You want to have a clear plan in raising your child with your ex-partner?

You wonder if there is a legal way to ensure that your child is protected?

Well, it sounds like you are looking to set up a parenting plan.

A parenting plan is an agreement between you and your ex-spouse where you each agree on the terms based on which you will manage your children.

In this article, we will look at the parenting plan in more detail and understand what is typically covered in such an agreement.

1. When do I need a parenting plan?
2. Does a parenting plan need to be formalized through the court?
3. Do I need a lawyer to formalize a parenting plan in court?
4. What do I include in a typical parenting plan?
5. Custody and access rights
6. Summer holidays
7. Christmas and New Year holidays
8. Religious holidays
9. Special medical needs and health care
10. Education and schooling
11. Extracurricular activities
12. Travel authorizations
13. Child support
14. Child’s special expenses
15. Conclusion on Parenting Plan

1- When do I need a parenting plan?

You need a parenting plan if you want to have a formalized agreement with your ex-spouse on matters related to the upbringing of your child or children.

You may also need a parenting plan when you and your former partner are unable to reach an agreement on matters relating to your children.

This agreement is therefore a legal mechanism that will help you achieve stability in your children’s dealings and also provide legal protection in case one parent does not comply with its terms and conditions.

2- Does a parenting plan need to be formalized through the court?

This is a question that we see very often.

In many cases, the spouses have come up with their own agreement on custody, access rights and child support for example, wrote their agreement down on paper and even signed it.

Now, you will naturally assume that a signed contract will create binding effects between you.

However, this is not the case when we are dealing with the future of your children.

In fact, the legal and statutory obligations relating to children will supersede any agreement of the parents, even an agreement in writing.

In order to give your agreement legally binding effects, you must submit your agreement to the court, either yourself or through a child custody lawyer, and have the courts ratify it.

Ratification is essential totally the court giving their seal of approval and incorporating your agreement in a judgment of the court.

3- Do I need a lawyer to formalize a parenting plan in court?

For a parenting plan to acquire legally binding effects and acquire executory effects between the parents, the agreement must be approved by the court and incorporated in a judgment.

To achieve this, you will need to file a child custody application in court and submit your parenting plan dealing with matters like custody and child support.

Your agreement must observe the legal conditions and cover all the legal topics necessary for the court to grant you its seal of approval.

If the agreement is incomplete or is inconsistent with the best interests of your children or even does not offer the minimum legally required protections for the children, the court will surely reject it.

Even though as a parent you are given the parental authority in deciding what’s best for your children and you do not appreciate anyone telling you how to raise your kids otherwise, when dealing with separation, you will need to find a way to make certain compromises to make it work.

As a result, your parenting plan has to be legally found and complete for the court to ratify it.

4- What do I include in a typical parenting plan?

The parenting plan is a document that should reflect your mutually desired parenting arrangement that you’d like to have with your children.

This means that each parenting plan will be drafted to suit some general needs and some specific needs applicable to your family situation.

There are some topics that will generally need to appear in your parenting plan and they are:

1. Custody and access rights
2. Summer holidays
3. Christmas and New Year holidays
4. Religious holidays
5. Special medical needs and health care
6. Education and schooling 
7. Extracurricular activities
8. Travel authorizations
9. Child support 
10. Child’s special expenses

5- Custody and access rights

The custody and access rights arrangement deals with matters like the residential arrangement of your child.

You will lay out the residential schedule where you will determine how your children will live.

In a joint custody arrangement, a common arrangement is for each parent to have custody of the child one week at a time in an alternating way. 

For example, from Monday morning to the next Monday morning, the child will live with the mother and the week after the child will live with the father.

Of course, the living arrangements of your child will largely depend on many variables such as how far each parent live’s from the child’s school, the suitability of the parent’s home and so on.

In the case of access rights, the living arrangement consists of the child or children living with one parent and have access rights scheduled during the week or the month.

For example, the child lives with the mother while the father has access rights and can come pickup the child on Saturday mornings to the end of the day.

You could also have access rights where there may be one or a couple of sleepovers per week.

For instance, the father can have access to his child from Friday evening to the evening of the following day.

At the end of the day, you will be defining the living arrangements and parenting schedules concerning your child or children by defining a mutually agreeable framework that you are comfortable with.

6- Summer holidays

An area of attention in a parenting plan may also be the summer holidays.

It is a good practice to provide for a default custody schedule for holidays should you be unable to reach an amicable decision for arranging your summer holidays with the children.

By having a default summer holidays schedule in your parenting plan, you know that you can rely on that at a minimum.

7- Christmas and New Year holidays

Similarly, it is a good practice to provide for any special custody and access rights arrangement applicable during the Christmas and New Year period.

This is a time of the year where families traditionally wish to gather and celebrate with one another.

As a result, parents also can find some normality in their lives after separation by having the chance to spend this time of the year with their children.

In many cases, parents will have a custody and access rights arrangement that will apply to them throughout the year and define a special arrangement applicable on Christmas day, New Year’s day or even the period.

For example, parents in a joint custody arrangement can say that the mother will have the Christmas period this year and the father will have New Year’s and the following year, they alternate where the father will have Christmas and the mother New Year’s.

In the case of a couple having custody and access rights, the parents may decide that the father or the mother having access rights once a week can also have the Christmas day or New Year’s day.

Remember that at the end of the day, regardless of your arrangement, you should think about the best interest of your children.

If it makes sense for them to see both parents during the Christmas and New Year’s period, it would be healthier for them to do so.

This way, the children will also achieve a higher level of normalization after the separation of their parents.

8- Religious holidays

Religious holidays can be another factor to consider putting in your parenting plan to prevent any disagreements.

In cases where both parents are religious and observe the same religious practices, it may be easier to mutually arrange the parenting schedule to reflect the parents’ religious obligations.

However, the parenting arrangement can become more critical in cases where one parent observes one religious practices while the other parent observes another one.

The parenting arrangement will therefore help the parents clarify the religious ceremonies and practices to be observed by the children.

The question of religion is a far more complex subject and will also have hearings on the notion of parental authority but we will not get into the detail here as it is not the purpose of this article.

Having said that, it’s a good idea for both parents to be clear and aligned on the religious holidays with the children.

9- Special medical needs and health care

This category may apply to some parents and not to others depending on the health and special needs of the children.

The medical and special needs can range from allergies, autism and to severe forms of handicap.

Depending on the specific need of your child along with the abilities of both parents to arrange for such care, your parenting plan should provide an arrangement that will meaningfully address such child needs.

If your child has allergies, this may not require a special parenting schedule of some sort but will require vigilance and organization of the parents.

The parents will need to ensure they have the proper allergy medication on hand and take appropriate measures in dealing with the allergy if an incident were to occur. 

If your child has a severe form of handicap, then you will probably need extensive planning and scheduling to ensure the child is cared for not having any autonomy.

The arrangement regarding your child’s health, medical needs and special arrangements will need to be crafted and designed to truly deal with your life realities.

10- Education and schooling

Education and schooling is a crucial area in the life of a child.

Quite naturally, in today’s economy, a minimum level of education is a must if your child wants to have a chance in finding a career type of job or even land a good job. 

Of course, your child may be able to find a great job without an education but having an education puts more chances on his or her side.

The parents can also have very different views on what’s best for their children.

In other words, while the father may think public school is just fine the mother will want the children to go to a private school.

11- Extracurricular activities

Your parenting plan can also deal with extracurricular activities in which your children are involved in. 

If both parents mutually agree on the nature of the extracurricular activity along with the corresponding scheduling obligations, time commitments and effort, then this subject may be less controversial or disputed between parents.

It is a good practice to ensure that both parents are aligned in the nature, scope, cost and effort required when committing to an extracurricular activity for the children.

As a result, the parenting plan can specify the actual activity in question, such as hockey lessons, music lessons, dance or any other extracurricular activity a child wishes to pursue.

The parenting plan should also provide for any parenting schedule adaptation required to allow for the activity. 

For example, if your son is playing hockey very actively and has three training sessions during the week and a full day of hockey on the weekend, then the parents must decide who will take the child to which sessions and who will be sacrificing one full day in the weekend to this effect.

The challenge that separated parents will face is that if the extracurricular activity takes a significant part of the child’s time, then the parents will feel as if they are also losing time with their child as well.

The parenting plan should also provide for the costs associated with the activities. 

Some activities are not that expensive but other activities such as hockey can be quite an expensive undertaking for the parents.

Having said that, the purpose of the parenting plan is to have the parents talk through the needs of their child and discuss their own abilities and limitations so that the process can be as smooth and peaceful as possible for all.

12- Travel authorizations

Travel authorization is another source of potential disagreements between the parents and it may be worth considering to include travel authorization parameters in the parenting plan. 

When parents decide on a parenting schedule and access rights in their agreement, they may not immediately think about the possibility that one day they may want to travel with their children during their summer holiday.

As a result, a parent may assume that since he or she has custody over the child for a week during the summer, then he or she can book a trip down south for a week and return just in time to give the child to the other parent.

However, if the custody agreement does not provide for travel authorizations, the you may face a more challenging situation if the other parent does not accept to give you a written approval.

Let’s be clear, even if your custodial agreement has travel authorization clauses, you are surely better off getting a specific travel authorization letter from the other parent every time you travel as the Canada border agent may refuse to let you travel without it.

So the less risky approach is to always have a travel authorization letter for each travel destination.

In your travel authorization letter, you should mention the duration of your trip, the name of your children, the name of the other parent, the place you will be staying during your travel abroad, telephone or email address to which you can be reached and any other notes or comment regarding your travel.

The travel authorization letter should also be sworn by a lawyer, notary or a commissioner for oaths.

If your parenting plan has a general authorization, at least you know that the other parent has already demonstrated willingness to travel with the child.

If your ex-spouse does not want to include a travel authorization clause in the custody agreement, then you will need to ensure that you get your authorizations before incurring any expense to avoid losing your money.

13- Child support

Another fundamental part of the parenting plan is related to child support.

In fact, the law requires that any parenting arrangement, custody or access rights plans also be submitted with the appropriate calculation of child support to take into consideration the basic needs of children.

The child support objective is to distribute as equitably as possible the basic and essential costs that parents will incur in raising a child.

Although each parent may raise their children differently and allocate priority to different types of expenses, when dealing with child support calculation under the law, you will be bound by the legal calculation of child support and what the law considers as the basic needs of your child.

Under the laws of Quebec, the legislator has considered the following to represent the nine basic needs of children:

• food
• lodging
• clothing
• furnishings
• communications
• transportation
• personal hygiene
• household maintenance
• leisure activities

As a result, the child support guidelines in the province of Quebec will provide for a child support obligation that takes into consideration the above list of nine basic needs.

Again, some parents may agree with this list and some parents may not.

However, when you are in a disagreement with your former spouse, then the application of the law will impose the Quebec child support guidelines on you.

This child support guideline will apply to all families and is the same regime applicable to all, no matter the income of each family.

14- Child’s special expenses

Your child’s special expenses will also represent another important element to include in your parenting plan and child support calculation.

The special expenses can be different for each family’s unique situation.

For some families, they will enroll their children in private school and so the tuition costs and additional expenses resulting from private school will be considered as a special expense that will need to be added to the basic child support amounts derived by law.

For some other families, having their children play sport activities and participate in tournaments is very important.

Therefore, if that’s a serious endeavor taken by the child, then the court will consider the sports expenses, like hockey or tennis or any other sport, as a special expense to be assumed by the parents.

Special expenses can also be related to other type of expenses such as:

• daycare expenses
• child care expenses for health reasons
• health insurance premiums
• college expenses
• university expenses
• sport activities
• music
• extracurricular activities

When dealing with special expenses, the court will consider the history of the family and how things used to be managed by you in “good times”, the overall financial capacity of the parents, the relevance of the underlying matter for the child and the child’s best interest and other factors.

In essence, the court must be satisfied that the special expense sought by a parent will truly serve the best interest of the children and that it will not impact the payer of child support so negatively as to compromise the person’s ability to provide child support.

15- Conclusion on Parenting Plan

The parenting plan is an excellent way for clarifying the terms and conditions governing your relationship with your former spouse in the context of separation.

It is also crucial to include the essential terms and conditions to assist you in preventing litigation and potential dispute going forward.

The parenting plan can be mutually negotiated between the parents without the need of a child custody lawyer or a professional intervention, however, you must make sure that you include all the legally mandated elements in the agreement so that a court can potentially accept it and ratify it.

A parenting plan that is signed between the parents but not submitted to court for ratification will not produce legally binding effects.

If you are comfortable that your ex-partner will comply with the terms of a parenting plan that was never ratified by the court, then you may choose to work it out that way.

On the other hand, if you feel that your ex-spouse will not pay child support on time or will not respect some fundamental terms of your parenting plan, then you are better off in submitting the agreement to the court for validation.

You can speak to a good family lawyer to get further information and details on the purpose of the parenting plan and best practices in case you have any questions or concerns.

Should you wish to speak to our family lawyers, we are happy to be able to assist you with any potential questions you may have and even represent you in negotiating and having the court ratify your parenting plan.

Feel free to contact us at your convenience.

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