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If you and your spouse agree on how every aspect of your divorce will be handled, your divorce can be finalized 60 days from the date that the Respondent was served with the Petition for Dissolution.

No. If your case is still pending in Maricopa County Superior Court, you can easily convert your case from a legal separation to a divorce by filing one simple document. If your separation case has concluded and the judge has issued a decree, you will have to file a Petition for Dissolution. If the separation resolved all outstanding issues (which could include custody, legal decision-making, parenting time, property distribution, debt distribution, and spousal maintenance), you might simply be able to ask the divorce judge to adopt the decree of legal separation that was previously approved and adopted by the court.

No. However, if you and the other party have reached verbal agreements, any documentation evidencing those agreements might help you convince the judge to adopt what you allege the agreements were.

In order to have child support modified, you have to demonstrate there is a substantial and continuing change in circumstances. In the case of child support, you have to be able to demonstrate to the judge that there has been a change significant enough that the new child support amount should be at least 15% more or 15% less than the current child support amount.

Before a court will modify custody, legal decision making authority and/or parenting time, the judge must find a substantial and continuing change in circumstances. There are a variety of circumstances that could result in a substantial and continuing change in circumstances. If you file a request to have the court modify custody, decision-making authority and/or parenting time, but you fail to demonstrate a substantial and continuing change in circumstances, your request will be denied and might even be dismissed before you have a chance to appear in court.