The Role of a Process Server
in Family Law Cases

A process server is the person who puts court documents into the right hands and then proves to the court that it happened. For a long time only attorneys and court officers could do it. Arizona opened the job to certified private servers, and today they handle most of the work of finding people who would rather not be found.

Family law is where that matters most. In a contract dispute both sides usually want their day in court. In a custody or support case, one party often has every reason to disappear. Here’s where a certified Arizona process server changes what’s possible in your case.

Finding Fathers For Paternity Testing

Custody and support both sit downstream of parentage. Until that’s settled, nothing else moves. Sometimes the mother isn’t certain. Sometimes she told him and he denied it. Either way a DNA test ends the argument.

When a man has to be served to compel a test rather than agreeing to one, that tells you something about how hard he intends to be to reach. Professional service of process is what gets the test ordered and the case moving.

Tracking Down Parents Who Have Gone Quiet

Say your co-parent left, stopped calling, and stopped paying. You’ve been carrying it alone and you want the arrangement written into an order instead of living on trust that already ran out.

You can’t get that order without serving them, and people who stop paying support tend to also stop being findable. New address, new number, sometimes a new county. A skip trace pulls current address and employment data to locate them, and where a location needs confirming before an attempt, a stakeout establishes the pattern. Once they’re served, the hearing happens whether they show or not.

Notifying An Absent Parent About An Adoption

A parent leaves. Years pass. The other parent remarries, and the new spouse becomes the adult those kids actually rely on. Now that stepparent wants to adopt.

Arizona won’t let that proceed without notice to the biological parent or a termination of their rights, and you can’t get either without a documented service attempt. Here the return of service becomes part of the adoption record, so the documentation has to be right the first time.

Serving A Spouse Who Doesn’t Want The Divorce

Divorce is rarely a surprise. What surprises people is how differently a spouse behaves once the petition is actually filed. Numbers change. Mail goes unanswered. Someone who was at the same address for nine years is suddenly staying with a cousin.

Getting them served is what lets the clock start. After that, whether they respond is their decision, and the case moves either way.

What To Ask Before You Hire One

Ask whether the server is certified in the county where service will happen, since Arizona certifies by county. Ask how many attempts are included and at what hours, because a defendant who works nights won’t be home at two in the afternoon. Ask when you’ll get the affidavit of service, since a return that shows up late can stall a hearing you waited months for. And ask what happens if service fails. A server who runs a skip trace and goes back out is worth more than one who closes the file at three attempts.

Process servers matter in family law precisely when the other party stops cooperating. If you’re having trouble getting documents in front of someone in your case, that’s the moment to bring one in rather than after a hearing gets continued.

About The Authors

Maha and Melissa Crossler own Subpoena Colada, a family owned and Arizona certified process serving company working across Maricopa County and the rest of the state. They bring more than seven years of legal support experience, and alongside standard, expedited and same day service they handle court runs, skip tracing, stakeouts, exhibit preparation, and preparing family law documents.

Subpoena Colada
Maricopa County and all of Arizona
Phone: (602) 335-1979
Email: service@subpoenacolada.pro
Web: subpoenacolada.pro