Family Responsibility Office (FRO)

Family Responsibility Office (the "FRO") is Ontario's maintenance enforcement program(MEP) that administers and enforces child support payments and spousal support payments in the province.

FRO is required to collect all child support payments and back child support or child support arrears in separation agreements or divorce or family court orders that are filed with the Family Responsibility Office.

The FRO can collect money directly from the payor, from his or her income source or sources, or by way of writs or liens filed against property or seizure of bank accounts.

All support orders made in Ontario are automatically filed by the court that makes the order with the Family Responsibility Office. It takes some time for the order to become registered with the FRO office, and when that occurs a case number is assigned and the parties are contacted. The support payor is obligated to make payments to the FRO office at that time.

Payments can be made by way of internet banking, telephone banking or payments made directly to the FRO office. Payments by way of cheque or money order are discouraged as they can lead to delays and tracking problems. Obviously, electronic bank payments are the most efficient to track.

It is critical that the case number be written on all payments made to the FRO. 

The FRO has the following enforcement powers in regards to collecting late support payments:

• Payroll deduction or garnishment of wages;
• Seizure of bank accounts, including joint accounts;
• Report a payor in arrears to a credit bureau to make it more difficult for them to obtain loans or other credit while they owe family support. The report will stay on the support payor's credit rating for seven years;
• Suspension of passports and federal licences;
• Seizure of income tax Refunds and GST rebates:
• Garnishment of 50% of Employment Insurance, CPP, OAS and other federal periodic payments;
• Suspension of a defaulting payor's driver's licence;
• Default hearings with jail terms possible for up to 180 days.

Unless the payments are current and up to date, the FRO will send a Support Deduction Order to the payor's income source (e.g. employer) as soon as the case is opened.

If the case falls into arrears, the enforcement office will send correspondence to the payor indicating all of the remedies that are available to collect the payments and invite the payor to begin making payments voluntarily.

The enforcement staff will also immediately initiate a number of "passive enforcement" steps. These include forwarding the support deduction order to an employer, the federal government for EI, GST, CPP and income tax refund seizures and notification of arrears to the credit bureau.

If these passive enforcement steps do not produce payment, the enforcement staff are authorized to initiate aggressive enforcement action including driver's licence and passport suspension and default hearings.

It is important to understand that the Family Responsibility Office exists to enforce the Court's Order or Agreement that is filed with the FRO. If you disagree with the amount of support or other provisions that are related to the support order or agreement, your complaint is not with the FRO, Ontario's maintenance enforcement program (MEP). Repeated attempts to contact the FRO with respect to those kinds of issues will not produce any resolution. The remedy is to return to the court with a Motion to Change (you will likely need a lawyer for this), or to the bargaining table with the support recipient to achieve a new support arrangement. Once the order is varied, it can be filed with the FRO and then the FRO will be bound by the new Agreement or Order and enforce it by its terms.