My X listed part of my alimony coming from my father's company where he is employed, without approval.?

Question

In our divorce aggreement, my x husband
said he would pay x amount of my allimony himself and the rest from my father's company where he is employed. My father had no knowledge of this agreement and didn't give him permission to pay part of my allimony from his company. Is what my x husband did legal?

Answer 1

If you x controls the company and it is private it is. If your father over rules him then he had no legal basis to make that contract in the first place.
How could something like that get past your lawyer? You aren't using your x's brother are you?

Answer 2

Much depends on whether you are adding value to the company, and thus whether the money you are receiving is wages legitimately payable to you as such, and reportable on form W-2. (Such earnings are beneficial to you insofar as you get Social Security credits, and also can devote all or part of it to a regular or Roth IRA.)

Alternatively, your ex might be assigning to you earnings attributable to him. This might be done for convenience. Indeed, a child support agency can garnishee his earnings that way if he were to fail to pay you the agreed, or legally determined, amount.

You seem to be saying (it's not clear) that your father owns the company. If he is an officer and director he can approve or veto such arrangements within limits.

It is possible that the payment arrangement is an unlawful scheme to avoid tax. If so, the firm's bookkeeper and accountant would in due course be expected to re-attribute the funds before they are wrongly reported to the IRS (or, at the latest, at the end of the tax year) so that no underpayment of tax occurs and nobody is guilty of wrongdoing.

As alimony is taxable to you and deductible to the paying ex-spouse it should make little difference to you (FICA aside) how the funds are paid. And as I said, it could be beneficial to you (if you have little or no other wages) to receive money as salary and to pay the small amount of social security and medicare tax involved. (But as I said, legally you have to perform some work or contribute some intellectual or entrepreneurial value to justify a wage taxed as such.)

Answer 3

Clarify the matter with the court so that proper adjustment with alimony will be made.

Answer 4

I think your Ex is trying to pull a fast one here. Start an investigation now.