(a) The petitioner may not be required to pay a filing fee or other costs.

Terms Used In Tennessee Code 36-5-2313

  • Foreign country: means a country, including a political subdivision thereof, other than the United States, that authorizes the issuance of support orders and:
    (A) Which has been declared under the law of the United States to be a foreign reciprocating country. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Law: includes decisional and statutory law and rules and regulations having the force of law. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Obligee: means :
    (A) An individual to whom a duty of support is or is alleged to be owed or in whose favor a support order or a judgment determining parentage of a child has been issued. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Obligor: means an individual, or the estate of a decedent that:
    (A) Owes or is alleged to owe a duty of support. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Responding state: means a state in which a petition or comparable pleading for support or to determine parentage of a child is filed or to which a petition or comparable pleading is forwarded for filing from another state or a foreign country. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Responding tribunal: means the authorized tribunal in a responding state or foreign country. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • State: means a state of the United States, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, or any territory or insular possession under the jurisdiction of the United States. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Support enforcement agency: means a public official, governmental entity, or private agency authorized to:
    (A) Seek enforcement of support orders or laws relating to the duty of support. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Support order: means a judgment, decree, order, decision, or directive, whether temporary, final, or subject to modification, issued in a state or foreign country for the benefit of a child, a spouse, or a former spouse, which provides for monetary support, health care, arrearages, retroactive support, or reimbursement for financial assistance provided to an individual obligee in place of child support. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
  • Tribunal: means a court, administrative agency, or quasi-judicial entity authorized to establish, enforce, or modify support orders or to determine parentage of a child. See Tennessee Code 36-5-2101
(b) If an obligee prevails, a responding tribunal of this state may assess against an obligor filing fees, reasonable attorney’s fees, other costs, and necessary travel and other reasonable expenses incurred by the obligee and the obligee’s witnesses. The tribunal may not assess fees, costs, or expenses against the obligee or the support enforcement agency of either the initiating or responding state or foreign country, except as provided by other law. Attorney’s fees may be taxed as costs, and may be ordered paid directly to the attorney, who may enforce the order in the attorney’s own name. Payment of support owed to the obligee has priority over fees, costs, and expenses.
(c) The tribunal shall order the payment of costs and reasonable attorney’s fees if it determines that a hearing was requested primarily for delay. In a proceeding under part 26 of this chapter, a hearing is presumed to have been requested primarily for delay if a registered support order is confirmed or enforced without change.
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