Wage Garnishment Compliance Software
Make every payroll garnishment calculation defensible.
PayGuard is wage garnishment compliance software for finance and payroll teams that cannot afford an indefensible deduction. It reads the court order, applies federal and 50-state rules, and produces a payroll-ready instruction with a statutory citation for every dollar. The Why-Trail for when auditors, plaintiffs, or courts ask how you arrived at the number.
Johnson v. Acme Corp
instance · fd493207...
CA-2026-IRS-0482
instance · d5a0a967...
Federal Tax Levy #891
instance · 106eeef1...
Ohio Support Order #44
instance · b1627dcc...
Court Order
Johnson v. Acme Corp
Type: Child Support
State: California
Amount: $356.15
Withholding Calculation
Multi-State Policy Evaluation
Johnson v. Acme Corp — Child Support Order
Federal CCPA Limit
50% of disposable earnings
CA State Override
CCP §706.050 — lower cap applies
Local Minimum Wage
SF $18.67/hr — no additional protection
Priority Ordering
Child support → Tax levy → Creditor
Final Withholding: $356.15
Based on CA CCP §706.050 — every dollar traced to statute
Court Order
Johnson v. Acme Corp
Type: Child Support
State: California
SHA-256: fd493207...
Type: Child Support · State: California · Confidence: 99.2%
Employee: James Wilson · Employer: Acme Corp · Payroll ID: EMP-4821
15 USC §1673(b)(2)(A) — 50% limit (supporting spouse)
CCP §706.050 — lower state cap supersedes federal
Final: $356.15 · CCPA cap: $876.00 · State override: -$58.78
Awaiting clerk approval · Priority: 1 of 3 active orders
Export to Payroll System
ADP
Connected
Workday
Available
UKG
Available
Ready for Export
Johnson v. Acme Corp
Child Support · $356.15 · Priority 1 of 3
Compliance workflow
From court order to payroll instruction
PayGuard handles wage garnishment processing, payroll garnishment rules, income withholding orders, child support withholding, creditor writs, tax levies, and multi-order priority stacking. It extracts the order, applies federal and state withholding limits, resolves priority rules, and preserves the statute, rule, input, and calculation trail behind every payroll-ready instruction.
| Input | PayGuard checks | Output |
|---|---|---|
| Court order or agency notice | Extract order type, jurisdiction, parties, amount, priority, and effective date. | Structured garnishment case. |
| Employee earnings and existing orders | Apply disposable earnings, CCPA limits, state overrides, support-order rules, and priority logic. | Defensible withholding calculation. |
| Payroll destination | Format approved output for payroll review, export, and audit retention. | Payroll-ready instruction with Why-Trail. |
Last updated April 24, 2026.
Official references: U.S. Department of Labor CCPA wage garnishment guidance; Federal wage garnishment limits, 15 U.S.C. Chapter 41, Subchapter II.
Production Results. Not Pilot Metrics.
Every number comes from the real cost of garnishment processing in regulated payroll operations.
20x
faster than manual statute research and calculation.
With PayGuard, a 2-4 hour garnishment order is processed in minutes — boosting throughput and ensuring compliance across all 50 states.
Full debt
the employer's exposure for a single defective answer.
SHRM: "In most states, even the slightest mistake administering a garnishment can make the employer liable for the full judgment debt." Confirmed by Oxmoor Portfolio (GA) and Discover v. Collins (OK): full judgment attached for minor administrative errors.
How it works
Six steps. Zero statute research.
From uploaded PDF to payroll-ready instruction — fully automated, fully auditable.
Entity Validation
KYC, employee earnings profile, prior garnishment history.
Data Source Calls
State garnishment rules API, employee earnings (Finch), geocoding for local minimum wage.
Document Analysis
Upload court order PDF, AI extracts order type, amounts, state, case details per page.
Policy Evaluation
Federal CCPA + state-specific statutes evaluated automatically. CA, TX, IL, FL, NY, OH — each with unique rules.
Withholding Calculation
Deterministic math: federal cap, state override, final amount. Every dollar traced to a statute citation.
Clerk Review
Human-in-the-loop: approve, override, or escalate. Full Why-Trail audit for every decision.
The platform
The Compliance Execution Stack
Four layers. One unified stack. The integration is the product.
Built for the Hardest Problems in Payroll Compliance
PayGuard Architecture
Data Index
Court Order Details
Employee Earnings
State Statutes
Priority Rules
Output
Withholding Instructions
Audit Evidence Trail
Statute Citations
Payroll Export
99%+
Accuracy in production
50
States supported
SOC 2
Type II Certified
Compliance risk
The cost of getting it wrong is existential.
Garnishment compliance errors are among the most common payroll audit findings. Manual processing guarantees mistakes.
Up to $1,000
CCPA Penalties
15 USC §1674(b): Willful violation of wage garnishment limits is a federal crime. Fines and/or imprisonment up to one year.
Class action risk
Employee Lawsuits
Systematic over-withholding creates class action exposure. Employees recover excess amounts plus attorney fees under state wage laws.
IRS + State AG
Audit Exposure
IRS levies require precise priority ordering. State attorneys general increasingly auditing garnishment compliance as part of worker protection.
Why PayGuard
Three things nobody else does.
Why-Trail Audit
Every dollar withheld traces to a specific statute. Click any amount to see: formula, inputs, legal citation, and the exact page of the court order. Compliance officers can verify in seconds.
State-Aware Policy Profiles
Not one-size-fits-all. Each state gets its own policy profile. California applies CCP 706.050. Texas detects constitutional prohibition. Illinois overrides to gross wages.
Deterministic + AI Hybrid
Math runs as code, not LLM. $508.25 is always $508.25. AI handles document extraction and edge-case flagging. The right tool for each job.
The difference
Manual processing is slow. And risky.
The hardest payroll workflows have resisted automation for decades. Not because the technology was missing. Because the architecture was.
2-4 hrs
Manual statute research, calculation, cross-referencing employee data
Minutes
AI applies 50 state statutes automatically with full audit trail
50 rule books
Each state has unique withholding formulas, exemptions, and priority rules
100% automated
Every calculation traced to a specific statute citation
Full debt
One defective garnishment answer has made employers liable for the entire employee judgment (Oxmoor Portfolio, Discover v. Collins)
Why-Trail defense
Every dollar withheld traces to a specific statute citation, with complete evidence chain for auditors and courts
Spreadsheets
Scattered documentation, tribal knowledge, manual evidence gathering
Why-Trail
Complete evidence chain from court order to payroll instruction
Manual entry
Re-keying data into ADP, Workday, or UKG with transcription errors
One click
Payroll-ready output with correct priority ordering, instant export
The market
A massive, underserved market.
Garnishment compliance sits at the intersection of payroll, legal, and HR — one of the last major payroll workflows not yet automated.
$85B+
RegTech market by 2035
16-21%
CAGR growth rate
Source: Precedence Research, Grand View Research
$5.2B
Payroll compliance services
~1% of US workers under active garnishment at any time (NBER w30724). Volume up 19.5% since 2022 (CT Corporation), accelerating in 2026.
Sources: NBER working paper 30724, Wolters Kluwer / CT Corporation
SOC 2 Type II
Enterprise-grade security
AES-256
Encryption
SSO + RBAC
Access
Full audit
Logging
Related platform pages
How PayGuard connects to the MightyBot platform.
PayGuard applies the same policy engine, compliance infrastructure, and ROI model to payroll and garnishment compliance.
FAQ
Questions & answers
Everything you need to know about PayGuard. Can't find what you're looking for? Talk to us.
Wage garnishment compliance software interprets garnishment orders, applies federal and state withholding rules, calculates the permitted deduction, and creates a payroll-ready instruction with an audit trail. PayGuard focuses on defensible calculations, statute citations, and payroll export.
Each state gets its own policy profile with jurisdiction-specific rules. California applies CCP 706.050, Texas detects constitutional prohibition, Illinois overrides to gross wages. The engine evaluates the correct statute for every garnishment automatically.
Yes. PayGuard functions as a payroll garnishment calculation engine for multi-state garnishment compliance. It extracts order details, applies federal CCPA limits, state-specific rules, support-order logic, and priority stacking, then exports a payroll-ready result with citations and calculation evidence.
Yes. PayGuard reads income withholding orders, child support orders, tax levies, creditor writs, student loan garnishments, and bankruptcy orders, then applies the correct federal and state payroll garnishment rules before producing a withholding instruction.
PayGuard exports payroll-ready instructions to ADP, Workday, UKG, and any HRIS with a standard API. We also integrate with Finch for employee earnings data and support SFTP, webhook, and REST API delivery.
Math runs as code, not LLM. $508.25 is always $508.25. AI handles document extraction and edge-case flagging — the right tool for each job. Every calculation is deterministic and traceable to a specific statute citation.
Every dollar withheld traces to a specific statute. Click any amount to see: formula, inputs, legal citation, and the exact page of the court order. The complete evidence chain is timestamped and immutable.
Yes. Start in audit mode where you see every decision the engine makes alongside your current process. Graduate to assist mode, then enable full autonomy only after accuracy is proven on your data.
SOC 2 Type II certified with AES-256 encryption at rest, TLS in transit, SAML SSO, SCIM provisioning, RBAC, MFA, and complete audit logging with configurable retention controls.
Stop Chasing Compliance.
Start Applying It.
Schedule a demo to see the PayGuard compliance engine in action. Whether you're a professional or a team leader, PayGuard helps you work smarter, ensure compliance, and accomplish more.
Request a Demo