Wage garnishment in Connecticut

Most a card or medical judgment can take

25% of disposable pay or the part above $677.60 a week if lesssource

Wait before withholding

20 days after the officer serves your employersource

Wage executions at one time

Only one is paid at a time, in the order servedsource

Bank accounts

Bank leaves up to $1,000 plus direct-deposited benefitssource

How much can a wage execution take in Connecticut?

Connecticut measures your protected pay with 40 hours, not the federal 30 and it uses whichever minimum wage is higher. The Labor Department’s state minimum wage table puts Connecticut at $16.94, so $677.60 a week is off limits. Above that, the employer can take the lesser of 25% of disposable earnings or the amount over $677.60.

Disposable earnings here means gross pay minus federal income and employment taxes, normal retirement contributions, union dues, group life and health insurance premiums and federal tax levies. That list comes from the exemption and modification claim form, JD-CV-3a, which quotes the statute. It does not mention state income tax, so the employer may start from a figure a bit above your net pay.

• Disposable pay of $650 a week: $0.
• $800 a week: up to $122.40.
• $1,000 a week: up to $250.

First comes the installment payment order

A Connecticut creditor cannot simply ask for your wages the day it wins. The court’s wage execution application, form JD-CV-3, states that you failed to keep up with an installment payment order. That is a court order setting a weekly or monthly amount you were supposed to pay on the judgment.

Once the clerk signs the execution, a state marshal or other proper officer serves it on your employer within a year. Your employer must fill in its part and give you copies of the execution and the claim form right away. The execution keeps running until the judgment, costs and fees are paid or until a court changes or ends it.

Only one wage execution is paid at a time. If a second creditor serves one, it waits its turn. Family support withholding comes ahead of all of them.

How to stop wage garnishment in Connecticut: the 20-day window

The JD-CV-3a form gives you two ways to ask the Superior Court for relief:

• Claim of exemption. Use it if the law says your pay cannot be taken, for example wages earned while on public assistance under an incentive earnings program.
• Claim for modification. Use it to ask for a smaller weekly deduction and write in the amount you can manage.

Sign the form and return it to the court address printed on it. The clerk then sets a hearing and tells both sides the date. If the court receives your form within 20 days after your employer was served, nothing is withheld until a judge rules. You can file after the 20 days too; the part you claim still cannot be taken while the claim is pending.

If the judgment came from a missed court date, you have four months from the judgment to ask the court to set it aside. Call and a garnishment specialist goes over the form and your 20-day date with you.

Can my bank account be garnished in Connecticut?

Yes, through a financial institution execution. The bank execution form, JD-CV-24, tells the bank what it must leave alone:

• All direct deposits from the past two months that are plainly Social Security, SSI, veterans’ benefits, unemployment or child support paid through the state program.
• Up to $1,000 of paychecks direct-deposited in those two months. If less than that came in, the bank still leaves the lesser of your balance or $1,000.

Anything the bank removes is held for 15 days after it mails you an exemption claim form, JD-CV-24A. Return that form within the 15 days and the bank keeps holding the money, for up to 45 days, while the court decides.