The Priority Order When Multiple People Are Owed Alimony by You

You may be responsible for supporting more than one person at once: a wife, children, parents, and perhaps other relatives. If your income is not enough for everyone, the law does not leave this to your personal judgment — there is a clearly defined priority order.

📜 The Official Order When Claims Compete

Article 65 of the Personal Status Law explicitly states that if there are multiple people entitled to alimony, and the person obligated to pay cannot support all of them, priority is ordered as follows:

1. The wife — undisputed first priority.
2. The children — second priority.
3. The parents — third priority.
4. Relatives — last priority, ordered among themselves from closest to most distant.

⏱️ Alimony for Distant Relatives Has a Completely Different Deadline

It is important to know that alimony for relatives (the last category in the order) is subject to a different time rule than a wife's alimony. While we saw in a previous article that claiming a wife's past alimony is limited to two years, a relative's alimony actually lapses with the passage of time, unless someone other than the obligated person paid it with the intent of seeking reimbursement later — and even then, a reimbursement claim exceeding 180 days from the date it is filed will not be heard.

✅ What Should You Do If Facing This Situation?

1. Order your financial obligations according to the legal priority: the wife, then the children, then the parents, then the relatives.
2. Don't ignore distant relatives' claims without review — they may lapse with time, but their time rules are different and precise.
3. Use Sanad to fully understand your financial position if you face multiple alimony obligations at once.