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Deployment Is Not, By Itself, a Change in Circumstances — and the Burden Shifts on Your Return

Absence, relocation or failure to comply with a custody or parenting time order because of deployment, mobilisation, temporary duty or unaccompanied tour orders may not by itself constitute a material change in circumstances warranting a PERMANENT modification. Any order limiting custody for that reason must be entered as a temporary order. On the returning parent’s motion the court must hear the matter within thirty days, and the non-deploying parent bears the burden.

Verified August 23, 2026

What this benefit is

What it's worth: A temporary order rather than a permanent one, an expedited hearing, and the burden on the other parent

Nothing here is money. The value is that an absence ordered by the military cannot be converted into a permanent loss of custody, and that the cost of undoing it falls on the other parent rather than on the returning one.
The weight reflects how expensive and slow the alternative is: reversing a permanent modification means proving a fresh material change of circumstances from a standing start.

Who is entitled to it

The section is written around the parent who receives the orders.
You are in this state.

Not sure whether that describes you?

Answer a few questions about this benefit specifically — we only ask what this one actually depends on, and we stop as soon as we know.

How to claim it

Deadline: On return — the hearing must be set within thirty days of filing

1Get the words into the order before you go. K.S.A. 23-3217(c) requires any order limiting custodial or parenting time rights because of the orders to SPECIFY the deployment, mobilisation, temporary duty or unaccompanied tour as the basis, and to be entered as a TEMPORARY order. An order that omits the recital is the one that hardens into a permanent arrangement.
2The same subsection makes the non-deploying parent give the court thirty days’ advance written notice of any change of address and of telephone number. Ask for that to be recited too — it is what makes service on your return possible.
3Agree a parenting plan covering deployment if you can. Under subsection (e), where the parties’ plan under K.S.A. 23-3213 includes provisions for custody and parenting time on deployment, it is PRESUMED to be in the child’s best interests, and the court may depart only on specific findings of fact saying why.
4File on return and the clock starts: subsection (d) requires the court to set a hearing that takes precedence on its docket, within thirty days of the filing of the motion.
5The burden is not yours. At that hearing the NON-DEPLOYING parent must show that re-entry of the order in force before the deployment is no longer in the child’s best interests.
6Service is easier than usual: subsection (d) provides that service at the last address the non-deploying parent gave the court in writing is, if otherwise sufficient, deemed sufficient notice for that hearing.
7Ask to delegate rather than lose the time. Subsection (f) lets the court delegate parenting time, or a portion of it, to a member of your family with a close and substantial relationship to the child for the duration of the absence, where that is in the child’s best interests.
8You need not be in the room to be heard: subsection (g) requires an expedited hearing for good cause shown where military duties have a material effect on your ability to appear in person.
9Three things go into every order under the section, and willful violation is contempt: the other parent must reasonably accommodate your leave schedule, must facilitate telephone and email contact with the child, and you must give timely information about your leave schedule.

Form: Motion to amend or review the custody or parenting time order on return
File with: The Kansas district court handling the custody matter
No renewal: Once granted it does not need renewing.

CorrectionOlder references send readers to K.S.A. 60-1630 for this protection. The Revisor’s note on the current section records 60-1630 as the source or prior law: the provision was re-enacted at K.S.A. 23-3217 by L. 2008, ch. 151, § 1 and moved into the family law chapter. Citing the old number invites an argument you do not need to have.

CorrectionThe section is often read as banning any change of custody during a deployment. It does not. It bars the absence from being, BY ITSELF, a material change of circumstances warranting a PERMANENT modification — and subsection (h) preserves the other parent’s right to petition on a genuine material change. What the section guarantees is that the deployment alone will not carry the argument.

Worth knowingThe definitions reach further than a combat deployment. Subsection (a) separately defines mobilisation — the call-up of a guard or reserve member to extended active duty, expressly excluding annual training — temporary duty for training or a noncombat mission, and an unaccompanied tour where dependent travel is not authorised. All four trigger the section.

Known gapThe section does not say what happens where the deploying parent cannot file the motion promptly on return, nor whether the thirty-day hearing requirement survives a delayed filing. No judicial branch form for the motion was read this session.

Sources

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