropriate monthly amount for each parent based on the number of children that they are claiming. The Child Tax Credit need not mirror the allocation of tax exemptions between the parents. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 6 of 15

7 Number of Children Enter the number of children. Currently, the program only supports 1 through 6 children. The Nebraska Child Support Guidelines do not provide a mechanism to calculate support for more than six (6) children. Joint Physical Custody If your case involves Joint Physical Custody, check this box, and enter the number of days that the child spends with each parent. The number of days should add up to 365. If you want a 50/50 calculation, enter days for each parent. If you want a 4/3 calculation, enter 209 days for the parent with 4 days per week, and 156 days for the parent with 3 days per week. If the total number of days do not equal 365, you will be prompted to correct or ignore this error. If you ignore the error, the program will calculate the percentages of time that the children spend with each parent based on the data that you entered. For example, if you state that the children spend 200 days per year with each parent (and you choose to over-ride the error dialogue), then the Calculator will allocate 50% of the parenting time to each parent. A Joint Physical Custody calculation will generate Worksheet One (Basic Custody), Worksheet 4 (Number of Children Calculation), and a separate Worksheet 3 for each group of children as they age out. For example, if you have 3 children, the program will generate three instances of Worksheet 3, one for three children, one for two children, and one for the final child. This will allow the Court to automatically reduce the support as children become ineligible. The Nebraska Child Support Guidelines provide that a Joint Custody Calculation is discretionary if each parent has more than 109 days of parenting time in one year, and there is a specific provision for Joint Physical Custody. The guidelines further provide that, when there is a specific provision for Joint Physical Custody and both parents have more than 142 days per year, use of Worksheet 3 is mandatory. A warning will be displayed if one parent has less than 109 days. This warning can be over-ridden, however, the final result will acknowledge that you over-rode the warning. Note: This program does not support a joint custody calculation overlaid with a split custody calculation or a Prochaska calculation. Neither the Child Support Guidelines, nor relevant case law provide sufficient guidance to determine how these calculations should interact. If you are unfortunate enough to confront one of these extremely rare issues, you are on your own. Good luck. Split Custody If the children will be split up (i.e., one or more children live with one parent, and one or more live with the other parent), check this box, and enter the number of v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 7 of 15

8 children that will reside with each parent. After you run the calculation, you will have the opportunity to enter the children s names on the worksheet before printing. As is noted above, joint custody, split custody, and/or Prochaska calculations cannot be used together. Subsequent Children (Prochaska) Section of the Guidelines permits the Court to consider a party s obligation to subsequently born, adopted, or acknowledged children as a defense to a claim for increased support. The Guidelines do not, however, provide a formal method for calculating such an obligation. This Calculator uses the three-step method endorsed by the Nebraska Court of Appeals in Prochaska v. Prochaska, 6 Neb.App. 302 (1998). Step One is a a basic calculation between the parties, using their income information, and without a deduction for subsequently born children. Step Two is a hypothetical calculation between the payor and subsequent spouse. In Step Two, the support obligation from Step One is deducted as Previously Ordered Support. Step Three is another calculation between the parties, which deducts the result of Step Two as Regular Support for Other Children. Worksheet Four is then displayed to show the effect of children becoming ineligible for support. If either party has subsequent children, check box to indicate which of the parent(s) have the subsequent children. After you press the Calculate button, you will be prompted for the income and deduction information for the spouse(s) of the parent(s) that have subsequent children. When carrying values between steps, the Calculator will automatically use the appropriate value (from Section or 4-218) in low-income cases. The heading for each calculation will indicate the source of the carry-forward value. By default in highincome cases, the Calculator will use the safe harbor found in Section 4-203(C) (see below) at every step. This behavior can be disabled by selecting No next to Allow Section 4-203(C) Additional Support at the bottom of the Prochaska form. Note: If both parents have subsequent children, then Step Two will generate two hypothetical calculations - one for the Father and subsequent spouse, and another for the Mother and subsequent spouse. IV-D Cases and Cash Medical Support If either parent will be subject to Cash Medical Support, select Yes in their column next to Deduct Cash Medical Support. The calculator will determine the maximum cash medical support obligation for each parent in a separate table. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 8 of 15

9 Cash medical support is reasonable if it does not exceed 3% of the obligor s gross monthly income, and does not put them below the poverty line. Prior to September 1, 2011, cash medical support was calculated based on available funds after child support was paid, and was not a proper deduction on Worksheet One. See State o.b.o. Martinez v. Martinez-Ibarra, 281 Neb. 547 (2011). Effective September 1, 2011, the Nebraska Supreme Court amended the Guidelines to pro-rate Cash Medical Support between the parents on Worksheet 1 in the same manner as the health insurance premium. This would require cash medical support to be calculated first. But Neb. Rev. Stat states that Cash Medical Support cannot be ordered if it would put the obligor below the poverty line, which would require child support to be calculated first, creating a seemingly endless loop. This calculator solves the problem by determining if the poverty line comes into play, and making appropriate adjustments in close cases where the poverty line partially limits cash medical support but does not eliminate it entirely. First, the Calculator determines if payment of child support will put the obligor close enough to the poverty line that cash medical support would be limited. If child support already puts the obligor at or below the poverty line, his or her support will be limited by and no cash medical support can be ordered. If the obligor s net income is sufficient to pay the child support plus the full cash medical support (3% of gross income) without going below the poverty line, then cash medical support will be calculated at three percent of gross income. If the poverty line limits, but does not eliminate cash medical support, then simply taking the excess amount over the poverty line will not suffice because of the prorating on Worksheet 1. This method would artificially limit cash medical support and would still leave the obligor with excess income over the poverty line. The calculator solves this problem by reversing the pro-rating process in these close cases. To do this, the Calculator divides the tentative cash medical support by the obligor s percentage of the combined net monthly income (Line 6 of Worksheet 1) to determine how much total cash medical support would result in the maximum pro-rated amount. If this happens to exceed 3% of the obligor s gross monthly income, then cash medical support is capped at 3%. Otherwise, cash medical support will be the excess over the poverty line, divided by the obligor s percentage contribution. After paying child support and cash medical support, the obligor will have between $ and $ per month remaining. This process would actually yield an exact result, except that the current Guidelines now round support to the nearest whole dollar. There are three important notes to consider before using the Cash Medical Support feature: 1. Cash Medical Support is only available in IV-D cases. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 9 of 15

10 2. Cash Medical Support can only be ordered when health insurance is not available. The Calculator will return an error if you attempt to deduct cash medical support and a health insurance premium. 3. The calculator will automatically calculate the maximum allowable amount of cash medical support, and then deduct that on Worksheet One. In rare cases, this might result in an unreasonably high number. If that is true in your case, argue for a lower cash medical support number, and deduct it as if it was a health insurance premium (in other words, turn off the CMS deduction). 4. The Supreme Court mandated that Cash Medical Support be pro-rated between the parents, but it did not update Worksheet Three (for joint physical custody) or Worksheet Two (for split custody). And it failed to properly update Line 11 on Worksheet 1 to give credit for support that is actually paid. This Calculator implements what the author believes the Court meant when it updated the Guidelines. Worksheets One, Two, Three, and Four which are generated by this program all treat Cash Medical Support the same as the health insurance premium, and pro-rate it between the parents. High Income Cases Section 4-203(C) of the Guidelines provides a safe harbor method to calculate support in cases where the total net monthly income exceeds $15,000. This allows the Court to increase the amount of support found on Line 7 of Worksheet One by a percentage of the combined net monthly income in excess of $15,000. Then, the total support and health insurance premium is apportioned between the parties. This section is a safe harbor because it states that the Court may do it, but that it is not a rebuttable presumption. The table to the right will automatically display if the combined net monthly income exceeds $15,000. The table contains separate columns to show the effect of multiple children. The final result is shown in the last two (2) rows, labeled Mother s Final Share and Father s Final Share. These rows contain the final support obligation for each parent when using the increased support contemplated by the safe harbor provision, and when adjusting the final obligation for the apportionment of the health insurance premium. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 10 of 15

11 Low Income Cases In low income cases, the Calculator automatically determines if either Section (the Basic Subsistence Limitation) or Section (Minimum Support) is applicable. First, the Calculator applies Section to determine whether the Final Share (Line 12) when combined with any cash medical support ordered to be paid would put either parent below the federal poverty level of $908 per month. In those cases, it adds a line below Line 12 for the Section Adjusted Share, which is the difference between the parent s net income (after payment of cash medical support) and $908. If a parent s net income (after payment of cash medical support) is below $908 per month before paying any regular support, then the Adjusted Share will always be zero. Then, the Calculator determines whether Minimum Support pursuant to Section is applicable. Minimum support is the greater of $50 per month, or 10% of the obligor s net monthly income. Section is applicable only if the Minimum Support would be greater than the Section Adjusted Share. If the Minimum Support for either parent is greater than the Section Adjusted Share, then the Calculator creates another line at the bottom of Worksheet One for Section Minimum Support. In any low-income case, the Calculator will also annotate Worksheet Four with the Section Adjusted Share or Section Minimum support which is applicable for each number of children. View Permutations The Permutations worksheet can be helpful in cases where a bona fide dispute exists as to one party s income or earning potential. This worksheet allows the user to simultaneously run One Hundred Twenty-one (121) calculations using variations on the monthly gross income for each parent. The Permutations worksheet uses the data entered by the user for the middle calculation. Then, it increases and decreases each parent s gross income in iterations of $100 to produce an 11x11 grid. The resulting worksheet is read like a multiplication table - select the Father s gross income from the top row, and the Mother s gross income from the Left column. Then, follow the row and the column to the square where they converge. To adjust the increments in the worksheet, use the form at the bottom. To return to the main worksheet, click Return to Calculation at the top. The Permutations worksheet contains only the final shares from Worksheet One. It does not attempt to implement the high income or low income adjustments, joint custody, Prochaska, or split custody. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 11 of 15

12 Life Insurance Requirements The Calculator can automatically calculate the amount of term life insurance coverage necessary to secure either party s support obligation. At the time of this writing (version 1.13), this feature is available only for a basic support calculation, and is not compatible with Split Custody, Joint Custody, or Prochaska calculations. To perform an insurance calculation, run the normal calculation and then click Life Insurance Requirements at the top of the page. The Calculator will prompt you for the year and month that each child was born. Enter the oldest child s information first, then the second-oldest, and so forth. If you enter the children s dates of birth out of order, you will not receive accurate results. Enter an appropriate discount rate. The discount rate represents the amount of interest that the surviving parent can expect to earn after paying all taxes and investment expenses. Most practitioners will be comfortable with a discount rate of four percent (4%), however, the author takes no formal position on this subject. After you enter the dates of birth and discount rate, click Continue. A table will be generated similar to the one below. The table lists the children in order of age, beginning with the oldest. Because support for multiple children is grouped, the Months Remaining column refers to the number of months that the support obligations will continue at the level in that row. In the example below, the oldest child will reach the age of majority in 50 months. The middle child will reach the age of majority 32 months thereafter, and the youngest after another 56 months. The monthly support amounts for each parent are copied from the Final Share of Worksheet Four, which includes adjustments based upon the health insurance premium. The monthly support amounts are not adjusted for the Basic Subsistence Limitation (Section 4-218) or Minimum Support (Section 4-209). v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 12 of 15

13 The columns entitled Mother Total Amount and Father Total Amount represent the sum total of all future payments due under the obligation, without any adjustment for the time value of money. The columns Mother Present Value and Father Present Value represent the discounted present value of the obligation based on the discount rate entered by the user. Here, the user need only be concerned with the numbers contained in the final row. The earlier rows are included only to provide supporting data and to show how the present value diverges as the obligation becomes more distant. Privacy Warning: Neb. Ct. R restricts the use of personal financial information in court records, pleadings, orders, and exhibits. For this reason, the Insurance Calculation worksheet refers only to each child s year and month of birth, and does not refer to any children by name. It is not clear to the author whether this practice is compliant with the Rule s prohibition on the use of dates of birth in exhibits. Additionally, your local rules may be more restrictive than the uniform rule. If you have any doubt about whether this worksheet is in compliance with your local rule, please check with your judge, redact the exhibit, or ask to have the exhibit sealed. Saving Calculations Starting with version 1.1 of the Calculator, calculations may be saved on the server. To save a calculation, just click Save from the page displaying the finished calculation. The saved calculation is accessible from the main menu or the form page by clicking on Saved Calculations. Saved calculations are displayed in reverse chronological order (the most recently saved calculation is at the top), and are labeled based on the Case Name that you entered when entering the income information. When you click View next to any saved calculation, the Calculator will immediately display the finished worksheet. From the finished worksheet, you can edit any values just as you could when you first ran the calculation. If you click Save again after editing, the Calculator will automatically save a new version with a new date/time stamp. It is not possible to over-write a calculation that you have already saved. If you want to do this, view the calculation, make your edits, save your changes, and delete the old version. When you Save a calculation, you are not saving the completed worksheet, but rather, you are saving the inputs that you used to create the worksheet. If the tax tables or child support guidelines change after you save a calculation, when you view the saved calculation, the worksheet will calculate support based on the current guidelines and current tax tables. If new features have been added to the Calculator since you saved your calculation, those features will be used based upon their default settings. v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 13 of 15

14 A Warning About Warnings The Calculator is designed to be easy to use and flexible. The author assumes that each user will have a basic understanding of the nuances of calculating child support, including the effects of manipulating a party s filing status and exemptions. Therefore, the Warnings generated by the Calculator will be limited to those which likely indicate a problem in the vast majority of cases. Presently, the Calculator checks for, and provides warnings only in the following instances: + The number of children is set to zero (not subject to override) + The number of exemptions exceeds the number of children and parents (no warning is provided if the number of exemptions is less than the number of children and parents) + Joint Physical Custody is selected, but the number of days does not add up to Joint Physical Custody is selected, but one parent has less than 109 days + Split Custody is selected, but the number of children assigned to each parent does not match the total number of children + Some combination of Joint Physical Custody, Split Custody, and Prochaska has been selected, and they are not compatible (not subject to override) + Cash Medical Support is deducted for one or both parents, and a health insurance premium is also deducted. In all other cases, the Calculator trusts the user, and will accept as absolute truth the values that you supply. ipad, ipod, and iphone Users If you are using an ipad, ipod, or iphone, the Calculator will use special HTML5 form fields to select the most appropriate virtual keyboard for the data that you are entering, including for your address on the login page. The calculator also has specific meta-tags to optimize your viewing experience. When running a calculation from an ios device, you can navigate from field to field by pressing the Previous and Next buttons as is illustrated in the graphic to the right. By default, each of the numeric fields is set to zero. Pressing the Next button will cause the cursor to advance to the right-hand side of v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 14 of 15

15 the zero in the next field. If you do not delete the zero, your numbers will have leading zero s. For instance, if you want to enter $5, per month for the Father s gross income, your entry would look like Do not worry about the leading zero s - the Calculator will automatically disregard them when running your worksheet. Printing Your web browser s default configuration will likely cause printed calculations to appear differently than those on the computer s monitor. This problem is easily solved by setting your web browser s preferences to print the background. Using Internet Explorer 8 on Microsoft Windows, go to the Tools menu and select Internet Options. A dialogue box will appear similar to the one displayed to the right. Then click on the Advanced tab (on the far right). Scroll down to the Printing heading, and select Print background colors and images. Then click OK to exit the dialogue box. When printing from other websites, this may cause you to print unwanted backgrounds and other images. In that case, re-open the preferences and turn off background printing when you are not using the Calculator. In most cases, the amount of extra printing should be negligible. Using Safari on Macintosh, go to the File menu and choose Print... When the print dialogue box appears, check the box that says Print backgrounds on the bottom half of the dialogue box. Then click Print. Getting Help Before calling for help, please consult the Help page online. This page contains answers to common problems such as printing, abnormal calculations, etc. The Help page is accessible from the main menu. If the Help page does not resolve your issue, please attempt to skim the documentation. If you still cannot find answers to your questions, you may contact the author using one of the methods below: adam@nebraskachildsupportcalculator.com Telephone: (402) Mail: 5121 Charles Street, Omaha, NE v August 31, 2011 Copyright Advanced Legal Software, LLC Page 15 of 15