Posted by Nydia Streets of Streets Law in Florida Divorce

In many Florida courts, parties to a divorce case are subject to a status quo order. This order may prohibit a spouse from cancelling the other spouse’s account access or use. The goal is to maintain the status quo until there is a court order or agreement stating otherwise so spouses do not worry about necessities such as utilities and health insurance being disrupted. Use of a credit card was an issue in the case Scott v. Scott, 5D23-2257 (Fla. 5th DCA December 1, 2023).

In this divorce case, the husband and wife owned multiple businesses together. The husband allegedly cut off the wife’s access to one of the company credit cards. At a hearing on the wife’s motion for contempt to address this issue, the husband argued the court could not grant relief because the credit card belonged to the company and the company was not a party to the divorce proceedings. The trial court rejected this argument, found the spouses equally owned the company and ordered the husband to reinstate the wife’s access to the card. The husband then filed a petition for certiorari relief with the appellate court.

The appellate court noted the standard for certiorari relief: “‘To obtain relief by certiorari, the order . . . must depart from the essential requirements of the law and cause harm that cannot be corrected on post-judgment appeal.’ Jordan v. State, 350 So. 3d 103, 105 (Fla. 1st DCA 2022). ‘The correctability is a jurisdictional question.’ Id. ‘In other words, before certiorari can be used to review non-final orders, the appellate court must focus on the threshold jurisdictional question,’ which is whether the order causes irreparable harm. Citizens Prop. Ins. Corp. v. San Perdido Ass’n, 104 So. 3d 344, 351 (Fla. 2012). This ‘jurisdictional evaluation is meant to discourage piecemeal review.’ Jordan, 350 So. 3d at 105.”

Considering the husband’s arguments in the context of this standard, the appellate court held “Even if these claims had merit, none of them pertain to Husband, who is the petitioner before us. [. . .] And it is obvious that we cannot grant certiorari relief based on alleged harm to a party not before the court.” The court continued “Beyond this clear defect, the petition also fails to identify harm that is ‘real and ascertainable’ rather than ‘speculative.’ [. . .] Husband suggests the court’s order ‘has the potential to create post-filing, non-marital debt for which [he] may be, ultimately, responsible.’ Husband worries that ‘if [Wife] were not to pay’ any debt she incurs with the credit card, then Husband would be on the hook for that balance. These tepid statements offering speculative concern are legally insufficient to show a material injury that could not be corrected on post-judgment appeal.”

Schedule your meeting with a Miami divorce lawyer to understand how the law may apply to the facts of your case.