CONSENT ORDERS

If you and your ex-partner are in agreement in relation to parenting and/or property matters, make it binding with Consent Orders.

At Law By Dan we can help you today drafting your agreement in relation to property and/or parenting matters into legally binding consent orders.

How Australia Lawyers Can Help You Today

Save Loads of Money

Great news that you have reached an agreement in your family law matter. The next step is to make it official. We can cost-effectively draft your agreement into a legally binding consent order.

Get Consent Orders Promptly

It usually takes us less than 12 hours to have one of our family lawyers consider your agreement.

Get Certainty About Your Legal Fees

We offer a fixed fee in relation to all consent orders.

Application for Consent Orders

Did you know that if you and your ex-partner agree, you can easily finalise the parenting or property arrangements by simply completing an application for consent orders, saving thousands of dollars?

What are Consent Orders?

Basically, think of a Consent Order as being an order made by the Family Court that makes an agreement between you and your ex-partner formal and binding. Without such an order, any agreement that you and your ex-partner make relating to property or parenting matters will not be legally binding.

Does it Really Have to Be Legally Binding Though?

People can often make agreements in the belief that they won’t change their minds. But as circumstances change, the agreement may become vulnerable to breaches and consequently, you have very little recourse to do anything about it.

For example, you and your ex-partner now agree on the parenting arrangements of your children. However, when one partner meets somebody else and the dynamics change, relationships can fray, and rash decisions may be made that are no longer consistent with the parenting order. In contrast, if you had consent orders, then you would simply lean on the court to intervene to ensure compliance.

When Can We Apply for Consent Orders?

You can only apply for consent orders in circumstances where you and your ex-partner agree on the specifics. You can make an application for consent orders at any time.

What Do Consent Orders Look Like?

Usually, a consent order is an agreement that contains about 25 or so pages. If the consent orders relate to property matters, then you both need to disclose to each other your personal financial information (assets etc).

In relation to consent orders that relate to parenting matters, you may need to disclose such things as:

• medical reports
• school reports
• and possibly information from the child (writing, drawings etc)

How Easy is it to Get Consent Orders from the Court?

In matters that relate to property, the court will only make a consent order in circumstances where it believes that the agreement is “just and equitable.”

In parenting matters, it only considers whether or not the consent orders are in the “best interests of the child.”

What Happens if the Court Rejects our Application for Consent Orders?

The court will provide its reasons for refusing your application for consent orders. Such reasons will allow you to further respond by way of an additional affidavit asserting why you believe the proposed order is “just and equitable.”

Failing further information being provided to the court, it may be the case that you could consider a Binding Financial Agreement.

If rejected, the court may ask for more information from you or ask you to file a further affidavit explaining as to why you think the orders you are seeking are just and equitable.

If you insist that you are happy with the terms of the settlement and the court still denies making the orders, you may have to enter into a Binding Financial Agreement.

Getting an Application for Consent Orders

At Law By Dan we make the whole process of getting consent orders very easy. Our process is as follows:

We do an initial meeting with you and pull together all the necessary and relevant information and documents, and give you a fixed fee quote.

We then prepare the Application for Consent Orders and Terms of Settlement.

We arrange for you and your ex-partner to sign the documents.

We file it at the Family Court.

Once the Order has been sealed, we will send a copy to both you and your ex-partner.