Wyoming Wage Garnishment Laws

When someone sues another on a debt or cause of action and wins (obtains a favorable court judgment), the debtor should pay voluntarily. Of course, that doesn’t always happen; and when it doesn’t the creditor may need to use garnishment to secure payment. Garnishment is getting a court order that a third-party garnishee with possession or control over some of the debtor’s money turn that money over to the creditor to pay the debt. Anyone holding money belonging to a debtor could be a garnishee and be subject to a garnishment order; for example, a property management company which is managing a rental home for the debtor and which collects rent for the debtor could be a garnishee. The debtor’s employer could also be a garnishee; and when the debtor’s employer is the garnishee and the money is the debtor’s salary or wages, it’s wage garnishment.

Wyoming Garnishment Exemptions and Non-Exemptions

Federal law, protects Social Security from almost all garnishment, allowing it to be garnished only be garnished for a certain few debts; e.g. child support, alimony, and federal taxes.

Wyoming also has its own exemptions from garnishment, such as:

Pensions and retirement benefits: Wyoming affords broad protection to both private and public retirement benefits; Wyoming retirees faced with garnishment should check to make sure that their specific benefits are exempt, but should be in good shape.
Public benefits or assistance: workers’ compensation; unemployment benefits; aid to families with dependent children; general assistance; and crime victim compensation all have protection from garnishment.
Insurance and annuities: a number of different types of insurance proceeds or annuity benefits enjoy protection from garnishment, such as: fraternal society benefits; disability benefits if the policy states the proceeds can’t be taken by creditors; group life or disability benefits; and annuity benefits up to a certain amount (currently $350) per month.

Wyoming Maximum Threshold

Like many other states, Wyoming has chosen to follow federal law in terms of determining how much of a debtor’s non-exempt income may be garnished—since even non-exempt income cannot be completely garnished for creditor’s benefit. (The idea is to leave the debtor something to live on.)

Under federal law and in Wyoming, the lesser of the following two amounts may be garnished:

25% total (across all garnishments) of a debtor’s non-exempt disposable income—disposable income here defined as gross income less only legally required or mandated payroll deductions, such as FICA
The extent to which a debtor’s income exceeds 30 times the federal minimum wage—which means that no matter what, the debtor gets to keep at least an amount equal to working 30 hours a week at minimum wage

Taxes and child support, however, allow greater levels of garnishment—up to 50% of a debtor’s income can typically be garnished for these purposes.

Wyoming Statute of Limitations

The creditor who wants to collect on some debt, obligation, or legal cause of action first needs to sue the debtor and win, thereby getting a monetary judgment. There is some urgency to this—any given cause of action or lawsuit must be brought within a defined period of time, known as a statute of limitations. Some common consumer debt statutes of limitations in Wyoming are:

Open accounts (credit cards): 8 years
Written contracts and promissory notes: 10 years

Next, if the debtor does not voluntarily pay, the creditor will have to bring an action to enforce the judgment, such as garnishment. Most states give a creditor longer to bring the action on the judgment than the creditor had to bring the original lawsuit, but not Wyoming: Wyoming only allows an additional 5 years for enforcing a judgment.

Writ of Garnishment in Wyoming

The debtor’s day in court has already come and gone by the time a creditor seeks garnishment: it was back when the creditor sued the debtor to enforce a debt or monetary obligation, or on account of some other legal cause of action.

Garnishment is not between the creditor and the debtor for the most part—it’s between the creditor and the party holding money owed the debtor (the garnishee), such as the debtor’s employer (holding the debtor’s wages). The creditor applies in writing to court for garnishment to satisfy an as-yet unpaid judgment against a debtor. The application is very straightforward, and does not require re-litigating or re-trying the debt. Instead, the creditor merely states that it is owed money due to a judgment; that garnishment appears necessary to satisfy the judgment, since the debtor is not paying voluntarily; and that an identified garnishee has money owed to the debtor which can be used for the debt.

The next step is the court serving papers on the garnishee, which will require the garnishee to verify the money owed to the debtor (if any). The garnishee cannot challenge the creditor’s right to garnish the debtor’s wages. . .though it can challenge any factual errors in the garnishment. (For example, it does not need to garnish more wages than it actually pays to the debtor.) If everything is factually correct, or can corrected, and the garnishee owes non-exempt income to the debtor—the court will typically order garnishment. More on Stopping Wage Garnishment in Wyoming.

Getting Legal Help

While it’s generally too late to dispute whether or not the debtor owes money (the time to do that was while creditor was suing the debtor in the first place, before a judgment was issued in the creditor’s benefit), there are still challenges to garnishment that an attorney can help a debtor make. For example, the debtor could:

Show there’s an error in the garnishment, such as the wrong person being named, or the debt being listed as larger than it is
Show that either the original lawsuit or the garnishment is too old and is barred by the statute of limitations
Show that the creditor did not follow the proper procedures in either obtaining the judgment or in seeking garnishment
Show that the debtor’s income is exempt, and not available for garnishment
Show that due to other garnishment(s), the debtor is already being garnished at the maximum allowable rate

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