Your child is a junior or senior, the college visits have started, and the question you have been putting off is finally on the table: who pays? If you and your child's other parent are divorced, paying for college after divorce in South Carolina is not settled by good intentions or by who has custody. It turns on what your divorce papers say, and, if they say nothing, on a line of South Carolina Supreme Court decisions that lets a family court order a parent to contribute in the right case.

Short answer

South Carolina child support normally ends at eighteen or at high school graduation. But a family court can order a divorced parent to help pay for college when the child will benefit from it, can do the work, cannot go without the help, and the parent can afford to contribute. Parents can also agree to share college costs in their settlement agreement, and once the court approves that agreement it is enforceable like any other part of the decree.

Paying for college after divorce starts with when child support ends

The family court's power over child support comes from S.C. Code § 63-3-530(A)(17). Under that section, orders for child support run until the child turns eighteen, marries, or becomes self-supporting, or past eighteen while the child “is enrolled and still attending high school, not to exceed high school graduation or the end of the school year after the child reaches nineteen years of age, whichever is later.”

The same sentence then lists the ways support can run longer: “in accordance with a preexisting agreement or order to provide for child support past the age of eighteen years,” or, in the court's discretion, where there are physical or mental disabilities of the child “or other exceptional circumstances that warrant the continuation of child support beyond age eighteen.” College lives in that last phrase.

The Risinger rule: college as an “exceptional circumstance”

In Risinger v. Risinger, 273 S.C. 36, 253 S.E.2d 652 (1979), the father argued the family court had no power to make him support a nineteen-year-old college student. The Supreme Court disagreed. It wrote that “[t]he need for education is the most likely additional ‘exceptional circumstance’ which might justify continued financial support,” and it affirmed an order requiring him to pay $100 a month toward his daughter's schooling for as long as she kept passing grades and did not marry.

The Court also set out the test family courts still use. A judge may require a parent to contribute the money needed for a child over eighteen to attend high school and four years of college where there is evidence that:

• •the characteristics of the child indicate that he or she will benefit from college;
• •the child demonstrates the ability to do well, or at least make satisfactory grades;
• •the child cannot otherwise go to school; and
• •the parent has the financial ability to help pay for such an education.

The Court was careful to say these are not the only circumstances that can justify an award, and that the decision “must be left largely in the hands of our family court judges.” That is why two families with similar facts can get different results, and why the evidence you put in front of the judge matters.

The 2010 detour and the 2012 correction

For about two years, a South Carolina family court could not order a parent to contribute to college at all. In Webb v. Sowell, 387 S.C. 328, 692 S.E.2d 543 (2010), the Supreme Court held that the Risinger reading of the statute violated equal protection. Then, in McLeod v. Starnes, 396 S.C. 647, 723 S.E.2d 198 (2012), the Court overruled Webb and restored the Risinger rule.

The McLeod majority was clear about what the rule is and is not. “There is no absolute right to a college education,” it wrote, and the statute as read in Risinger “does not impose a moral obligation on all divorced parents with children.” Instead, the factors “seek to identify those children whose parents would otherwise have paid for their college education, but for the divorce, and provide them with that benefit.” That sentence is a useful way to think about any college claim: the question is what this family would likely have done if it had stayed together.

How the four factors play out

Benefit and ability are usually the easy part. A student with a solid high school record and a plan is the typical case. The fights tend to be over the third and fourth factors.

Whether the child can go without the parent's help. Courts look at grants, loans, and what the student can earn during the school year and over the summer. In Hughes v. Hughes, 280 S.C. 388, 313 S.E.2d 32 (Ct. App. 1984), the daughter had covered most of her costs with loans, a scholarship, and part-time work, and the father was ordered to pay $300 a semester toward what was left. The Court of Appeals described a college student's “duty to help minimize college expenses.” The Supreme Court later noted that, although it treats grants and the student's ability to earn as factors, it has “never held that there is a duty under Risinger for a child to minimize college expenses.” In practice, a student who applies for aid and works when possible makes a much stronger case for help than one who does neither.

Whether the parent can afford to help. Hughes also held there is “no limitation that child support payments be made solely from current earnings.” The father's monthly expenses exceeded his income on paper, but he had assets, and the court found those were enough to cover a modest contribution.

Private colleges and expensive choices. In McLeod, the family court had also relied on the fact that the son chose a private college. The Supreme Court said cost is relevant but that attending a private school “does not foreclose an award.” The tuition is weighed together with scholarships, grants, and loans and with the parents' ability to pay in deciding whether to award anything and how much.

Scholarships, grants, and veterans' benefits come first

Before anyone argues about a parent's share, add up what the student can get elsewhere. In a Risinger case, that is the heart of the question whether the child can attend without the parent's help. Under an agreement, it matters whenever the clause says aid is applied first. For South Carolina students, these are the usual sources.

Lottery-funded state scholarships. The South Carolina Commission on Higher Education administers the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship, the LIFE Scholarship, and the HOPE Scholarship (a freshman-year award at four-year schools for students who do not qualify for LIFE or Palmetto Fellows), along with Lottery Tuition Assistance at two-year and technical colleges. Each has its own academic requirements, renewal rules, and award amounts, which the Commission sets and updates, so a scholarship a student has as a freshman is not certain to last four years.

Need-based grants. The South Carolina Need-Based Grant and the federal Pell Grant both depend on the family's finances, and both require the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). A settlement agreement or order should say who completes the FAFSA and when, because a missed deadline can cost the student money that does not have to be repaid.

Free tuition for children of certain veterans. Under S.C. Code § 59-111-20, a child of a wartime veteran may attend a state-supported college, university, or technical college “free of tuition” with approval from the South Carolina Department of Veterans' Affairs. The veteran must meet one of the statute's service conditions, such as being killed in action, permanently and totally disabled, a former prisoner of war, or a Purple Heart or Medal of Honor recipient, and the child must be twenty-six or younger and pursuing an undergraduate degree. 2026 Act No. 135, effective May 15, 2026, rewrote the residency requirements and added a new route for a child who has lived in South Carolina since birth. The waiver covers tuition only; fees, housing, meals, and books remain.

VA Chapter 35 benefits. Survivors' and Dependents' Educational Assistance (often called Chapter 35) pays a monthly education benefit to the child of a veteran who, for example, is permanently and totally disabled due to a service-connected disability or died as a result of one. How it is paid matters as much as how much. VA pays the student directly, not the school. Under 38 C.F.R. § 21.4138(e), VA pays only after the school certifies the enrollment and the student verifies it, generally every month, which results in monthly payments. A month the student is only partly enrolled is prorated by the number of days enrolled. And an advance payment at the start of a term is made only if the student specifically asks for one.

The practical result is that Chapter 35 money works like a reimbursement, not an advance. It arrives month by month after the student has attended, while tuition and housing bills are due at registration. A college clause or order involving a Chapter 35 student should say whether the benefit reduces the parents' share, and who covers the bills up front while the monthly payments catch up.

If your decree says nothing about college

A decree that is silent on college does not end the question. In Hughes, the parents had divorced in 1972 under an order that covered their “minor children,” and the mother brought a new action in 1980 when their daughter was eighteen and headed to college. The father argued the old order barred the claim. The Court of Appeals held that it did not, because the daughter's plans for college were a change in circumstances that did not exist when the original order was entered.

Timing still matters in practice. A request for college support is easier to present while a child support case is open, or before the existing order ends, than after the student is already enrolled and the bills have been paid by one parent alone. If college is two or three years away, that is the time to talk with a Charleston family law attorney about your options.

If you are negotiating a settlement now: write the college clause carefully

Many college disputes in Charleston, Berkeley, and Dorchester County family courts start with an agreement, not a Risinger claim. Parents who agree to share college costs usually mean it when they sign. The trouble comes years later, when the words have to answer a question nobody asked at the time. Our post on Fennell v. Fennell and contempt for unpaid college expenses shows how a clear clause gets enforced, and how a vague one invites a second lawsuit.

A workable college clause usually answers these questions:

• •What counts as a college expense: tuition and required fees only, or also room and board, books, a laptop, travel, and spending money?
• •Is there a cap, such as the cost of in-state tuition and fees at a South Carolina public university?
• •How are scholarships, grants, and existing 529 or other college savings accounts applied, and are they applied before the parents split the rest? Do student loans count, or only aid that does not have to be repaid? Do a veterans' tuition waiver or Chapter 35 payments count?
• •Who pays the tuition bill at registration when some aid, such as Chapter 35, arrives later in monthly payments?
• •What is the split: equal shares, or in proportion to income?
• •What does the student have to do to keep the support going: full-time enrollment, a minimum GPA, applying for financial aid, working in the summer? If the agreement does not say, a court will not add it.
• •How long does the obligation last: four years, a set number of semesters, or until a certain age?
• •Who gets the bills and grades, and how quickly? Colleges deal with the student as an adult, so the agreement should require the student's cooperation in sharing that information.
• •Is payment made to the school, to the student, or to the other parent?

The words matter because the family court reads a college agreement as a contract, and the South Carolina Supreme Court has shown how literally it will do that. In McDuffie v. McDuffie, 313 S.C. 397, 438 S.E.2d 239 (1993), the Court held that such agreements “are not modifiable by the Court without the consent of the parties,” and that because nothing in the agreement required the daughter to keep her costs down, she had no duty to do so. It also found the phrase “all college expenses,” standing alone, “patently ambiguous.”

In Ellis v. Taylor, 316 S.C. 245, 449 S.E.2d 487 (1994), the father had agreed to pay reasonable college expenses “to the extent that such expenses are not provided by any scholarship, grant or other assistance.” The Court would not reduce his share based on his finances or his son's ability to work, because the agreement did not say to. It held that “other assistance” did not include loans that have to be repaid. And a separate promise that the parents “shall agree to an amount” for household support once each child started college was void as too indefinite to enforce. The lesson for a clause written today: if you want scholarships, loans, the student's earnings, or a cap to count, say so, and do not leave any number to be agreed on later.

Get the arrangement into the court-approved agreement rather than an exchange of texts. Informal side deals tend to fail in family court, for the same reason our post on why direct child support payments do not count explains: the court enforces the order as written.

What paying for college after divorce looks like in court

If the parents cannot agree, the parent seeking help files an action in family court, or asks for college expenses as part of a pending case. Expect to exchange financial declarations and to prove each factor with documents: transcripts and test scores, acceptance letters, the college's cost of attendance, financial aid award letters, and the student's own earnings. The judge can order a monthly amount, a percentage split, or a contribution toward specific costs. Once ordered, the obligation is enforceable through the family court, and a parent who stops paying risks the enforcement process described in our Fennell post.

Frequently asked questions

Do divorced parents have to pay for college in South Carolina?

Not automatically. A parent can be ordered to contribute when the Risinger factors are met, and a parent who agreed to pay in a court-approved settlement agreement can be held to that agreement. There is no blanket rule that every divorced parent must pay.

What are the Risinger factors?

The child will benefit from college, the child can make at least satisfactory grades, the child cannot attend without the parent's help, and the parent has the financial ability to help. The family court has discretion in weighing them.

Does a scholarship reduce what a parent pays?

It depends on where the obligation comes from. When a court decides a Risinger claim, scholarships, grants, loans, and the student's own earnings all bear on whether a parent's help is needed and how much. When the obligation comes from an agreement, the agreement controls: aid reduces a parent's share only if the agreement says it does.

Can I be ordered to help pay for a private college?

Possibly. The Supreme Court has said a private school's cost is relevant but does not rule out an award. The court weighs the tuition against financial aid and the parents' ability to pay.

Our divorce was final years ago and the decree does not mention college. Is it too late?

Not necessarily. The Court of Appeals has allowed a college claim years after the original decree because the child's college plans were a new circumstance. Talk to an attorney before the current support order ends if you can.

Talk to a Charleston family law attorney about college costs

Whether you are negotiating a college clause, asking the court for help with tuition, or defending against a claim you think goes too far, the details decide these cases. Klok Law Firm represents parents in child support, modification and enforcement matters across Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley, and Dorchester Counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

It is one of the most common questions parents ask, and it usually arrives with a number attached. Twelve. Fourteen. Sixteen. Someone at work or on a forum said that once a child reaches that age, the child decides. It would be simpler if that were true.

Where the child's preference actually sits

Custody is governed by S.C. Code § 63-15-240(B), which directs the family court to consider the best interest of the child and then lists the factors that consideration may include. The third is simply this: “the preferences of each child.”

That is the whole of it. One factor among seventeen. The statute attaches no age to it, gives it no special weight, and nowhere says it controls. It sits alongside the child's adjustment to home and school, the stability of each residence, each parent's ability to be involved, and the conduct factors about encouraging the other parent's relationship.

In practice a court will listen more closely to a mature sixteen-year-old than to a seven-year-old, and it will listen differently again if the preference looks coached. But listening more closely is not the same as being bound.

The mistake that turns a good position into a bad one

Here is where this question stops being academic. A parent hears the child say they do not want to go, decides the child is old enough to have a view, and stops sending them. That parent has now violated a court order.

The leading South Carolina decision is Noojin v. Noojin, 417 S.C. 300, 789 S.E.2d 769 (Ct. App. 2016). Over roughly two years a father received a small fraction of his ordered time with his two children. The mother's position was that she would not force them, and she coined the phrase “forced visitation” for what the order required. The Court of Appeals affirmed a finding of contempt against her:

The court described what the mother's own emails showed: that she refused to set a schedule, sought the children's guidance whenever the father tried to enforce the agreement, and told them she would never support forcing time with him. She was ordered to pay $41,375.84 towards the father's attorney's fees and costs.

The lesson is not that a parent must physically put a resisting teenager in a car. It is that passively deferring to the child, and telling the child the choice is theirs, is itself the violation.

Two limits the court was careful about

Noojin is not a rule that a parent is always in contempt when a child refuses. The Court of Appeals said so twice, and the qualifications matter as much as the holding.

The distinguishing feature was the absence of harm. Asked directly at oral argument whether visiting was causing the children any psychological or physical harm, the mother said it was not.

When the child's resistance is real

Contrast Nash v. Byrd, 298 S.C. 530, 381 S.E.2d 913 (Ct. App. 1989), which Noojin distinguishes. There a boy refused to get in the car for visitation. His mother dressed him for each visit, contacted his treating psychologist and her attorney, and offered to work with the father to resolve the problem; the father refused and simply demanded his visitation.

The psychologist advised that forcing the visits would likely bring back the child's earlier physical and emotional problems. The family court found the visitation problems were caused by the father's own conduct, that the mother had taken reasonable steps, and refused to hold her in contempt. It suspended visitation until the father completed counselling. The Court of Appeals found no error, noting that “[a] determination of contempt is a serious matter and should be imposed sparingly.”

The difference between the two cases is not the child's age or the strength of the child's feelings. It is whether the resisting was being caused by the other parent's conduct, whether the visits were genuinely harming the child, and whether the custodial parent took reasonable steps rather than simply deferring.

Where a child's safety or wellbeing is genuinely at issue, the route is a court order, not self-help. Our post on when South Carolina courts can suspend visitation rights covers those cases.

What to do when your child does not want to go

Our post on whether custody and visitation awards can be modified in South Carolina explains what a modification requires.

Frequently asked questions

At what age can my child decide in South Carolina?

There is no such age. The child's preference is one factor under § 63-15-240(B), and the statute attaches no age to it and does not make it controlling.

Will the judge talk to my child?

Sometimes, and how that happens is a matter for the court. What the statute guarantees is that the child's preferences are among the things the court may consider, not that the child will testify or choose.

My teenager refuses to go. Am I in contempt?

Not automatically. Noojin was limited to its facts and says contempt is decided case by case. What got the mother there was not the refusals themselves but her encouragement of them. If you are following the order, documenting what happens, and seeking help rather than deferring, you are in a materially different position.

What if visits are genuinely harming my child?

That changes the analysis, as Nash shows. But the answer is to go to court for relief, not to stop the visits on your own. A parent who stops unilaterally is the one explaining themselves at a contempt hearing.

Does what my child wants matter at all?

Yes. It is expressly one of the factors, and its practical weight grows with the child's age and maturity. It simply is not the decision, and it does not suspend an order.

Talk to a Charleston custody lawyer

If your child is resisting time with the other parent, the next few weeks matter more than the next few months, and the wrong response is expensive. Klok Law Firm handles South Carolina family law in Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley, and Dorchester counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

You were in the passenger seat of a friend's car on Folly Road, or in the back of a rideshare on I-26, when the crash happened. You did nothing wrong, you are hurt, and now two insurance companies are pointing at each other while a third is asking whether you really want to make a claim against the person who was driving you. Understanding your passenger rights after a car accident in South Carolina starts with one fact: a passenger is almost never at fault, and the law is built to compensate the person who is not.

You can claim against the driver of the car you were in

For decades South Carolina had a “guest statute” that barred a non-paying passenger from recovering against the driver for ordinary negligence. The South Carolina Supreme Court struck it down in Ramey v. Ramey in 1979, holding that the statute violated the equal protection clauses of the state and federal constitutions because it “irrationally distinguishes non-paying guests from paying passengers.” Since then a passenger stands in the same position as anyone else the driver owed a duty of care: if the driver was negligent and that negligence caused your injury, you have a claim.

That claim is paid by the driver's liability insurance, not out of the driver's pocket in the ordinary case. South Carolina is an at-fault state, and every policy issued here must carry liability coverage of at least the limits set by S.C. Code § 38-77-140. Friends and relatives often hesitate here, and drivers sometimes ask their passengers not to claim.

The premium was paid for exactly this situation, and a passenger who declines to claim is giving up medical bills, lost wages and more that the law says are theirs.

When another driver caused the crash, or both did

If the other driver was at fault, your claim runs against that driver's liability coverage. If both drivers share the fault, South Carolina's apportionment statute, S.C. Code § 15-38-15, has the jury assign each driver a percentage. A driver found fifty percent or more at fault is jointly and severally liable, meaning you can collect the whole judgment from that driver's coverage and leave the insurers to sort out contribution between themselves; a driver found less than fifty percent at fault pays only that share. For crashes on or after January 1, 2026, an amended version of the statute also lets a defendant ask the jury to assign fault to a person who was never sued, so identifying every vehicle involved matters from the first day.

Your own percentage in that calculation is usually zero. A passenger does not steer, brake or choose the speed. The exceptions insurers reach for are a passenger who grabbed the wheel, distracted the driver, or got into the car knowing the driver was impaired; those arguments are judged under the same comparative-fault rules as any other, and they have to be proved, not assumed. Our explainer on why South Carolina is an at-fault state covers how the comparison works.

Where the money comes from: the layers of coverage

Seat belts and other arguments used against passengers

An adjuster may suggest that you were not wearing a seat belt, or ask you to say so. Under S.C. Code § 56-5-6540, a seat belt violation “is not negligence per se or contributory negligence, and is not admissible as evidence in a civil action.” It cannot be used to reduce a passenger's recovery in South Carolina.

You will also be asked for a recorded statement, sometimes by two insurers on the same day, each hoping you will describe the crash in a way that shifts fault to the other driver. You are not required to give one, and our guide to how insurance companies handle auto accident claims explains why the answer before you have counsel is no.

Passenger rights after a car accident in South Carolina: what to do now

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to sue my friend to make a claim?

No. The claim is presented to the driver's insurer, and most are resolved without a lawsuit. If a suit becomes necessary, the driver is the named defendant because the policy responds to claims against the insured, but the insurer defends and pays.

What if the driver who hit us had no insurance?

The uninsured motorist coverage on the car you were in applies to you as a guest, and coverage on your own household's vehicles may as well. This is the situation UM coverage exists for.

I was a rideshare passenger. Is it different?

The claim works the same way, but the coverage in force depends on the rideshare company's policy and the phase of the trip. Preserve the trip record in the app immediately.

There were four of us in the car. Does that reduce what I get?

It can strain the at-fault driver's per-accident limit, which is shared among everyone hurt. That is when underinsured coverage on the host vehicle and in your household becomes the difference.

How long do I have?

Generally three years from the crash, and shorter where a government vehicle is involved. Underinsured claims have their own notice requirements, so do not wait.

Talk to a Charleston car accident attorney about a passenger claim

Passenger claims involve more insurers, more policies and more finger-pointing than any other kind of car accident case, and the coverage questions are where the money is won or lost. Klok Law handles car accident claims for passengers across Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley and Dorchester counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

If you have a contested divorce, custody, or support case in a South Carolina family court, you will almost certainly be required to mediate before a judge hears the merits of your case. Clients are often surprised by that. They filed because they could not agree, and now the court is telling them to sit in a room and try. This post explains how family court mediation in South Carolina works under the state's Court-Annexed Alternative Dispute Resolution Rules, who has to be there, what stays private, what happens when it works, and the change the Supreme Court made to those rules in 2026.

Family court mediation in South Carolina is required, not optional

Under Rule 3(a) of the South Carolina Court-Annexed ADR Rules, every contested issue in a domestic relations action filed in family court is subject to court-ordered mediation. That covers the issues people fight about most: custody, visitation, child support, alimony, and the division of marital property.

There are exceptions. Rule 3(b) carves out requests for temporary relief, contempt proceedings, and cases started by the Department of Social Services, among others. So the temporary hearing we wrote about in our post on Rule 2(a) and temporary hearings does not wait for mediation, and a rule to show cause for a missed support payment does not either. Everything on the path to a final hearing does.

A party who has a case-specific reason not to mediate can ask the Chief Judge for Administrative Purposes of the circuit to exempt the case for good cause. Rule 3(c) gives the example of a party who cannot participate because of incarceration or physical condition. Exemptions are the exception, and a plain preference for trial is not one.

When it happens and who picks the mediator

Rule 4(d) governs family court. It encourages early mediation, and a judge can order early mediation of custody and visitation issues on a party's motion or the court's own. Otherwise, the rule is triggered by the request for a merits hearing. That request must name the mediator the parties have agreed on or ask the clerk to appoint one, and the court will not schedule the merits hearing until a Proof of ADR has been filed.

If the parties do not agree on a mediator, the clerk appoints a primary and a secondary mediator from the Supreme Court's roster of certified neutrals on a rotating basis. Either party can also ask the clerk to appoint one at any time. Once a mediator is selected or appointed, the first mediation conference must take place within thirty days.

Parties can also opt out of mediation on money issues in a specific way. Rule 4(d)(5) lets them submit property and alimony to binding arbitration instead, or send all issues to early neutral evaluation. Custody and visitation cannot be arbitrated under that provision, so mediation remains the route for the issues involving children.

Who must be in the room

Rule 6(b) requires the mediator, every individual party, and each party's attorney of record to physically attend the mediation conference unless the mediator and all parties agree otherwise or the Chief Judge for Administrative Purposes orders or approves something different. Rule 5(h) allows the conference to be held in whole or in part online unless a party objects, and the people required to attend may appear that way if the mediator and all parties agree.

The mediator runs the conference. Under Rule 7(a) the mediator controls the procedure, and under Rule 7(e) a mediation cannot be ended by one side walking out; only the mediator declares an impasse. The mediator can recess and reconvene, and can require each side to submit a short position memorandum, capped at five pages unless the mediator allows more, before the conference begins.

One thing you will no longer find in the statewide rules is a minimum number of hours. Until April 30, 2026, Rule 6(g) required the parties to participate in at least three hours of mediation unless they settled sooner; that sentence was deleted, as explained below. How long a session runs is now the mediator's call, and in a case with several contested issues it is common to schedule more than one.

What stays confidential

Rule 8 is the reason mediation works. Everything communicated during the mediation is confidential and cannot be introduced as evidence in the family court case or any other proceeding. That includes settlement positions, admissions, the mediator's own proposals, and whether a party was willing to accept a particular offer. The mediator cannot be subpoenaed to testify about what was said, and what a party tells the mediator in a private caucus stays with the mediator.

Two limits matter for family court clients. First, confidentiality does not convert otherwise admissible evidence into protected material; under Rule 8(h), a bank statement that would have been discoverable anyway does not become privileged because it was handed across the table at mediation. Second, once the parties sign an agreement reached at mediation, confidentiality is waived as to the terms of that agreement, and mediation communications can be used in a later court proceeding to establish, void, or reform that agreement. That exception is what makes the post-mediation fights we described in our post on buyer's remorse after signing a family law mediation agreement possible at all.

What happens when you reach an agreement: the 2026 change

This is where the rules changed. On January 30, 2026, the South Carolina Supreme Court submitted an order amending Rule 6(g) of the ADR Rules to the General Assembly, and the amendment took effect on April 30, 2026 after the ninety-day review period passed without objection.

As amended, Rule 6(g) now provides that when the parties reach an agreement in a family court mediation, the mediator provides a Memorandum of Agreement to the parties, their attorneys of record, and any guardian ad litem of record, and that it is the parties' obligation to seek approval of that agreement by the family court.

What the order deleted was the first sentence of the old subsection, which read: “Parties must participate in at least three (3) hours of mediation unless an agreement is reached sooner.” That three-hour minimum was the one piece of the statewide rules that set a clock on family court mediation, and it is gone. A mediator may still keep the parties at the table as long as the mediator believes the process is viable, and under Rule 7(e) only the mediator declares an impasse, but a family court mediation that is plainly going nowhere no longer has to run three hours before it can end.

In practice, that means three things for a Charleston-area family court client. The written record of what you agreed to comes from the mediator, on the day, rather than from one side's lawyer weeks later. Your guardian ad litem, if there is one, gets the same document at the same time. And getting the agreement in front of a judge is on you and your attorney; the mediator's job ends with the memorandum and the Proof of ADR. A mediated agreement in family court is not final until a judge has reviewed it and found it fair, and a case does not close because the parties shook hands in a conference room.

The circuit court rule is different. Under Rule 6(f), civil litigants must reduce their agreement to writing and sign it before the mediation adjourns, and a consent judgment or dismissal is then filed. The family court version now has its own procedure built around the Memorandum of Agreement and court approval, which fits the family court's independent duty to review agreements affecting children and support.

What happens when you do not

If the mediator declares an impasse, the case moves forward. Within ten days of the conference, the mediator files a Proof of ADR with the clerk under Rule 7(f). That filing is what clears the case for a merits hearing, whether the mediation settled everything, some things, or nothing. A partial agreement is common and useful: parties frequently resolve property and support and leave one custody question for the judge, which shortens the trial considerably.

Nothing said at the mediation comes into the trial. The judge will know the parties mediated because the Proof of ADR is in the file, but not what was offered or refused. Rule 7(b)(2) requires the mediator to tell the parties at the outset that they keep their right to trial if they do not settle, and that is exactly how it works.

How to get the most out of it

Mediation goes better when the parties arrive with the financial declarations exchanged, the real sticking points identified, and a realistic range in mind. It goes worse when one party treats it as a formality on the way to trial. Family court judges in Charleston, Berkeley, and Dorchester Counties see the same cases the mediators do, and a party who refuses to engage rarely gets a better result from the bench than the one that was available across the table.

Before you sign anything at mediation, read it. Under the amended rule the Memorandum of Agreement will be in your hands the same day, and the later post on buyer's remorse explains why a signed mediated agreement is very hard to walk away from.

Talk to a Charleston family law attorney

Family court mediation in South Carolina is a required step, and it is also the point where most contested cases actually get resolved. If you have a divorce or custody case headed to mediation and want to go in prepared, Klok Law Firm represents clients in family court mediation and litigation in Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley, and Dorchester Counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your case.

Frequently asked questions

Is mediation mandatory in South Carolina family court?

Yes, for contested issues. Rule 3(a) of the ADR Rules makes all contested issues in domestic relations actions subject to court-ordered mediation, and Rule 4(d) bars the court from scheduling a merits hearing until a Proof of ADR is filed. Temporary hearings, contempt proceedings, and DSS cases are exempt.

Do I have to attend mediation in person?

Rule 6(b) requires the parties and their attorneys of record to attend physically unless the mediator and all parties agree otherwise or the Chief Judge for Administrative Purposes approves a different arrangement. Online participation is permitted under Rule 5(h) if no party objects and the mediator and all parties agree.

Is what I say in mediation confidential?

Yes. Rule 8 makes mediation communications confidential and inadmissible, and the mediator cannot be compelled to testify. Confidentiality is waived as to the terms of a signed agreement, and evidence that was already admissible does not become protected because it was used at mediation.

What is a Memorandum of Agreement in family court mediation?

It is the written record of the agreement the mediator provides to the parties, their attorneys, and any guardian ad litem under Rule 6(g) as amended effective April 30, 2026. The parties then have the obligation to present that agreement to the family court for approval; it is not a final order on its own.

Is there a minimum length for family court mediation in South Carolina?

Not anymore. Until April 30, 2026, Rule 6(g) required at least three hours of mediation unless an agreement was reached sooner; the Supreme Court deleted that sentence effective that date. The mediator controls the conference and decides when an impasse exists. Many cases take more than one session.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. Court rules change and every case turns on its own facts. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

The letter from the Department of Social Services says the case is closed and the report was unfounded. If you were the parent under investigation, you probably expect that word to settle things. If you were the parent who called DSS, you may be wondering whether the finding will be held against you. In a Charleston, Berkeley or Dorchester County custody case, an unfounded DSS report is rarely the end of the story, and both parents need to understand why.

Short answer: An unfounded finding means DSS did not find enough evidence of abuse or neglect. It does not erase the report. The fact that a report was made, when, by whom and about what can still be relevant to custody, because South Carolina's best-interest factors ask whether a parent supports the child's relationship with the other parent or works against it. The DSS file itself is confidential, so getting it in front of a family court judge takes a specific process: the judge reads the records privately, decides what is relevant, and releases only that part under seal.

What "unfounded" actually means

South Carolina's Children's Code sorts every DSS report into one of three categories: suspected, indicated or unfounded. Under S.C. Code § 63-7-20, an unfounded report is one "for which there is not a preponderance of evidence to believe that the child is abused or neglected." An indicated report is the opposite: the facts support a finding that abuse or neglect "is more likely than not to have occurred." Every report starts as suspected, and § 63-7-930 gives DSS no more than sixty days to move it into one of the other two columns.

Unfounded is not a single verdict. Section 63-7-930(C) splits unfounded reports into four categories, and two of them matter here. A Category I report is one "in which abuse and neglect were ruled out following the investigation." A Category II report is one where "the investigation did not produce a preponderance of evidence" of abuse or neglect. The first says DSS looked and found nothing. The second says DSS could not get to more-likely-than-not. A judge weighing what a report says about the parent who made it can be expected to read those two labels differently, so the category on the closing letter is worth finding before anyone argues about what the report means.

Categories III and IV cover investigations DSS could not finish and information it never investigated. Neither says anything about whether the allegation was true.

Why an unfounded DSS report still matters in a custody case

When a family court decides custody in South Carolina, S.C. Code § 63-15-240(B) lists the factors the judge must consider (our post on what "best interests of the child" actually means walks through all seventeen). Three of them are about how the parents treat each other, and they are the reason a closed DSS file can matter:

• •"the actions of each parent to encourage the continuing parent-child relationship between the child and the other parent, as is appropriate, including compliance with court orders" (factor 6);
• •"the manipulation by or coercive behavior of the parents in an effort to involve the child in the parents' dispute" (factor 7); and
• •"any effort by one parent to disparage the other parent in front of the child" (factor 8).

A single report made in good faith about a real concern fits none of those. A series of reports against the same parent, each timed to a custody filing or a holiday exchange, each closed as unfounded, is a different picture. The argument is not that the reporting parent lied. It is that the reports are evidence of how that parent handles the other parent's role in the child's life, which is exactly what factors 6 through 8 ask about. The same history can also bear on that parent's credibility when the two accounts of everything else conflict.

Notice the limits built into the statute. Factor 8 is about disparagement "in front of the child," so a report made to a caseworker, out of the child's hearing, is not itself factor-8 conduct. Factor 14 separately asks "whether the child or a sibling of the child has been abused or neglected," which is about what happened to the child, not about who reported it. How much weight a pattern of unfounded reports gets is for the judge, who is the fact-finder in family court, and the answer depends on the facts of the case rather than on any fixed rule.

The Court of Appeals' 2023 decision in Greene v. Greene shows how this plays out. There, the mother reported the father to DSS and the police after a remark by the child; DSS twice closed its investigations as unfounded and law enforcement twice declined to act. Affirming an award of joint custody, the court recited that history and pointed to the guardian ad litem's testimony that the mother "would not be able to encourage a relationship between Child and Father," while also noting the consensus that both were fit and loving parents. The court announced no rule about unfounded reports; it weighed the whole record. That is the point. The reports and their outcome became part of the picture the judge looked at, not a verdict on either parent.

One more point for the parent who made the report. Section 63-7-390 protects a person who reports suspected abuse or neglect in good faith, and good faith is presumed. If you saw something that worried you and called DSS once, the statute is on your side. What draws a court's attention is repetition, timing and the absence of any new facts.

The confidentiality wall around DSS records

The DSS file is not a public record, and neither parent can walk in and copy it. Section 63-7-1990(A) makes all DSS reports and the information collected in an investigation confidential, and the statute strictly limits who may see them. For records of indicated cases, § 63-7-1990(B) lists the people and agencies DSS may give access to, and the list includes parents of the child named in the report and the person named as having abused or neglected the child.

Unfounded reports have their own section. Under § 63-7-940(A), DSS must keep the information for at least five years, it is exempt from the Freedom of Information Act, and "access to and use of information contained in unfounded cases must be strictly limited" to the purposes the statute lists. One of those purposes is the one that matters in a custody case: the information may be used "as evidence in a court proceeding, if admissible under the rules of evidence as determined by a judge of competent jurisdiction."

Read together, the two sections mean the same thing for a parent: a court can let the records in, but only a court. Trying to get them any other way, or passing them along once you have them, is a mistake the statute takes seriously. If someone has shared DSS records with you outside the case, talk to a lawyer before you do anything with them.

How DSS records reach the judge: in camera review and release under seal

The mechanism for parties to a private case is spelled out in § 63-7-1990(B)(11). DSS records may go to "the parties to a court proceeding in which information in the records is legally relevant and necessary for the determination of an issue before the court," but only "if before the disclosure the judge has reviewed the records in camera, has determined the relevancy and necessity of the disclosure, and has limited disclosure to legally relevant information under a protective order." That sentence is the whole procedure, and each clause is a step:

• •The motion. A parent asks the family court to obtain the DSS file and review it. Because DSS is not a party, the request usually pairs a motion with a subpoena to DSS as the records custodian under Rule 45, SCRCP. If DSS produced an incomplete file earlier, the same motion can ask the court to compel the complete, certified file.
• •In camera review. The judge reads the file privately, without either parent seeing it, and decides what in it is "legally relevant and necessary" to the issues actually before the court.
• •Release under seal. The judge releases only the relevant portions to the parties. Those pages are filed under seal, not in the public file, so a stranger pulling the court record will not find the allegations or the children's names.
• •The protective order. Under Rule 26(c), SCRCP, the court sets terms: the records are used only for this case, stay with counsel, the court, any guardian ad litem and any retained expert, and are returned or destroyed when the case ends.

Sealing is not automatic in South Carolina. Rule 41.1, SCRCP starts from the presumption that court records are open and puts the burden on the party asking to seal. But the rule speaks directly to this situation. In family court matters the judge "shall also consider whether documents ... relate to sensitive custody issues, and shall specifically balance the special interests of the child or children involved." Every order sealing documents must "set forth with specificity the reasons that require they be sealed," so a good proposed order names the interests being protected: the children, and any adult named in an allegation that was never substantiated.

Our earlier post on the Supreme Court's decision opening DSS adoption files to discovery covers the related point that confidentiality concerns are handled with protective orders rather than by refusing discovery altogether. The same thinking runs through § 63-7-1990(B)(11).

Three ways an unfounded report can come into evidence

Getting the records released is one step. Getting the report in front of the judge as evidence at the temporary or final hearing is a second one, and there are three routes. They can be used together.

1. The other parent admits it

Family court cases allow discovery, including requests for admission under Rule 36, SCRCP. (Whether discovery is available in a contempt action is a separate question we covered in No discovery in a family court contempt action.) A request for admission asks the other parent to admit, in writing, a specific fact: that they made a report to DSS on a given date, about a given person, and that DSS closed it as unfounded. If they admit it, the matter "is conclusively established unless the court on motion permits withdrawal or amendment of the admission." No DSS file is needed to prove it.

Two features of Rule 36 shape how this is used. A matter is also admitted if the other side does not respond within thirty days. And withdrawal is not easy: the court may permit it only when "the presentation of the merits of the action will be subserved thereby" and the party who obtained the admission cannot show prejudice. The rule caps a party at twenty requests, including subparts, without leave of court, so the DSS questions have to be chosen with care.

2. The certified DSS record

If the court has released the records, the record showing that a report was made and how it was classified can be offered under the public-records exception to the hearsay rule, Rule 803(8), SCRE, and a copy certified by the DSS custodian is self-authenticating under Rule 902(4), SCRE, so no caseworker has to testify to what the document is. There is a limit that matters. Rule 803(8) provides "that investigative notes involving opinions, judgments, or conclusions are not admissible." The date, the subject and the classification of a report are one thing; a caseworker's opinion of either parent written into the file is another, and the second is not carried in by this rule.

3. The reporting parent's own words

A parent's statements to a DSS investigator, recorded in the file, are that parent's own statements. Offered against that parent, they are not hearsay at all under Rule 801(d)(2), SCRE, which covers "the party's own statement." What a parent told the caseworker, and when, can be compared with what the same parent says under oath at the hearing.

What the evidence does and does not prove

An order admitting a prior unfounded report should say what it is for, and a careful lawyer asks for that language. The evidence goes to pattern, motive and credibility under the best-interest factors. It is not proof that the underlying allegation was false, and it is not proof that it was true. An unfounded classification means DSS did not find a preponderance of evidence; it is not a finding that nothing happened. If the truth of the allegation is itself in issue, the court decides that on the full record.

The same caution runs the other way. A parent who was reported and cleared should not assume the judge will treat the report as proof of the other parent's bad faith. The judge weighs it with everything else, including how the two of you have handled exchanges, communication and court orders since. If a visitation order has been ignored in the meantime, enforcing it is a separate track and usually a stronger one.

Two notes on process. Nothing here applies to a case DSS itself has brought; those proceedings, including removal and permanency planning, run on their own rules, and our post on DSS permanency planning hearings is the place to start for those. And the arguments in this article about how §§ 63-7-940 and 63-15-240 fit together are how we approach these cases; they are not settled appellate holdings, and a judge may see it differently.

What to do now

• •Find the closing letter and the category. Category I and Category II say different things. Keep every letter DSS sent.
• •Write down the timeline. The date of each report, what was pending in the custody case at the time, and what changed afterward. Pattern is about timing.
• •Do not share DSS records outside the case. Send them to your lawyer and no one else.
• •Keep reporting real concerns. If your child is in danger, call DSS. A good-faith report is protected, and nothing in this article should keep a parent from making one.
• •Raise it early. In camera review, sealing and Rule 36 requests all take time. They belong in the plan before the temporary hearing, not the week before trial.

Frequently asked questions

Does an unfounded DSS report go away? No. Under § 63-7-940(A), DSS keeps unfounded case information for at least five years. It is confidential and exempt from FOIA, but it exists, and a court can allow it to be used as evidence.

Can I get a copy of the DSS file on my own? For an indicated case, § 63-7-1990(B) allows DSS to give access to the parents of the child named in the report and to the person named as the alleged abuser, with some medical and mental-health material subject to notice. For a private custody case, the route to the full file is a court order after in camera review.

Will the DSS records be public once they are in my case? Not if the order is done properly. Section 63-7-1990(B)(11) requires a protective order, and Rule 41.1 lets the court seal the records, weighing the special interests of the children involved.

I reported my ex to DSS once because I was worried. Will that be used against me? A single good-faith report about a real concern is protected by § 63-7-390 and is not what the best-interest factors are aimed at. Repeated reports with no new facts, timed to the custody case, are a different matter.

Talk to a Charleston custody lawyer about DSS records

Deciding whether to put a DSS history in front of the judge, and doing it in a way that protects your children's privacy, is a judgment call that depends on the file. Klok Law Firm handles South Carolina family law in Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley, and Dorchester counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

Your husband was hit on Highway 17, or your wife fell at a store in Mount Pleasant, and the injury did not stop at the hospital door. You are now the driver, the nurse, the only parent on duty and the only paycheck, and the person you married is in pain and not himself or herself. When you ask about the claim, everyone talks about the injured spouse. Loss of consortium in South Carolina is the part of the law that talks about you.

The statute behind loss of consortium in South Carolina

S.C. Code § 15-75-20 is short. It says that “any person may maintain an action for damages arising from an intentional or tortious violation of the right to the companionship, aid, society and services of his or her spouse.” Four words carry the claim. Companionship and society are the relationship itself: the shared life, affection, conversation and intimacy of a marriage. Aid and services are the practical side: the income, the work around the house, the care of children and the help each spouse gives the other.

The statute has one proviso. The consortium claim “shall not include any damages recovered prior thereto by the injured spouse.” In plain terms, the two spouses cannot both be paid for the same loss. If the injured spouse has already recovered the medical bills or the lost wages, the other spouse cannot claim them again. What the consortium claim covers is what the uninjured spouse lost personally.

A separate claim, not a piece of your spouse's case

This is the point most people, and some adjusters, get wrong. In some states the spouse's claim is “derivative,” meaning it rises and falls with the injured person's case. South Carolina is not one of them. In Preer v. Mims, the South Carolina Supreme Court said plainly that “under South Carolina law, unlike that of some other states, loss of consortium is an independent action, not derivative,” and reversed a trial judge who had thrown out a wife's claim because her husband's had been dismissed.

The Court had said the same thing a decade earlier in Graham v. Whitaker: one spouse's cause of action for loss of consortium “is a different and distinct cause of action from one maintained by the injured spouse,” and a judgment against one spouse is not a bar to the other. In practice that means your claim is pleaded separately, valued separately and, if it comes to it, tried on its own evidence.

It also means an insurer that settles with your spouse has not settled with you unless you signed the release.

What a loss of consortium claim pays for

The damages are almost entirely what the law calls noneconomic. S.C. Code § 15-38-15, the statute that governs how fault is shared among defendants, lists “loss of companionship” alongside pain, suffering and loss of enjoyment as a form of noneconomic loss. The evidence is the marriage before and after: who did what in the household, what the couple did together, how the injured spouse's temperament, mobility or intimacy has changed, and what the uninjured spouse now does that a paid caregiver would otherwise do. Friends, family, a pastor and treating providers are often the best witnesses, because they saw both versions of the marriage.

The claim is strongest where the injury is lasting: a brain injury, a spinal cord injury, an amputation, chronic pain or a disfigurement that has changed how the couple lives. It exists for lesser injuries too, but its value follows the depth and length of the change. For the injured spouse's own losses, see our guide to the damages an injured person can claim in South Carolina.

Who can bring the claim, and when it starts

The statute speaks of a spouse. It does not mention partners who are not married, parents or children, and the claim it creates belongs to a husband or wife. The marriage must exist at the time of the injury; a couple who marry afterward do not acquire a consortium claim for an injury that predates the wedding, because the right the statute protects did not yet exist.

As to timing, the Court in Preer explained that the right of action “does not accrue until the loss of the services, society and companionship of the spouse has actually occurred,” which it defined as the point when the spouse sustained the injuries. For most crash and fall cases that is the day of the event, and the general three-year limitation in S.C. Code § 15-3-530 applies. Claims against a government defendant run on a shorter clock, and the safest course is to treat your claim's deadline as the same day as your spouse's and file both together.

If your spouse did not survive

Loss of consortium is a claim by a living spouse for a living spouse. Where the injury proves fatal, the law shifts to South Carolina's wrongful death statute, which gives the surviving spouse and family a different claim with its own rules. If you are reading this after a death, call us and we will explain how that claim works.

How the claim is handled in practice

Frequently asked questions

Is loss of consortium only for married couples in South Carolina?

The statute creates the claim for a “spouse,” and that is the claim this article describes. It does not mention unmarried partners, children or parents.

Can I bring the claim if my spouse settles?

Your claim is independent, so a settlement of your spouse's claim does not end yours unless you were a party to the release. Read every release before anyone signs it, and make sure your claim was valued, not folded in.

Do I have to file a separate lawsuit?

The claims are legally separate but are usually filed and tried together, with each spouse as a named plaintiff. What matters is that yours is pleaded and valued on its own.

How much is a loss of consortium claim worth?

There is no schedule. The value follows how much the marriage has changed and for how long, and it is decided by a jury on the evidence if the case does not settle. A lasting, disabling injury supports a substantial claim; a full recovery in a few weeks supports a modest one.

How long do I have?

Generally three years from the day your spouse was injured, and shorter where a government defendant is involved. File alongside your spouse's claim rather than treating yours as something to add later.

Talk to a Charleston personal injury attorney about your own claim

The spouse of a seriously injured person carries the injury too, and South Carolina law says so. Klok Law evaluates both spouses' claims together in serious injury cases across Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley and Dorchester counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

Every custody decision in South Carolina turns on one phrase. You will hear it from your lawyer, read it in the pleadings, and hear the judge say it from the bench. What almost nobody explains is that the phrase is not vague judicial language. It is a statute, and it contains a list.

The standard is a statute, not a feeling

S.C. Code § 63-15-240(B) governs, and its opening words matter as much as the list that follows:

“In issuing or modifying a custody order, the court must consider the best interest of the child, which may include, but is not limited to: …”

Three things there are doing work. The court must consider the child's best interest — it is not optional. The listed factors are what that consideration may include, so the court is not required to make a finding on every one. And the list is expressly not limited to what follows, which is why the seventeenth factor is a catch-all.

Note also that the section applies to a modification as much as to an original award. The words are “issuing or modifying.”

The seventeen factors

Here is what the statute lists. The wording below tracks the section closely.

1. 1The temperament and developmental needs of the child.
2. 2The capacity and the disposition of the parents to understand and meet the needs of the child.
3. 3The preferences of each child.
4. 4The wishes of the parents as to custody.
5. 5The past and current interaction and relationship of the child with each parent, the child's siblings, and any other person, including a grandparent, who may significantly affect the best interest of the child.
6. 6The actions of each parent to encourage the continuing parent-child relationship between the child and the other parent, as is appropriate, including compliance with court orders.
7. 7The manipulation by or coercive behavior of the parents in an effort to involve the child in the parents' dispute.
8. 8Any effort by one parent to disparage the other parent in front of the child.
9. 9The ability of each parent to be actively involved in the life of the child.
10. 10The child's adjustment to his or her home, school, and community environments.
11. 11The stability of the child's existing and proposed residences.
12. 12The mental and physical health of all individuals involved — except that a disability of a proposed custodial parent or other party, in and of itself, must not be determinative of custody unless the proposed custodial arrangement is not in the best interest of the child.
13. 13The child's cultural and spiritual background.
14. 14Whether the child or a sibling of the child has been abused or neglected.
15. 15Whether one parent has perpetrated domestic violence or child abuse, or the effect on the child of the actions of an abuser if any domestic violence has occurred between the parents, between a parent and another individual, or between the parent and the child.
16. 16Whether one parent has relocated more than one hundred miles from the child's primary residence in the past year, unless the parent relocated for safety reasons.
17. 17Other factors as the court considers necessary.

Four of them are about how you behave during the case

Read factors six, seven and eight together and a pattern appears. The statute is not only asking who is the better parent in the abstract. It is asking how each parent is conducting themselves right now, while the case is pending.

The court is directed to consider whether you encourage the child's relationship with the other parent, including compliance with court orders. It is directed to consider manipulation or coercive behaviour aimed at pulling the child into the dispute. And it is directed to consider any effort to disparage the other parent in front of the child.

This is where clients most often damage themselves, usually by text message. A parent who is doing well on stability and involvement can lose ground on three separate statutory factors in a single evening.

Those behaviours have consequences beyond the custody analysis. Our post on how to enforce a visitation order in South Carolina covers what happens when one parent stops following the order.

What the list does not say

Just as useful is what is absent.

What the court can order

Subsection (A) of the same section lists what a custody order may include: approval of a parenting plan; sole custody to one parent with appropriate parenting time for the other; joint custody; or other arrangements the court determines to be in the child's best interest.

Where joint custody is ordered, the statute requires the order to spell out two things — the residential arrangements with each parent according to the needs of each child, and how consultations and communications between the parents will happen on major decisions about health, medical and dental care, education, extracurricular activities and religious training.

Our post on joint custody in South Carolina covers when courts order those arrangements.

How to prepare

Frequently asked questions

Does the court have to make a finding on all seventeen factors?

No. The statute says the analysis “may include, but is not limited to” the listed factors. The court considers what is relevant to the case in front of it, and factor seventeen lets it consider anything else it finds necessary.

Do mothers get preference in South Carolina?

Not under the statute. Section 63-15-240(B) never mentions the sex of a parent.

How much does what my child wants count?

It is one of the seventeen factors. The statute sets no age and does not make the preference controlling. In practice its weight rises as a child gets older and more mature, but it never becomes the decision.

Does this apply if we already have an order?

Yes. The section applies to “issuing or modifying” a custody order, so the same factors frame a modification. See our post on whether custody and visitation awards can be modified in South Carolina for what a modification requires.

Is a parent with a disability at a disadvantage?

Not on that basis alone. The statute states that a disability, in and of itself, must not be determinative of custody unless the proposed custodial arrangement is not in the best interest of the child.

Talk to a Charleston custody lawyer

Custody cases are won on the facts that map onto the statute, and lost on the ones a parent did not realise were being weighed. Klok Law Firm handles South Carolina family law in Charleston, Mount Pleasant, Berkeley, and Dorchester counties. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

Most of us learned to sign court papers one way, in ink, and most clerks' offices in the Lowcountry still expect it. The pandemic changed the rule and the change stuck, but the practice at the counter did not always follow. This post sets out what the Supreme Court actually adopted, where the wet-ink requirement genuinely survives, what to do with a client or witness who cannot get to a notary, and how far South Carolina will go in honoring a notarization done electronically, or by video, somewhere else.

The short answer on electronic signatures in South Carolina family court: since May 2, 2022, any pleading, motion or other paper that a rule requires a party or lawyer to sign may be signed electronically under Rule 614 of the South Carolina Appellate Court Rules. The exception is a paper for which the law requires an original signature, and the rule names the example itself: an affidavit. An affidavit still has to be sworn before a notary in the notary's physical presence, but that notarization can itself be electronic if the notary is registered as a South Carolina electronic notary, and a notarization done in another state under that state's law is recognized here. Three of the finer points below are arguments rather than settled law, and each is marked.

Electronic signatures in South Carolina family court after Rule 614

From April 2020 through the spring of 2022 the Supreme Court's trial-court operations orders provided that "[a] lawyer may sign documents using 's/[typed name of lawyer],' a signature stamp, or a scanned or other electronic version of the lawyer's signature." The last of those orders expired on May 5, 2022. Three days earlier, by order dated May 2, 2022, the Court confirmed that the General Assembly had let the ninety-day review period run without objection, and the provision took effect as Rule 614, SCACR:

Where a rule of court requires that a pleading, motion, or other paper be signed by the party or the party's attorney, the document may be signed using 's/ [typed name of person],' a signature stamp, or a scanned or other electronic version of the person's signature, except in cases where an original signature is required by law, such as an affidavit. Regardless of form, the signature shall act as a certificate that the person has read the document; that to the best of the person's knowledge, information, and belief there is good ground to support it; and that the document is not interposed for delay.

The same order amended Rule 11(a), SCRCP, which now provides that "[t]he written or electronic signature of an attorney or party constitutes a certificate" under the rule, and the note to the 2022 amendment records that the earlier limitation of electronic signatures to e-filed papers "has been deleted from the rule." Rule 11 applies in family court through Rule 2(a), SCRFC; our earlier post on how the two rulebooks interact covers that mechanism. The practical result: a summons and complaint, an answer, a motion, a financial declaration's cover pleading, a proposed order submitted by counsel, all may carry a typed, stamped or scanned signature, and a clerk's office that returns one for lack of wet ink is contradicting a Supreme Court rule rather than enforcing one.

Where wet ink still matters: the affidavit exception

Rule 614 carves out "cases where an original signature is required by law, such as an affidavit." Rule 11(c), SCRCP, defines an affidavit as a written statement "sworn to or affirmed before an officer authorized to administer oaths," and the notary statutes supply the presence requirement. Under S.C. Code § 26-1-90(C)(1), a notary may not perform a notarial act if the signer "is not in the notary's presence at the time the notarial act is performed"; § 26-1-5(13) defines personal appearance as the signer and the notary being "in the physical presence of one another so that they may freely see and communicate"; and § 26-1-90(E) provides that a notary "shall not certify or authenticate a photograph or photocopy." In family court that reaches every Rule 21 affidavit, the sworn financial declaration under Rule 20, verifications, and affidavits of service.

The Supreme Court has shown what happens when the presence requirement is skipped. In In re Woods, 390 S.C. 446, 702 S.E.2d 562 (2010), a family court temporary-hearing affidavit from the client's out-of-state mother had been mailed to her and notarized by the lawyer's staff member; the lawyer "admits the document was not signed or affirmed by the client's mother in the notary's physical presence." In a separate matter the same office had a client sign a verification of a complaint that had not yet been drafted. The Court accepted an agreement for discipline by consent, issued a public reprimand, and required the lawyer and each employee to read the Secretary of State’s Notary Public Manual. The affidavit rules are enforced against the lawyer whose office notarizes them, and that is the reason to take the exception seriously even where the clerk's office does not.

Can you file a copy of a notarized affidavit?

This is an argument, not a decided question. Nothing in Rule 11(c) or Chapter 1 of Title 26 says the paper filed with the court must be the notary's ink original rather than a scan or photocopy of it; the statutes govern the act of notarizing, not what is filed afterward. The Clerk of Court Manual's family court chapter tells the clerk to review subsequent filings "for case number and proper signature" and to "return for signature" only where a required signature is "missing"; a copied signature is not a missing one. And under Barnes v. State, 433 S.C. 399, 859 S.E.2d 260 (2021), whether a filed paper complies with a requirement of form is "a question of law reserved for a judge," not a ground on which a clerk may refuse to file. Our reading is that a scanned affidavit that was in fact signed and sworn before a notary is a valid affidavit whose copy is on file, and that its weight is for the judge. We found no South Carolina decision holding a filed copy invalid because it was a copy, and none holding the opposite. Keep the original; a judge or opposing counsel can ask for it.

Electronic notarization in South Carolina: in person, but no ink

Since May 18, 2021 the Electronic Notary Public Act, 2021 Act No. 85, has allowed a South Carolina notary to perform electronic notarizations after registering with the Secretary of State, paying a fifty-dollar fee, passing the electronic notary test and selecting an approved technology vendor (§ 26-2-20(A)). The signer signs the electronic document electronically; the notary attaches an electronic certificate carrying the notary's name as commissioned, electronic seal, commission expiration date and electronic signature (§ 26-2-60(A)). The Uniform Electronic Transactions Act supplies the legal effect: "A law requiring a signature or record to be notarized, acknowledged, verified, or made under oath is satisfied if the electronic signature of the person authorized to perform those acts . . . is attached to or logically associated with the signature or record" (§ 26-6-110).

The limit is presence. Section 26-2-50(A)(1) allows an electronic notarization only if the principal "appears in person before the electronic notary public at the time of notarization," and the Secretary of State describes the process the same way: electronic notarization "requires that the notary public and the signer must be in the presence of one another when the notarization takes place." South Carolina has not adopted remote online notarization. For a client who can come to the office, though, a staff member registered as an electronic notary lets the firm produce affidavits, verifications and financial declarations with no ink anywhere.

One open question, flagged. Rule 614 excepts papers for which "an original signature is required by law." Whether an electronically signed and electronically notarized affidavit satisfies that phrase has not been decided by a South Carolina court. Section 26-6-110 is the answer we would give a judge, and in our view the right one, but it is an argument until a court says so.

Out-of-state notaries and remote online notarization

The out-of-state witness, the affiant in Woods, is the everyday problem, and the Uniform Recognition of Acknowledgments Act, S.C. Code § 26-3-10 et seq., has answered the simple version of it for decades. Section 26-3-20 defines notarial acts to include "the administering of oaths and affirmations . . . and attesting documents" and provides that they may be performed outside this State "for use in this State with the same effect as if performed by a notary public of this State" by, among others, a notary public "authorized to perform notarial acts in the place in which the act is performed." Section 26-3-30 makes the notary's signature and title prima facie evidence of authority. A witness in Charlotte who signs before a North Carolina notary has given you a South Carolina affidavit.

Remote online notarization changes the arithmetic. The National Association of Secretaries of State counts forty-seven states and the District of Columbia with a law allowing remote e-notarization. South Carolina and Georgia are not among them; Mississippi's 2020 notarial-acts statute permits electronic notarization only with the signer physically present; and California's law does not fully take effect until 2030. Alabama has had it since 2021. North Carolina enacted a Remote Electronic Notarization part (G.S. 10B-134 to 10B-134.26) in 2022, but the Secretary of State has not yet issued the first license under it; in the meantime North Carolina notaries use the emergency video notarization statute, which the General Assembly extended "to 12:01 AM on July 1, 2027 or until the first license is issued for Remote Electronic Notarizations." The pattern in those states is that the notary must be inside the commissioning state and the signer may be anywhere. Florida says an online notary "physically located in this state may perform an online notarization . . . regardless of whether the principal or any witnesses are physically located in this state" (Fla. Stat. § 117.265(1)); Virginia says an electronic notarial act "shall be deemed to have been performed within the Commonwealth and is governed by Virginia law" (Va. Code § 47.1-13(D)).

Whether South Carolina honors such an affidavit is an argument, not a holding. Read with the deeming language, a Florida or Virginia remote notarization is a notarial act performed in Florida or Virginia by a notary authorized to perform it there, and § 26-3-20 gives it "the same effect as if performed by a notary public of this State." That is the better reading in our view. The counter-argument is that the act was "performed" where the signer sat, and if the signer sat in Mount Pleasant, by a notary with no South Carolina authority; another state's characterization of where its notary acted does not bind a South Carolina judge, and no South Carolina appellate court has applied § 26-3-20 to a remote notarization. The fact pattern most likely to draw an objection is the South Carolina client signing from home before an out-of-state online notary. The fact pattern least likely to is the out-of-state witness who appears by video before a notary in her own state, which is the Woods problem solved lawfully.

Practice pointers

• •Sign pleadings, motions and proposed orders electronically if you want to, and cite Rule 614, SCACR, and Rule 11(a), SCRCP, if the counter objects. Under Barnes the question of form is the judge's in any event.
• •Treat every affidavit and every sworn financial declaration as requiring physical presence before the notary, whether the notary works with paper or electronically. Mailing a document out for signature and notarizing it on return is the conduct Woods was disciplined for.
• •Consider registering a staff notary as an electronic notary with the Secretary of State. For clients who can come in, it removes ink from the file entirely.
• •For an out-of-state affiant, the cleanest route remains a notary in the affiant's own state, in person; § 26-3-20 has recognized it since 1972. A remote online notarization by a notary commissioned in a RON state is the second route, and we would cite § 26-3-20 and the other state's deeming provision if it were challenged.
• •Keep the electronic certificate, the audit trail and, for a scanned affidavit, the ink original. If an affidavit is attacked, the notary's authority and identity verification are what § 26-3-30 and the RON statutes turn on.
• •Remember that Rule 21's affidavit and page limits, described in our post on the 2025 amendments to Rule 21, apply regardless of how the affidavit is signed.

Frequently asked questions

Can a family court clerk refuse a pleading because the signature is typed, stamped or scanned?

Not under Rule 614, SCACR, which has permitted exactly those signatures since May 2, 2022, or Rule 11(a), SCRCP, as amended the same day. The exception is a paper for which the law requires an original signature, such as an affidavit.

Does an affidavit still need a wet-ink signature?

It needs to be sworn before a notary in the notary's physical presence. That can be done in ink, or electronically before a registered South Carolina electronic notary. Whether the electronic version satisfies Rule 614's "original signature" exception is an open question; the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act says a law requiring an oath is satisfied by an electronic notarization.

Can I file a scanned copy of a notarized affidavit?

No rule or statute we found requires the ink original to be the paper on file, and under Barnes whether the copy is sufficient is the judge's question, not the clerk's. That is our reading rather than a holding. Keep the original.

Is remote online notarization available in South Carolina?

No. South Carolina allows in-person electronic notarization only. The National Association of Secretaries of State counts forty-seven states and the District of Columbia with remote e-notarization laws; Georgia and Mississippi are the other holdouts, and California's law is not fully effective until 2030.

Will South Carolina honor an affidavit notarized by video in another state?

Section 26-3-20 recognizes notarial acts performed outside the State by a notary authorized in the place where the act is performed, and RON states deem the act performed where the notary sits. Our reading is that this recognizes the affidavit, but no South Carolina court has decided it, and a South Carolina signer using an out-of-state online notary is the case most likely to be challenged.

Working with Klok Law in the Lowcountry family courts

Klok Law appears in all three Lowcountry family courthouses and handles family law matters in Charleston, Berkeley and Dorchester Counties, including referrals and co-counsel arrangements. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

If you practice in more than one Lowcountry family courthouse, you have had this experience. The paper is handed back across the counter. The coversheet is the wrong one. The pages are stapled rather than clipped. The signature is a scan rather than wet ink. "We don't accept it that way here." Nothing in the Family Court Rules or the Rules of Civil Procedure says any of that, and the practice in Horry is not the practice in Charleston County. Our office has run into it in all three, and colleagues tell us the same.

This post collects the authority for the next time a clerk of court rejected a filing in your office. The short version: the Supreme Court has said twice, in Miller v. State (2008) and Barnes v. State (2021), that a clerk's duty to docket what is delivered is ministerial and that whether a paper is on the proper form is a question for a judge. It said in Spartanburg County DSS v. Padgett (1988), a family court case, that a court may not vary practice by local rule, and on February 13, 2026 the Chief Justice struck every local rule in the circuit and family courts that he had not approved. Whether a clerk's counter practice is an "unapproved local rule" under that order is an argument rather than a holding, and the post says so where it matters. There is also a suggestion at the end for the Family Law Section.

Barnes v. State: the clerk accepts, the judge decides

Barnes v. State, 433 S.C. 399, 859 S.E.2d 260 (2021), is a per curiam order signed by all five justices. A self-represented litigant mailed an application to the Charleston County clerk's office before his one-year deadline. The clerk returned it because he had used the wrong form. His refiled application on the correct form arrived thirty-seven days after the deadline, and the lower court dismissed it as untimely. The matter was a post-conviction application rather than a family court pleading, but the Court's language is addressed to clerks of court generally, and nothing in it turns on the kind of case.

The Court took "this opportunity to remind the clerks of court of their ministerial duty to docket filings irrespective of potential procedural flaws that may exist," and then said this:

Unless specifically authorized by statute or a court rule, a clerk of court may not exercise any judicial power reserved for a judge. . . . Accordingly, a clerk of court does not have the authority to reject a filing based on ostensible or perceived failures, including whether the document is contained on the proper form. . . . Instead, the clerk shall accept the filing, thereby permitting the court to decide any issues the parties may have with it.

Two further points in Barnes are the ones to carry to the counter. First, the Court held the application was filed when the clerk received it, not when the corrected version arrived; the rejection did not move the filing date. Second, the Court adopted the Fifth Circuit's formulation in Hooker v. Sivley that "[a] clerk of court may not reject a pleading for lack of conformity with requirements of form; only a judge may do that," and framed the question of form as one that a judge must consider "in light of the flexible pleading and amendment provisions of the South Carolina Rules of Civil Procedure." Rule 15(a), SCRCP, and Rule 2(a), SCRFC, do the rest of the work in family court; our earlier post on how the two rulebooks interact in family court covers that ground.

Miller v. State: the 2008 order Barnes built on

Barnes quotes Miller v. State, 377 S.C. 99, 659 S.E.2d 492 (2008), a unanimous order on a petition for a writ of mandamus against the Richland County Clerk of Court. The clerk had argued, among other things, that the petition at issue was not on the prescribed form, was untimely and lacked merit. The Court denied mandamus on the facts, then took "this opportunity to emphasize the Clerk of Court's duties," describing the clerk's ministerial task as verifying that the petition "contains a case caption, a proper county designation, and the signature of the filing party," and adding that "[t]he Clerk of Court's duty is not discretionary." The sentence Barnes lifted from it is the one to quote: "it is not within the Clerk of Court's authority to refuse to perform her duty based on her opinion that a filing lacks legal merit or is untimely." The matter was a habeas petition; again, nothing in the reasoning depends on that.

Padgett: the family court case on local rules

The February 2026 order quotes a case the family law bar should know by name. In Spartanburg County Department of Social Services v. Padgett, 296 S.C. 79, 370 S.E.2d 872 (1988), the Chief Administrative Judge for the family courts of the Seventh Circuit had posted a "Notice to Attorneys" in the Spartanburg courthouse announcing that attorneys who requested insufficient court time would face sanctions. A family court judge then held an attorney in contempt for running thirty minutes past the hour she had requested. The Supreme Court reversed and vacated the contempt finding, and it did so on Article V.

The Court held "that by reason of the mandates of Article V of the South Carolina Constitution, a family court may not adopt its own rules of administration or practice and procedure. Such local, non uniform rules are inconsistent with both the provisions and purpose of the constitutional mandate and are therefore unconstitutional and void." Then the sentence the Chief Justice quoted in 2026: "We take this occasion to admonish the trial bench of this state that there is no place in the unified judicial system for local rules which have the effect of varying the administrative and procedural rules of practice from circuit to circuit and court to court."

Three things about Padgett matter here. It is a family court case. The "rule" was a posted notice, not something styled as a rule. And the Court tied the holding to the purpose of Article V: that every participant, "be he litigant, lawyer or judge, can find in the Constitution, statutes and rules of this Court a court system which is the same in each county of this state." Article V, §§ 1 and 4 vest the judicial power in a unified judicial system and the rulemaking power for administration, practice and procedure in the Supreme Court.

The February 13, 2026 order: every unapproved local rule is stricken

Chief Justice Kittredge's order titled Re: Local Rules in Circuit and Family Courts, Appellate Case No. 2026-000323, restates that "[w]e operate in a unified judicial system" and that "the power to make rules governing administration, practice, and procedure is vested in the Supreme Court," quotes Padgett and State v. Duncan, 274 S.C. 379, 264 S.E.2d 421 (1980), in which the Court held a circuit court’s own discovery rule “unconstitutional and void” because “[t]he promulgation of rules by the respective circuits is inconsistent with the constitutional mandate,” and explains that the Chief Justice asked the chief administrative judges of the circuit and family courts to submit their local rules for his approval. Four survived: two Richland County common pleas orders, an Eighth Circuit memorandum on juvenile detention hearings, and a Thirteenth Circuit memorandum for common pleas cases. Then: "All other local rules are hereby stricken and shall have no effect." Footnote 1 forecloses the labeling argument: "Local rules are sometimes issued as memoranda or administrative orders."

Rules approved since are posted on the Judicial Branch's approved local rules page. As of this writing there is one, a Fifteenth Circuit rule on automatic reference of certain foreclosure matters to the master in equity. Nothing on the approved list, and nothing in the order, concerns how family court papers must be stacked or fastened, which coversheet must be attached, or whether a wet-ink signature is required in Charleston or Horry County.

The order did not arrive alone. Three months earlier, on November 13, 2025, the Chief Justice had reissued the order defining the authority of family court chief judges for administrative purposes, rescinding every prior version. Its closing paragraph tells the family court bench that local rules and individual judge requirements not authorized by the uniform rules "are strictly forbidden," and that a proposed local rule "shall not be utilized without the prior approval of the Chief Justice." The February 2026 order is the enforcement of that instruction: the chief judges were asked to submit what they had, and everything not approved was struck.

The argument: is a clerk's counter practice an unapproved local rule?

Be careful here. This is an argument, not a decided question. No appellate court has held that a clerk's filing practice is a "local rule" within the meaning of the February 2026 order. Padgett and the 2026 order both concern rules issued by judges, and the order was directed to the bench; it does not appear to have reached the clerks' offices at all.

Read together, though, the authorities point one way. Padgett treated a posted "Notice to Attorneys" as a local rule, and footnote 1 of the 2026 order says memoranda and administrative orders count, so the label on a counter requirement does not save it. A requirement that appears in no Supreme Court rule and on no approved list is, on that reading, a local rule that "shall have no effect." And even if a counter practice is not a "rule" at all, Barnes and Miller do the work without it: the clerk's authority to reject exists only where a statute or a court rule "specifically authorize[s]" it, so the question to put to the office is which statute or Supreme Court rule authorizes the requirement. If the answer is none, Barnes says the clerk accepts and a judge decides.

One honest qualification before the argument goes any further. Some form requirements are the Supreme Court's own. The financial declaration is a Supreme Court form, and the notice and filing deadlines that arrived with the 2025 amendments to Rule 21 are real, so noncompliance has consequences at the hearing even though it is not the clerk's to enforce by refusal. And Miller drew the clerk's ministerial checklist from the Clerk of Court Manual, which raises the question the next section answers: what does the Manual actually tell a family court clerk to require?

What the Clerk of Court Manual actually requires in family court

The Clerk of Court and Register of Deeds Manual is not a local rule. It was approved by a Supreme Court administrative order issued "[p]ursuant to the provisions of S. C. CONST. Art. V, § 4" for use "by all County Clerks of Court and their staff in the South Carolina Judicial System," and it supersedes every earlier manual. It is statewide guidance from the same office the February 2026 order came from, and it is the document Miller cited for what a clerk is supposed to check. So if a counter requirement is in the Manual, the Article V argument does not reach it. We read Chapter 7, the family court chapter, to see which requirements are.

Three are. First, the fee. If a filing fee is required and not attached, the Manual tells the clerk to "return the document to the filing party and advise that the fee is required." Second, the motion coversheet. Court Administration memoranda incorporated in the Manual provide that the Motion and Order Information Form and Coversheet "is to be submitted with every motion or proposed order filed with the clerk of court or presented to a judge at chambers," whether or not a motion fee applies. Third, for subsequent filings such as answers, counterclaims and financial declarations, the clerk is to "[r]eview papers for case number and proper signature. If signature is required and missing, return for signature. If docket number is missing, return to the sender so that the docket number can be added."

Now the things that are not there. The family court coversheet is a "should," not a "must": "A Family Court Coversheet should be included with the summons and complaint or petition," and the Manual says nothing about a coversheet on an answer or any other subsequent filing. Nothing in Chapter 7 requires an original or wet-ink signature; the initiating-document task is to "[r]eview documents for required signatures (plaintiff, petitioner, or attorney)," and the subsequent-filing task is to check for a "proper signature." The contrast with the common pleas chapter is instructive, because that chapter's checklist does say "Original signature of filing party." The family court chapter does not. Nothing anywhere in Chapter 7 addresses staples, clips, page order or how papers are fastened.

The Manual's own instinct, where it speaks, is the Barnes instinct. When an affidavit of indigency is filed instead of a fee, "the clerk must accept the summons and complaint or petition. The court will determine later whether a fee should be assessed." When the attorney and the clerk disagree about a motion fee, "the judge is to make the final decision," and the clerk marks the coversheet as contested. For orders of protection, "[t]he clerks do not screen petitions for relief and must accept any petition a petitioner wishes to file." Chapter 7 also opens with the reason file-stamping matters: every paper "must be file stamped immediately to provide a record of when the document was received."

One more open question, and it is a real one. The Manual was approved in 2014 and Barnes was decided in 2021. Barnes says a clerk may exercise judicial power only where "specifically authorized by statute or a court rule," and a Supreme Court administrative order approving a manual is neither on its face. Whether the Manual's "return for signature" instruction for subsequent filings survives Barnes unchanged, or has to be read as a request to cure rather than a refusal to file, has not been decided. What is not open is the practical point: a coversheet on an answer, a wet-ink signature, and the way the pages are fastened have no source in the Manual at all, and those are the requirements we run into most.

Wet-ink signatures: a short note

The wet-ink requirement deserves its own treatment, and it has one: our companion post on electronic signatures, electronic notarization and out-of-state notaries in family court. The one-paragraph version is that since May 2, 2022, Rule 614, SCACR, has permitted a pleading, motion or other paper to be signed with "s/", a signature stamp, or a scanned or electronic signature, "except in cases where an original signature is required by law, such as an affidavit," and Rule 11(a), SCRCP was amended the same day to match. A clerk who returns a pleading for lack of ink is contradicting a Supreme Court rule; an affidavit is the genuine exception.

What to do when the clerk of court rejected a filing

• •Get the rejection in writing, with the date the office received the paper. Under Barnes the date of receipt is the filing date, and the rejection letter is how you prove it. Keep the returned original, the envelope and the courier slip.
• •Cure and refile the same day. Standing on principle while a deadline runs is a poor trade for the client. Fix the coversheet or the signature, refile, and preserve the argument.
• •If a deadline passed between rejection and refiling, move for an order deeming the filing complete on the date of receipt, citing Barnes and Miller. The difference between a timely and an untimely post-trial motion is the difference between a tolled and an expired appeal window, as our post on timely Rule 59(e) motions discusses.
• •Ask the office to identify the rule. Not as a confrontation; as a question. "Which rule requires that?" is often enough, and the answer tells you whether you are dealing with a Supreme Court requirement or a local habit.
• •Escalate through the chief administrative judge for the family court in the circuit. The 2026 order's second footnote points to the November 13, 2025 order on the duties of family court chief judges, which is blunt on the point: "Local rules and individual judge requirements that are not authorized by the uniform rules are strictly forbidden. If a local family court or individual judge believes a local rule is essential, the local court or judge may submit the proposed local rule to the Chief Justice. Such local rule shall not be utilized without the prior approval of the Chief Justice." The same order makes the chief judge the officer who directs the clerks of court on record-keeping and who informs the clerks of judicial assignments, so the chief judge is both the approval channel and the natural person to hear that a counter practice has no approved source.

A suggestion for the Family Law Section

Individual letters from individual firms do not change counter practice, and none of us wants to be the lawyer who made an enemy of the office that stamps our papers. A request from the Family Law Section would carry more weight than any one firm writing on its own, and the Manual gives the Section a way to ask that is a request for clarification rather than a complaint. The ask is modest: that the Section ask Court Administration to confirm which family court counter requirements have a source in the Clerk of Court Manual or a Court Administration memorandum and which do not, whether the February 13, 2026 order should be communicated to the clerks of court, and whether a short statewide statement of what a family court clerk may and may not require at the counter, consistent with Barnes, Miller and Chapter 7 of the Manual, is worth issuing. Only Court Administration can answer the first question authoritatively, and an answer would resolve most counter disputes on its own. There is also a ready-made audience for it. By order dated December 12, 2024, the Chief Justice charged the Clerks of Court and Registers of Deeds Advisory Committee with, among other duties, "maintaining the Clerk of Court and Registers of Deeds Manual by reviewing policies and procedures to determine whether revisions are required for clarity, efficiency, or effectiveness," and it meets in February, June and October. A Section request that the Committee take up a short family court filing-acceptance section, one that restates Barnes, Rule 614 and what Chapter 7 already says, is exactly the kind of item that order contemplates. If you have run into the same thing, let the Family Law Section know so that they may review to determine if the Section would support taking up this issue.

Frequently asked questions

Can a clerk of court refuse a family court pleading for using the wrong form?

Barnes says no: a clerk "does not have the authority to reject a filing based on ostensible or perceived failures, including whether the document is contained on the proper form." The exception is a statute or court rule that specifically authorizes the clerk to act, so the first question is always which rule the office is relying on.

If the clerk sent the filing back and the deadline has since passed, what is the filing date?

In Barnes the Supreme Court held the paper was filed when the clerk received it, even though the corrected version arrived after the deadline. Whether a family court reaches the same result on your facts is for the judge, which is why the written rejection with the receipt date matters.

Is a clerk's office practice a "local rule" under the February 2026 order?

That is an open argument, not settled law. Padgett treated a posted notice as a local rule and the order says memoranda and administrative orders count, but both concern rules issued by judges, and no court has applied the order to a clerk's counter practice.

Does the Clerk of Court Manual let a family court clerk refuse a filing?

Chapter 7 tells the clerk to return a filing that lacks a required fee, and to return a subsequent filing that is missing a required signature or the case number. It requires a motion coversheet on every motion and proposed order. It says the family court coversheet "should" accompany a summons and complaint, requires no coversheet on an answer, says nothing about original or wet-ink signatures, and says nothing about how papers are fastened. Whether even the Manual's "return for signature" instruction survives Barnes is an open question.

Does this mean form requirements do not matter in family court?

No. Supreme Court forms and rules, including the financial declaration and the Rule 21 deadlines, bind you, and a judge can act on noncompliance. The point of Barnes is who decides, and when: the judge, after the paper is on file.

Working with Klok Law in the Lowcountry family courts

Klok Law appears in all three Lowcountry family courthouses and handles family law matters in Charleston, Berkeley and Dorchester Counties, including referrals and co-counsel arrangements. Call Klok Law at (843) 701-1695 to discuss your options.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your specific situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.

This article is for general information only and is not legal advice. For advice about your situation, contact Klok Law at (843) 701-1695.