§ 19-11-155.Contesting of order from another tribunal

When another state’s income withholding order goes straight to a Georgia employer under § 19-11-150, the obligor needs a way to fight it. This section provides two. The obligor may contest the validity or enforcement of the order by registering it in a Georgia tribunal and filing a contest under Part 6 of the article, or may contest it in the same manner as if a Georgia tribunal had issued it.

Under the Part 6 route, an order is registered when it is filed with the Georgia tribunal (§ 19-11-162), and the contesting party bears the burden of proving one of the defenses listed in § 19-11-166(a): the issuing tribunal lacked personal jurisdiction, the order was obtained by fraud, the order was vacated, suspended or modified, it was stayed pending appeal, Georgia law supplies a defense to the remedy sought, full or partial payment was made, the statute of limitation bars some or all of the arrears, or the order is not the controlling order. Under the Georgia-order route, § 19-6-33 lets an obligor apply to a court on the ground of mistake of fact about the amount of support owed, the arrearage, or the obligor’s identity; the court must hear the matter within 30 days after the application is filed (extendable for good cause by up to 30 days) and enter an order within ten days after the hearing. Filing doesn’t stop withholding unless a court grants relief.

This section sets no deadline of its own. But when the obligee or an agency registers the order and the obligor receives notice of registration, § 19-11-164 gives the nonregistering party 20 days after notice to request a hearing. Missing it means the order is confirmed by operation of law (§ 19-11-165(b)) and further contest of any matter that could have been raised is barred (§ 19-11-167). In a Part 6 proceeding, a hearing is presumed requested primarily for delay if the order is confirmed or enforced without change, and under § 19-11-132(c) a tribunal that determines a hearing was requested primarily for delay must order costs and reasonable attorney’s fees.

Subsection (b) requires the obligor to give notice of the contest to (1) any support enforcement agency providing services to the obligee; (2) each employer that has directly received an income withholding order relating to the obligor; and (3) the person designated to receive payments in the order or, if none is designated, the obligee. The section was last amended in 2024.