About this service
Alimony claims on behalf of a spouse — maintenance, as the Civil Code calls it — are the legal instrument by which, against the background of marriage or divorce, material assistance is demanded by the spouse who needs it. The Civil Code of Georgia builds this circle on three principal norms: the general obligation of spouses to support each other and the persons entitled to maintenance, the continuation of a disabled spouse's right after divorce, and the procedure for determining the amount of maintenance. This page answers three questions: when the claim arises, who is entitled to receive it, and how the court calculates the amount.
The spouses' obligation of mutual support and the entitled persons
Under Article 1182 of the code, spouses are obliged to provide each other with material support. Where such support is refused or no agreement on maintenance exists between the spouses, the right to receive maintenance by judicial procedure belongs to: first, a disabled spouse who needs material assistance; second, the wife during pregnancy and for three years from the birth of the child. These two categories are the law's emphasis: maintenance is not anyone's reward — it attaches only to these two situations, and a claimant must substantiate her or his category precisely in the claim.
The second category deserves particular attention: the wife's right does not rest on disability — it rests on the fact of pregnancy and the age of the child, and the three-year period is counted from the day of the child's birth. In the first category, by contrast, both elements are decisive: the spouse must be both disabled and in need of assistance — one of the two alone is not enough.
At divorce and after it: the court's decision
Article 1129 of the code imposes an obligation on the court: at the request of the spouse entitled to receive maintenance from the other spouse, the court is obliged, together with deciding the divorce case, to determine the amount of the funds the other spouse must pay. In practical terms this norm means that the maintenance question must be raised together with the divorce case — its later separation is not provided for by law and does not serve the claimant's interests.
After divorce, the right is preserved as follows by Article 1183 of the code: a disabled spouse who needs assistance from the spouse retains the right to receive maintenance after divorce as well, if he or she became disabled before the divorce or within one year from the day of divorce. Here the time limit is decisive: if the disability arose more than one year after the divorce, maintenance cannot be claimed under this article.