Court Upholds Imputed Income Decision in Guelck v Ballentine, 2025 ABCA 101

In Guelck v Ballentine, 2025 ABCA 101, the Alberta Court of Appeal upheld a lower court decision imputing income to a father who failed to provide complete financial disclosure as required under section 21 of the Federal Child Support Guidelines.

The father appealed, arguing that the chambers judge erred by not applying the principles from Peters v Atchooay, 2022 ABCA 347. However, the Court found that the Peters framework was not applicable. Unlike in Peters, the chambers judge did not determine that the appellant was intentionally under-employed or unemployed. Instead, the focus was on the difficulty of assessing the father’s actual income due to his failure to provide full financial disclosure.

The Court noted a longstanding pattern of incomplete disclosure and underreporting of income by the father throughout the proceedings. Additionally, while the chambers judge acknowledged that the father faced periodic but uncertain unemployment due to medical issues, he addressed these evidentiary challenges by averaging the appellant’s reported income over six years to estimate his current income.

The Court of Appeal concluded that the chambers judge acted within his discretion in making this determination, aligning his approach with section 19(1)(f) of the Guidelines.

Special thanks to Melissa Abusow, counsel for the respondent at both levels of court, for highlighting this important decision.