2011 Version - Missouri Civil Procedure Form 14: Calculation of Presumed Child Support Amount

In 1989, the Missouri Supreme Court issued guidelines for establishing a "presumed child support amount" in dissolution cases and other proceedings in which child support is awarded. These guidelines, contained in Missouri Supreme Court Rule 88, require the use of "Civil Procedure Form No. 14" for the calculation of the presumed amount of child support in all such cases. Under the authority of Section 452.340.8, R.S.Mo., the amount of support resulting from the Rule 88 guidelines "is the correct amount of child support to be awarded" unless a court specifically finds that application of the guidelines would be "unjust or inappropriate in a particular case."

Form 14 is subject to periodic review and revision by the Missouri Supreme Court. The most recent version of Form 14 was adopted by the Court on August 31, 2010, effective January 1, 2011. Under the August 31 order, significant new changes were made to Form 14.

This office has developed an electronic spreadsheet for use in performing the calculations mandated by Rule 88 and Form 14, which is available to family law practitioners and judges throughout Missouri, as well as to interested individuals. From this page you may:

• Purchase: Order a copy of the 2011 edition of Form 14 in spreadsheet form, for use with MS Excel 2003, MS Excel 2007, or Corel Quattro Pro X4
• Login: If you have already purchased the spreadsheet, login here to download your copy. (Ver. 5.1 - 8/17/11)

New Features with Version 5.1

The Supreme Court's 2011 version of Form 14 preserves the schedule of basic child support obligations, along with the directions, comments for use and examples previously in effect. The appearance and specific information on the Form No. 14 exhibit has been revamped, to include identification of the parent paying support and the number of children for whom support is being calculated, while removing specific reference to children by name and birthdate.

Version 5.1 of the spreadsheet implements these changes and preserves many of the other features familiar to our users. Specific features include:

• Significant redesign of the Input Sheet for gathering the data needed to perform the calculations, including separate areas for financial data for "Mother" and "Father" rather than for "Parent Paying Support" and "Parent Receiving Support."
• One-click recalculation of support for "Father" or "Mother" as the "Parent Paying Support."
• A multi-columnar analysis sheet for quickly determing the amount of support where multiple children are involved
• Automated prompts and warnings to alert counsel or court where special conditions or caveats in the instructions may apply.

Screen shots of version 5.1 are available below.

This document was last revised: August 17, 2011.