How to modify child support or alimony in Mississippi

Sources last checked: 7 November 2026. Information only, not legal advice. The Cusp is not a law firm. We could not open the Mississippi Code on a code website, so the statute wording below comes from bills printed on the Mississippi Legislature’s own site, and several points rest on court opinions and agency pages (see the end of this page).

Mississippi divorce kit How child support is calculated Alimony in Mississippi Legal aid in Mississippi After your divorce

The short version

In Mississippi, changes to child support and alimony go through the chancery court that made the order. Section 93-5-23, as printed in a Legislature bill, says “The court may afterwards, on petition, change the decree”. The person asking for a change carries the burden of proof. For child support, section 43-19-34 as printed there says a material change in circumstances is needed outside the three-year review cycle, and none is needed inside it. For alimony, the Court of Appeals describes a change that was “not reasonably foreseeable at the time of the original judgment”. We found no court form for asking a chancery court to modify either kind of order.

What the request can ask for

Child support, the usual test: the Court of Appeals opinion says parties may request a modification where substantial and material changes in circumstances exist, and that the person asking “bears the burden of proof”. It also says the change must be one that was not reasonably foreseeable when the original judgment was entered.
Child support, the three-year review: the Mississippi Department of Human Services (MDHS) says parents may request a review of the support amount every three years from the date the order was entered or modified. It says reviews on that cycle “do not require proof of a substantial change of circumstances” before a court may modify the order, and reviews inside the cycle need proof of a substantial change. The Legislature’s printed text of section 43-19-34(3) matches this: “No proof of a material change in circumstances is necessary in the three-year review”, and a change is “necessary for modification outside the three-year cycle”.
What MDHS lists as a substantial change: a substantial increase or decrease in the paying parent’s income, increased needs caused by the children’s age and maturity, an increase in expenses, the health and special needs of the child, and the health and special medical needs of the parents.
Alimony: the Court of Appeals opinion says alimony may be modified on a showing of “material and unforeseen changes in the circumstances of the parties”, quoting a Mississippi Supreme Court case about periodic alimony. If the court finds such a change, it then weighs a list of factors, including the parties’ income and expenses, their health and earning capacities, their needs, and the length of the marriage.
Medical support: the guideline statute as MDHS reproduces it says all orders involving support of minor children include reasonable medical support, and that the court makes findings on the availability and cost of health insurance for the children.

What the Legislature’s printed text says

We read three bills on the Legislature’s own site, billstatus.ls.state.ms.us. Each prints the full text of a section it amends: Senate Bill 2680 (2016, as passed the Senate) prints sections 43-19-34 and 93-5-23, and Senate Bill 2131 (2024, as passed the Senate) prints section 93-11-65. A bill print is not the current codified statute, and parts of it are the bill’s own proposed changes, so we quote only wording that matches the court opinions and agency pages above.

Who decides, section 93-11-65: “the chancery court of the proper county shall have jurisdiction” over suits for the support and maintenance of minor children.
Changing a decree, section 93-5-23: after a divorce decree, “The court may afterwards, on petition, change the decree” and make new decrees as the case may require.
Agreeing instead of litigating, section 43-19-34(1): a written agreement to modify support, acknowledged before a clerk or notary and approved by the judge, has the same force as a court order for modification.
Raising support back to an earlier date, section 43-19-34(4): an upward modification “may be ordered back to the date of the event” that justifies it. The McKinney opinion below quotes the same rule.
When support ends, section 93-11-65(8): unless the judgment says otherwise, support ends at emancipation, which the text defines to include turning 21, marrying, full-time military service, or a felony conviction with a sentence of two or more years. Support for an adult child with a disability that began in childhood is treated differently in subsection (9) of the printed text.
Keeping the court informed, section 93-11-65(5): each party must notify the other “within five (5) days after any change of address” and update the court and the state case registry.

What else you file

Court form: we found no court form to modify child support or alimony. The Mississippi Access to Justice Commission’s Free Legal Forms page lists forms such as a Petition to Cite for Contempt, a Petition to Establish Visitation Rights, an Order Setting Hearing, the Rule 8.05 Financial Statement, a Civil Case Filing Form, Rule 4 and Rule 81 summonses and a Motion to Proceed In Forma Pauperis. It lists no modification form. We did not confirm the Commission’s relationship to the courts.
Financial statement: Uniform Chancery Court Rule 8.05 requires each party in every domestic case involving economic issues to give the other side a statement of income, expenses, assets and liabilities, copies of the preceding year’s tax returns or W-2s, and a statement of employment history. For proceedings other than divorce the history covers the five years before the petition is filed. Rule 8.01 says this part of the rules applies to actions involving “child custody or support, modification” and other domestic matters.
MDHS review forms: if you want MDHS to review a child support case, it posts a Custodial Parent Review Questionnaire (MDHS-CSE-628, Revised 04-2022) and a Noncustodial Parent Review Questionnaire (MDHS-CSE-629, no revision date shown on the copy we read). Form 628 says submitting it “does not guarantee” support will be raised, and form 629 says the same about lowering it. These ask MDHS to review the case. They are not a filing with the court.
Filing fee waiver: the Commission’s forms page lists a Motion to Proceed In Forma Pauperis and a Pauper’s Affidavit for people who need to try to get the civil filing fee waived.

What the opinions, rules and agency pages say

The wording below is a plain-language summary of two opinions posted on the Mississippi Judiciary website, the Uniform Chancery Court Rules as posted there, and pages and PDFs published by MDHS, with short quotations. The two opinions are Braswell v. Braswell, No. 2020-CA-01090-COA (Miss. Ct. App., 9 November 2021) and McKinney v. Hamp, No. 2016-CA-00844-SCT (Miss., 8 February 2018). We did not check whether either was later changed.

Raising support back to an earlier date: McKinney says the Supreme Court has held that an upward retroactive modification “may be ordered back to the date of the event justifying the upward modification”, citing Code section 43-19-34(4). It also says the court has suggested the better rule is to allow an increase “as of the date of the petition to modify or thereafter”, and calls this “a discretionary call”. In that case the chancellor used the date the other parent first filed a separate petition for child support.
Past-due support: McKinney says child support payments “become fixed and vested when the payments become due” and unpaid, and that “Once fixed and vested, those judgments cannot be modified”. Because of this we would not assume a past-due amount can be reduced.
Guidelines, section 43-19-101 (as reproduced by MDHS): the statutory guidelines are a rebuttable presumption in proceedings about “awarding or modifying of child support awards”. A court that departs from them must make a “written finding or specific finding on the record” that applying them would be unjust or inappropriate under the criteria in section 43-19-103. Where adjusted gross income is above $100,000 or below $10,000 the court must make a written finding on whether applying the guidelines is reasonable.
Reasons to depart, section 43-19-103 (as reproduced by MDHS): the listed criteria include extraordinary medical, psychological, educational or dental expenses, the child’s independent income, payment of both child and spousal support to the same person, seasonal variations in income, the child’s age, shared parenting arrangements, available assets, child care expenses, and any other adjustment needed for an equitable result.
Order of events in an MDHS review: MDHS says each parent receives notice of the review results and a chance to agree or disagree, and that “A court must approve the final order”. Its handbook says reviews are conducted on all active TANF cases every three years, and that non-TANF reviews are conducted on written request only.

Notice, service and hearing

Court: a chancery court, which the printed text of section 93-11-65 gives jurisdiction over support suits.
Service and hearing: the sources we read do not say how the other party must be served on a modification, what deadlines apply, or how a hearing is set. The Commission’s forms page lists Rule 4 and Rule 81 summonses, and we do not say which applies to a modification. We did not read the Mississippi Rules of Civil Procedure.
Ongoing disclosure: Rule 8.05 also says a party must supplement a disclosure if it no longer accurately reflects income, expenses, assets and liabilities.

Before you file

Court staff cannot give legal advice. See legal aid in Mississippi for free or low-cost help, or the Mississippi divorce kit for the wider process.
Timing matters: an increase can reach back to the event or the petition date, and past-due amounts are fixed. We could not confirm the rule for a decrease (see below), so file as soon as your circumstances change.
Gather your current order, your last year’s tax return or W-2s, and records of your income and expenses. Rule 8.05 asks for these in domestic cases.
Think about whether the change was foreseeable when the order was made. The Braswell opinion describes a change that was not reasonably foreseeable as the test for both kinds of order.
Child support amounts follow the state guidelines. See how child support is calculated in Mississippi and alimony in Mississippi. For other changes after a divorce, see After your divorce.

What we could not confirm

The current codified statutes. We could not open the Mississippi Code on a code website: the Legislature’s main site was not reachable from our tools, and the commercial code sites are not used here. The statute wording above comes from two bill prints (2016 and 2024) that were passed by the Senate, and we do not know whether each bill was enacted or whether the sections were amended after those dates.
Whether a decrease can reach back before you file. The 2016 bill print says a downward change may reach back no more than one year or the petition date, whichever is less, but that wording may be the bill’s own proposal, so we do not state it as law. The opinions we read discuss an increase only.
A court form to modify support or alimony. We found none. The Mississippi Judiciary page we tried for civil legal forms returned a page-not-found error, and we did not search every court or clerk site.
Whether alimony can change for the period before you file, and when alimony ends on remarriage or cohabitation. We read neither the statute nor an opinion on these points, so we do not say. Your decree may also say.
Which kinds of alimony can be modified. A lower court’s remarks about lump-sum and periodic alimony appear in the Braswell opinion, but the Court of Appeals reversed and remanded that case, so we do not rely on them.
Filing fees and sheriff or process-server fees. No amount appears in the sources we read, so this page states none.
Service, notice and deadlines. Not stated in the sources we read.
How judges apply “material” and “unforeseen”. We read two opinions, not the full body of case law, and do not predict outcomes.
Rule changes. The Uniform Chancery Court Rules PDF we read shows amendments through 2012 on Rule 8.05. We did not check for later amendments. The MDHS guideline PDF is a 2020 upload, and we did not check it against the current Code.
Local practice. We did not read any chancery district’s local rules.

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