The Free Child Custody Plan Checklist: 62 Decisions to Make Before You File
Most parenting-plan disputes come from decisions nobody made. This checklist walks through every clause a complete plan should address — schedule, holidays, decision-making, money, travel, and communication.
A parenting plan fails in the gaps. Not the big disagreements — those get litigated — but the ordinary questions nobody wrote down: who buys the cleats, who has the passport, what counts as an emergency, how far in advance a vacation is announced.
Work through this checklist before you draft, and you will negotiate once instead of forty times. Print the companion sheets in the free documentation templates set.
1. Legal decision-making
- Joint or sole legal decision-making
- Education: school selection, tutoring, IEP and 504 decisions
- Medical: routine care, specialists, elective procedures, mental health treatment
- Religion
- Extracurriculars: who may enrol, who consents, who attends
- Deadlock procedure: mediation, parenting coordinator, or tiebreaker
2. The residential schedule
- Base rotation and the exact exchange days and times
- Where exchanges happen, and who transports
- Late arrival grace period and what happens after it
- Right of first refusal, with a defined trigger period
- Make-up time rules for missed periods
- School-closure and snow-day coverage
3. Holidays and special days
- The full holiday list and the rotation style for each
- Whether holidays override the regular schedule
- Mother's Day and Father's Day
- Children's birthdays and parents' birthdays
- School breaks: winter, spring, and the summer structure
- Extended family events and religious observances
4. Communication
- The channel of record for scheduling and important matters
- Response time expectation
- Contact with the child during the other parent's time
- What is emergency-only, and how emergencies are communicated
- Rules against using children as messengers
5. Money
- Child support amount, method, and dates
- Health insurance: who carries, who pays premiums
- Unreimbursed medical: split, submission deadline, reimbursement deadline
- Childcare and camp
- Extracurricular costs and equipment
- School fees, supplies, and technology
- Tax dependency claims and the alternating pattern
- How receipts are shared and disputes raised
6. Travel and relocation
- In-state and out-of-state travel notice
- International travel and passport custody
- Itinerary, lodging, and contact requirements
- Relocation notice period and the process for objecting
7. Information sharing
- School portal, medical portal, and activity account access
- Sharing report cards, notices, and medical records
- Emergency contact lists and authorised pickup lists
- Notice of new adults with significant time around the children
8. Records and review
- The method for proposing and recording changes
- An annual review date
- Step-up provisions tied to age or milestones
- What documentation each parent keeps
Turn the checklist into a working system
A plan is only as good as the daily practice around it. Once the clauses are agreed, put the schedule on a shared calendar, keep scheduling in one written channel, and log exchanges and expenses as they happen so the record exists before you need it.
Related reading: what to put in a custody agreement and the co-parenting agreement template.
The CustodyTrac Team
Written for parents building two-home families.