How to: change an existing Order

I get quite a few enquires about changing existing parenting orders – perhaps the Orders that were made years ago didn’t envisage your children’s High School needs, or maybe you need to move away, or maybe the kids are just spending more time with friends or on extra-curricular activities or part-time jobs and the Orders no longer suit.

If both parents agree that changes are needed to the Orders and you both agree on those changes you have two options:

* You can enter into a Parenting Plan varying the existing Orders. You should obtain specific legal advice about the effect of a Parenting Plan in these circumstances; or

* You can both sign draft Consent Orders, which the Family Court can make into new Orders, without the need for either of you to appear in Court. Again, you should seek specific legal advice.

If you have been approached about changing existing Orders – or if you want to approach the other parent about changing existing Orders – you should consider if the change proposed is in the best interests of the kids – that consideration comes before any advantage to you or the other parent or any impact on you or the other parent.

If you wish to change existing Court Order but the other side doesn’t agree – or the other side wants a change and you don’t agree – it may be necessary to make an application to the Court.

However, in order to make an application to change existing Orders it will be necessary to show that there has been a significant change of circumstances that makes a change necessary.

What exactly constitutes a significant change of circumstances can be a vexed question. A change in circumstances can include the age of the child, the health of the child, or the financial circumstances of the household. But it needs to be a significant change in circumstances and not simply the passage of time or a change in the Family Law Act.