Who is allowed to claim a non-custodial dependent on federal income tax?

Question

I am divorced and have a 20 year old daugther in college. I pay her $103 in child support each week that goes directly to her. In my divorce papers my ex-wife and I are to take turns claiming our daughter on our income tax return. In the last 5 years I have claimed her once. Now my daughter lives on her own and the only support she receives is the child support I send her which is directly taken out of my paycheck by the state and mailed to her.
Today I found out my ex-wife claimed her on her taxes. Does my ex-wife have any right to claim my daughter even if she is not the custodial parent and pays no support or offer any other form of support to our daughter? How can I claim her now without getting into trouble with the IRS?

Answer 1

If your divorce decree says you can claim her in alternate years, the IRS will honor that as long as she is still a full-time student and is under 24, and is not providing more than half of her own support or married filing a joint return. Until that time, your ex-wife can continue to claim her in alternate years, even if she doesn't support her. You'd be wise to talk to your ex about which year who is claiming her, or you could both end up with your refunds held up if you have one, while the IRS sorts it out. And if the one year out of the last five that you claimed her was last year, you'd likely be out of luck for this year.

If your daughter is only a part-time student, then neither of you can claim her.

Answer 2

If you feel that you have the right to claim your daughter, you can file a paper return and the IRS will sort it out. They will decide who can claim her. If you both qualify to claim her, they will use tiebreaker rules to decide: 1st deciding factor will be who she lived with the longest. 2nd deciding factor will be the parent with the highest AGI. If you think that you should be the one claiming her, you won't get into any trouble, they will just hold the $ credit that you should get for her until it is sorted out. Child support payments usually do not factor into tax situations.
Since you are paying child support then your ex is probably the custodial parent and the divorce decree would have to specify if you could claim her for tax purposes. If it did, your wife could still claim her as a dependent every year and you could claim her as your qualifying child every other year. Qualifying child is different from dependent.

You may want to look at your divorce decree and see if you have a form 8332.

This is from the IRS site:
The dependency exemption can not be split. Generally, the child is treated as the qualifying child or qualifying relative of the custodial parent. This parent is usually allowed to claim the exemption for the child if the other exemption tests are met. However, the child may be treated as the qualifying child or qualifying relative of the noncustodial parent if certain conditions are met.

The custodial parent signs a Form 8332 (PDF), Release of Claim to Exemption for Child of Divorced or Separated Parents, or a substantially similar statement, and provides it to the noncustodial parent who attaches it to his or her return. Please beware that if the custodial parent releases the exception, the custodial parent may not claim the Child Tax Credit.

Refer to Publication 501, Exemption, Standard Deduction, and Filing Information or Publication 504, Divorced or Separated Individuals, for more information on the special rule for children of divorced or separated parents.

Answer 3

AL, or the different state, might want to not make a regulation about who might want to declare little ones for federal taxes - really the IRS publishes those guidelines. lower than IRS guidelines, the custodial ascertain has the right to declare any little ones, till there's a written courtroom order contained in the perfect legal form saying that the different ascertain is authorized to declare them, or the custodial ascertain supplies the different ascertain, in writing, permission to declare them. this isn't something very new.