Garnishment Laws

• Garnishment is a form of debt collection. The procedure for garnishment depends on who initiates the process. Title III of the federal Consumer Credit Protection Act gives employees some protection with respect to garnishment, such as restriction on the amount of wages that can be garnished and protection from termination because of a single garnishment. Within the parameters defined by Title III, state laws control much of the details of the garnishment procedures.
  
  

Initiating Garnishment

• If the federal government is initiating a garnishment, it will do so through a wage garnishment package, SF-329, that includes a direction to garnish from the creditor agency, a letter to the employer, and a garnishment worksheet. Federal garnishment usually occurs for the collection of unpaid taxes, defaulted student loans or debts in bankruptcy. States can also initiate garnishment through a similar process. It's somewhat more difficult, however, for a private entity, such as a bank or individual, to initiate garnishment. Here, a court must enter a judgment upholding the amount of the debt--called a writ of execution--and a court order must be issued directing garnishment, sometimes called an earnings withholding order.
  
  

Levying Garnishment

• With the order from the court directing garnishment, the creditor can pass the document to a levying officer, usually a county sheriff. The levying officer is responsible for serving the garnishment order, collecting the garnished wages from the employer and delivering them to the creditor. There are, however, restrictions on garnishment that prevent the employee from being garnished into indigency. No more than 25 percent of a worker's wages can be garnished, and no worker's wages can be garnished unless he earns at least 30 times the federal minimum wage per week gross. The only exception in the federal limits is for child or spousal support, for which up to 60 percent of the wages can be garnished. State laws can be even more protective of workers, however, and where they conflict with federal limits, the smaller garnishment amount prevails.