Stop Guessing What the Family Court of Western Australia Expects
You've separated. You've agreed on a schedule — or you're about to sit across from your ex in mediation. Now you need to turn that into something the court will actually accept.
But every template you find online is built for the federal system. The Commonwealth Courts Portal. The wrong forms. The wrong terminology. Western Australia runs its own Family Court, its own eCourts Portal, and since May 2024, operates under completely rewritten rules that abolished "custody," "access," and the presumption of equal time.
Filing the wrong way doesn't just waste time — it gets your application requisitioned (rejected), costs you another filing fee, and pushes your resolution back by months.
The WA Parenting Orders System
This guide replaces the guesswork with a tested, WA-specific process. It covers the full journey — from your first Family Dispute Resolution session through to lodging enforceable Consent Orders on the eCourts Portal — using the exact terminology, clause structures, and filing steps the Family Court of Western Australia requires under the 2024 reforms.
Where generic tools give you a blank form and wish you luck, this guide gives you pre-written clauses, worked scheduling examples, and portal walkthroughs that match what you'll actually see on screen.
What's Inside — 11 PDFs
- Complete guide (guide.pdf) — 19 chapters covering the full WA parenting orders process from separation through enforceable Consent Orders, using the exact terminology and filing steps the Family Court of Western Australia requires under the 2024 reforms
- Minute of Proposed Orders template (consent-orders-template.pdf) — pre-formulated clauses using "parental responsibility" and "parenting time" (the only terminology the court accepts post-2024), structured so the registrar can approve without requisitioning
- Parenting-time schedule templates — 50/50, 60/40, 70/30, and 80/20 splits with age-appropriate variations for infants, primary schoolers, and teenagers, including how each split affects your Services Australia care percentage
- eCourts Portal walkthrough — account creation, File Number registration, completing the interactive Form 11, printing the physical affidavit, witnessing before a JP, and uploading the sworn PDF for eLodgement
- FDR Mediation Preparation Worksheet (fdr-mediation-prep.pdf) — structured prompts that help you enter Family Dispute Resolution with clear scheduling goals, fallback positions, and documented reasoning tied to the best interests factors
- Holiday Rotation Planner (holiday-rotation-planner.pdf) — Christmas, Easter, school holiday splits, birthday rules, Father's/Mother's Day, WA Day, and ANZAC Day — ready to fill in and attach to your orders
- Best Interests Factor Self-Assessment (best-interests-assessment.pdf) — the six updated considerations under the 2024 reforms, with space to document your evidence for each factor
- Child Support Care Percentage Reference (care-percentage-reference.pdf) — how nights per year translate to Services Australia percentages, the cliff-edge thresholds, and the 8-step formula summary
- Parenting Schedule Calculator (parenting-schedule-calculator.pdf) — count annual nights for each parent and identify your care band for child support purposes
- Changeover Details Worksheet (changeover-details.pdf) — pin-to-fridge reference with every changeover detail in one place
- Parenting Plan Decisions Worksheet (parenting-plan-decisions.pdf) — record how parental responsibility is allocated across 13 decision areas
- Court Forms & Fees Quick Reference (court-forms-reference.pdf) — every WA family court form, filing fee, document checklist, and deadline on one page
Who This Is For
- Parents who've reached an agreement and need to convert a verbal understanding into proper Form 11 Consent Orders without paying a lawyer $3,000-$7,000 to do it for them
- Parents heading into FDR mediation who want to walk in with a structured proposal rather than negotiating from scratch under pressure
- Self-represented litigants who've been served with court papers and need to understand what to file, where to file it, and what the registrar will check
- De facto parents navigating WA's unique dual-jurisdiction system under the Family Court Act 1997
Why Free Court Forms Aren't Enough
The blank Form 11 is free on the Family Court of WA website. So is a blank canvas — but neither one tells you what to put on it.
The government's amica platform charges $297 AUD and can only produce simple, non-binding parenting agreements. It cannot generate Form 11 Consent Orders — the legally enforceable document you actually need. And its templates aren't tailored to WA's state-level court system.
Co-parenting apps like CustodyXChange and OurFamilyWizard are built for the US market. They use terms like "visitation" and "physical custody" that Australian courts abolished in 2006. They know nothing about the WA eCourts Portal, Form 11 requirements, or the 2024 best interests reforms.
This guide exists in the gap between free-but-useless forms and $400/hour legal representation. It gives you the structural knowledge that blank forms assume you already have.
What You're Getting
For , you get the complete toolkit — less than half the cost of a single hour with a family lawyer in Perth, and a fraction of what amica charges for a non-binding agreement that can't even produce the orders you need.
100% satisfaction guarantee. If the guide doesn't give you the clarity you need to file confidently, email us for a full refund. No questions.
Start With the Free Checklist
Not ready for the full guide? Download the free Western Australia Parenting Plan Starter Checklist — a quick-reference overview of the WA custody process, timeline, and key terms. It shows you what's ahead so you can decide what level of support you need.
Ready for the complete system? Get the full guide and start drafting your parenting plan tonight.