Interest on accrued payments in family law cases is critical. It sometimes amounts to enough money to pay all costs and attorney's fees, while still enlarging the net award to the client. Basically, over the past twenty years or so, interest has run at about 10% per year; if it takes five years to collect a judgment after it accrues, the sum owed increases by about 50%. And that is just interest. Child support also accrues a 10% per annum penalty, when calculated and requested by the party owed the money.

We created the original version of the Marshal Law Judgment and Interest Calculator Program (for DOS) in May, 1991. It was adopted by a number of practitioners, courts and agencies, including the Washoe County District Attorney's Office. Eventually, the program was ported to Windows. A complete reworking of the program, version two for Windows, shipped in November, 1999. Version three of the program, which is user-updateable as the interest rates change, and correctly calculates the child support penalty, shipped in late 2001.

Generic computer packages (spreadsheets or databases) are generally unable to deal with all the complexities of correctly calculating interest under the Nevada statutes and case law, including freezing some interest rates while adjusting others, and the "looping" calculations that are required to comply with Nevada law. We have noticed that "judgment calculator" software packages available from other states do not seem to properly handle Nevada's semi-annually adjusted interest rate very well, or to properly abide by Nevada case law (one frequent error is to apply payments to interest before principal).

We have personally tried every other means of calculating interest and penalties that has come to our attention -- manual, automated, or by third party. We have not discovered anything other than the MLAW program that is economical, efficient, and accurate.

This software is currently offered for $500 per copy. A single run of the program is available by our Staff for $100. You may also use this program for free at the Self Help Center inside the Family Court building.

An attorney has apparently been circulating to various attorneys around the state some or all of pieces of a recent district court decision. I thought those who are doing support calculations would want to know how this affects what we do in Family Court, and what is going to happen next. For convenience, a copy of the entire opinion in one piece is attached.

Specifically, a question has arisen as to the correct methodology of calculation of penalties on child support arrears, when those arrears are owed for more than about two years. One department of the Eighth Judicial District Court, Family Division, has held (in April, 2009) that because the State Welfare Division calculates those penalties as one-time, non-recurring events, the court on balance believes it should do likewise. That decision is not binding on anyone but the parties to that one case, in that one department, but the matter is of sufficient interest to the Bench and Bar that the matter has been taken up on appeal.

The district court opinion contains a number of errors of fact and law, although the court followed the argument generally, and I believe the court tried to fairly weigh the alternatives. For example, the federal child support regs only require (in Welfare cases) applying any incoming payment to that month's support due first, and then to any arrears, while long-standing Nevada case law requires applying all incoming payments to the oldest arrearage first. The MLAW program has had a switch (since version 1) that allows the user to do either, a distinction that the court missed, believing it to be a variation between NOMADS and MLAW, and the doing of which is irrelevant in a non-IV-D case (there is no federal law mandating either approach in private, non-Welfare cases, which is why the program default conforms to the directions of the Nevada Supreme Court on the point). There are multiple other similar errors, which is why the briefing will be extensive, and why I think the court's bottom line conclusion is simply wrong.

Resolution of the appeal can, and probably will, take a couple of years. The Legislature may act to clarify the matter - but that will also take two years. Of course, should either the Nevada Supreme Court or the Legislature adopt the view of penalty calculation found preferable by Department I (or otherwise change the law), the Marshal Law Interest and Penalty Calculation program will be modified to perform calculations in that manner. In the meantime, it is possible to manually recreate the sloppy and less accurate NOMADS methodology, but it would be somewhat laborious in any complex support case, and there is no reason to do so at this point.

In the meantime, anyone with questions as to the alternate methods of calculation can contact this office at the link below or go to www.willicklawgroup.com/Actual_Calculation_Differences for a detailed explanation of the current methodologies being used. Those wishing to know the background and detail as to the dispute can reference the entire article, posted on our Published Works page, entitled: "Why the Nevada Welfare Division is Calculating Interest and Penalties Incorrectly, and How It Injures Nevada Litigants" or by pressing the following link, www.willicklawgroup.com/why_the_nevada_welfare_division. Comments and suggestions are welcome at www.willicklawgroup.com/blog.

A Matter of Interest. An Article Authored by Marshal Willick
Order Form for Marshal Law Program.
Mashal Law Arrearage Single Run Order Form