Wage Garnishment in Texas: When Creditors Can Reach Your Pay

Texas protects paychecks more strongly than almost any other state, and the protection sits in the state constitution rather than in an ordinary statute. What follows covers who can reach a Texas paycheck, how much each of them takes, and the point at which the protection runs out. It sits alongside the other consumer rules explained in what the Texas Deceptive Trade Practices Act covers.

Why an ordinary judgment creditor cannot garnish Texas wages

Two sources carry the rule. Article XVI, Section 28 of the Texas Constitution provides that current wages for personal service are never subject to garnishment except for the enforcement of court-ordered child support payments. The statute that implements it, Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 63.004, repeats that current wages for personal service are not subject to garnishment except as otherwise provided by state or federal law, and adds a practical consequence: the garnishee, which in a wage case is the employer, is discharged from the garnishment as to any debt owed to the employee for current wages.

The exemption statutes say it a second time. Tex. Prop. Code § 42.001(b)(1) lists current wages for personal services as exempt from seizure and places them outside the aggregate personal-property caps that apply to other exempt items, again carving out court-ordered child support.

None of this erases the debt. A creditor who sues and wins still holds a judgment, and that judgment reaches non-exempt property, bank balances, and, through an abstract of judgment, non-homestead real estate. What it does not reach is the paycheck itself. A creditor also has to obtain the judgment in the first place, which means filing suit inside the statute of limitations on debt collection in Texas. ## The debts that can still reach a Texas paycheck Court-ordered child support is the exception written into the constitution itself. Support is collected through an income withholding order served on the employer rather than through a writ of garnishment, and the Office of the Attorney General’s Child Support Division runs the program. The agency’s guidance for employers on child support withholding treats income withholding as one of seven employer responsibilities, alongside new-hire reporting and medical support notices. Court-ordered spousal maintenance is enforced the same way. A Texas court that orders maintenance can order it withheld from earnings, and the employer handles it as it handles a support order. A defaulted federal student loan can be collected by administrative wage garnishment, which is a creature of federal law and does not require a lawsuit or a court judgment first. The Department of Education issues the order directly to the employer under 34 CFR 34.19. Unpaid federal tax is collected by levy rather than by garnishment, and a levy on wages is continuous: it stays attached to each paycheck until the liability is paid or released. The IRS sets out the mechanics in its guidance on wage levies. ## How much of a paycheck each order takes Federal law, not Texas law, supplies the ceilings. 15 U.S.C. § 1673(a) caps ordinary garnishment at the lesser of 25 percent of weekly disposable earnings or the amount by which those earnings exceed 30 times the federal minimum hourly wage. That ceiling almost never comes up in Texas, because the underlying garnishment is not permitted at all.

Support orders get more room. 15 U.S.C. § 1673(b)(2) allows withholding of up to 50 percent of disposable earnings when the employee is supporting another spouse or dependent child, and up to 60 percent when the employee is not, with an additional 5 percent in either case when the arrears run more than 12 weeks behind.

Administrative wage garnishment for a defaulted federal student loan is capped at 15 percent of disposable pay by 34 CFR 34.19, and the same section keeps the total from exceeding the general federal ceiling when more than one order is running.

A federal tax levy works on a different logic. Instead of taking a percentage, the IRS leaves an exempt amount tied to the taxpayer’s filing status and number of dependents and takes everything above it, which is why a levy can consume a much larger share of a small paycheck than a support order would. The exempt-amount tables are published with the IRS wage levy guidance.

Wages lose their protection once they are paid

The exemption is written in the present tense: it covers current wages. Once the employer pays them and the money lands in a checking account, the funds are no longer wages in the hands of an employer, and a judgment creditor can apply for a writ of garnishment directed at the bank under Chapter 63 of the Civil Practice and Remedies Code. The CFPB’s explanation of when a debt collector can garnish a bank account or wages describes the same two-track pattern that Texas produces in a sharper form.

Some deposits carry their own federal protection. Social Security, SSI, VA, and certain other federal benefits paid by direct deposit are shielded by a bank-side rule that requires the bank to protect a lookback amount of benefit deposits automatically when it receives a garnishment order, as the CFPB guidance above describes. Mixing protected benefits with wages in one account makes the tracing harder, not impossible.

Not every creditor is aiming at wages. A contractor or material supplier who has not been paid on a Texas project has a property remedy instead of a wage remedy, governed by Texas mechanics lien deadlines and filing requirements.

What happens at the employer when an order arrives

Employers are the pressure point in every garnishment, and Texas employers receive paperwork for orders they cannot lawfully honor as well as orders they must.

1. Identify what kind of order it is

   An income withholding order for support, a federal administrative wage garnishment, and an IRS levy each come on their own form and travel under their own authority. A writ of garnishment issued by a Texas court in a private debt case is a different document, and under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 63.004 the employer is discharged as to current wages when it answers.

2. Begin withholding on the schedule the order sets

   Support withholding starts with the first pay period after the order arrives. Federal orders set their own start date. The employer withholds from the employee’s disposable earnings, not from gross pay.

3. Apply the federal ceiling before sending money

   When more than one order is in play, or when the ordered amount is larger than the paycheck can absorb, the limits in 15 U.S.C. § 1673 control how much leaves the check. Support orders take priority over most other withholding.

4. Remit and report

   Support payments go to the state disbursement unit rather than to the other parent, and the employer notifies the Child Support Division when an employee with an active order leaves. Both duties are described in the Attorney General’s employer materials.

If a paycheck is being garnished anyway

Wage deductions sometimes show up for debts that Texas law does not allow to be collected that way. That happens when a creditor obtained a judgment in another state and served paperwork on a Texas employer, when an employer treats a bank garnishment as a wage garnishment, or when a payroll processor applies an out-of-state rule. The remedy runs through the court that issued the writ: the employee or the employer raises the exemption, and Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 63.004 discharges the garnishee as to current wages.

Deductions an employer takes on its own, without a court order or written authorization, raise a separate wage-payment question rather than a garnishment question. Complaints about a collector’s conduct can go to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau or to the Texas Attorney General’s consumer protection division.