The Second "Must Do" after Divorce

Today I am going to talk about some of the most important steps you should take in your divorce action and they're actually after the divorce is over. There are five "must do's" to protect yourself, which I will be covering during the next few days.

The second “to do” is to take action to avoid those unpleasant surprises months or sometimes years down the road after your divorce is finalized.

The last thing you want to think about after a divorce is more paperwork, contacts, tasks, and to-do's, but you need to press on.

Make certain that you have opened new bank accounts or that your spouse's name has been removed from old ones. If you're not opening new accounts, i suggest that you obtain written confirmation from your bank or financial institution stating that your former spouse has no access to your accounts.

This is the same with credit cards. These days most people have a number of credit cards, many of which they seldom or never use and they forget about them. The safest route is to close all joint accounts and open new ones in your own name.

Now maybe you mediated your divorce case and you and your spouse are on really good terms so you don't think this is necessary. Even in the best circumstances things happen. One spouse does something the other doesn't like and they lash out, whether it be something to do with the children, a new relationship, or a myriad of other events that could trigger the anger and unexpected charges on that credit card or withdrawals from that bank account.

Another possibility is your former spouse may run into financial trouble and charging on an old card may seem like a good remedy. Hopefully, this doesn't apply to your case but cancel those bank accounts and credit cards just to be sure.

Finally, if issues arise post divorce, consider mediation. Divorce Mediation is a great method of resolving issues and the sooner that you address them, the easier and more comfortable they are to resolve. Once an issue has time to fester, finding a good solution acceptable to both parties will be much more difficult.

Divorce Mediation will save you time, money and most important, will take the stress away from you and your children by facing issues head-on when first discovered. Keep a divorce mediator handy for any post divorce issues which may arise.