How to Stop a Garnishment Order in Ohio: Deadlines and Exemptions

To stop a garnishment in Ohio, you have to move fast and pick the right tool for your situation: request a hearing and claim your exemptions, challenge the underlying judgment, negotiate a settlement with the creditor, or file bankruptcy to trigger an automatic stay. The deadlines are short. For a bank account garnishment, you have five business days after receiving the court’s notice to request a hearing. For wage garnishment, you get a 15-day head start after the creditor mails the required notice, and that window is your best chance to act before money starts leaving your paycheck.

Meet the Deadlines First

Missing the hearing deadline is the single most costly mistake, because it can waive your right to contest the garnishment at all.

When a creditor targets your bank account, the court sends a notice explaining the garnishment and your right to dispute it. A written request for a hearing must reach the court clerk’s office within five business days of your receipt of that notice. Miss the window and the court releases your money to the creditor.¹

Wage garnishment works differently. It starts when the creditor mails you a “Notice of Court Proceeding to Collect Debt,” often called the 15-day letter. The creditor cannot file for a garnishment order until 15 days after mailing that notice.² Use those 15 days to contact the creditor, consult an attorney, or prepare an exemption claim. You can still claim exemptions after the order issues, but acting during that window gives you the most leverage.

Claim Your Exemptions

Ohio and federal law protect a chunk of your income and property from creditors. For most consumer debts, a creditor can take no more than 25 percent of your disposable weekly earnings, or the amount by which your weekly disposable earnings exceed 30 times the federal minimum wage ($217.50), whichever is less.³ Ohio follows those same limits through Ohio Revised Code 2329.66.⁴ Disposable earnings means what’s left after legally required deductions like taxes and Social Security, not after voluntary deductions like health insurance.

Several kinds of income are exempt from garnishment entirely, including Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, workers’ compensation, unemployment benefits, Ohio Works First cash assistance, veterans’ benefits, black lung benefits, and many pension payments.¹ If your income comes only from these sources, a creditor generally cannot reach it.

Ohio also shields specific property from being seized to satisfy a judgment. As of April 1, 2025, and through March 31, 2028, the exemption amounts are:⁵

Personal residence: up to $182,625 in equity
One motor vehicle: up to $5,025
Cash on hand or in accounts: up to $625
Household goods: up to $800 per item, $16,850 total
Jewelry: up to $2,125
Tools of your trade: up to $3,200

To claim any of these on a bank account garnishment, file a written request for a hearing with the court within the five-business-day window. Say which exemptions apply and bring supporting documents to the hearing: bank statements showing where deposits came from, benefit award letters, pay stubs, or proof of property value. The court then decides whether the funds or property qualify.

Federal Benefits Get Automatic Bank Protection

If you receive federal benefits by direct deposit, your bank has to protect those funds even before you claim an exemption. When a garnishment order hits the account, the bank reviews the last two months of deposits, calculates how much came from federal benefits like Social Security or veterans’ payments, and automatically shields that amount.⁶ Anything above the protected amount can still be seized. Don’t rely on the bank alone. File a hearing request to cover any additional funds that may qualify under Ohio law.

Challenge the Judgment or the Order

Every garnishment rests on a court judgment. If the judgment has a defect, you can attack it directly with a motion to vacate the judgment or a motion to quash the garnishment order.

The most common ground is improper service of process. If you were never properly notified of the original lawsuit and a default judgment was entered against you, that judgment may be void. A challenge to a void judgment has no time limit, which matters because many people first learn of the judgment when a garnishment hits their paycheck or account months or years later.

Other grounds include genuine mistake or excusable neglect for failing to respond, fraud by the creditor, or a judgment that has already been satisfied through prior payments. Challenges based on mistake, inadvertence, or fraud generally must be filed within a reasonable time and no later than one year after the judgment. Void-judgment challenges, such as those based on lack of proper service, can be raised at any time.

Bring concrete evidence. If you were never served, gather proof that you lived at a different address, were out of state, or never signed for the certified mail the creditor claims to have sent. If you already made payments, bring receipts or bank records.

Dormant Judgments

An Ohio judgment goes dormant if the creditor takes no enforcement action for five years from the date of the judgment or its last renewal. A dormant judgment cannot operate as a lien or support a garnishment.⁷ The creditor can revive a dormant judgment by filing a revival action within ten years after it went dormant.⁸ If you’re being garnished on an old judgment, check whether the creditor kept it alive. If they let it lapse, you have a strong argument to quash the garnishment.

File Bankruptcy to Trigger the Automatic Stay

Filing for bankruptcy triggers an automatic stay that halts most collection activity immediately, including wage garnishment and bank account seizures. The stay takes effect the moment the petition is filed, without a separate court order.⁹ It bars creditors from continuing lawsuits, garnishing wages, enforcing liens, and even contacting you.

Chapter 7 can eliminate many unsecured debts entirely. Chapter 13 lets you restructure debts into a three-to-five-year repayment plan. Both carry significant consequences for your credit and your ability to borrow for years afterward. The stay also has limits. It doesn’t stop child support or alimony garnishment. And if you filed and dismissed a bankruptcy case within the past year, the stay may last only 30 days or not apply at all. Talk to a bankruptcy attorney before filing just to stop a garnishment.

Negotiate With the Creditor

You can always contact the creditor to propose a resolution. Before an order issues, creditors are often willing to negotiate a payment plan or take a lump sum settlement for less than the full balance. Once garnishment has started, creditors have less reason to negotiate because they’re already being paid, and a lump sum offer usually works better than a payment plan proposal since it gets them the money faster.

Get any agreement in writing before you pay a dollar. The written agreement should state the total amount, the timeline, and the creditor’s explicit commitment to dismiss the garnishment and satisfy the judgment when payment is complete. Without that, you can pay the settlement and still get garnished.

Watch Out for Debt Relief Scams

If a company promises to settle your debts or stop a garnishment for a large upfront fee, be cautious. The Federal Trade Commission warns that predatory debt relief operations often collect fees and then fail to negotiate anything on your behalf.¹⁰ Legitimate debt settlement involves you or your attorney speaking directly with the creditor. No one can guarantee a garnishment will stop.

Some Debts Follow Different Rules

The options above apply to ordinary consumer debts like credit cards, medical bills, and personal loans. A few categories play by their own rules.

For child support and alimony, federal law allows garnishment of up to 50 percent of disposable earnings if you’re supporting another spouse or child, and up to 60 percent if you’re not. Payments more than 12 weeks overdue add another 5 percent.³ Bankruptcy will not stop support garnishment.

For federal tax debt, the IRS can levy wages and bank accounts without first getting a court judgment, and federal and state tax debts are not subject to the standard 25 percent cap.³ Your options run through the IRS directly, not the Ohio courts: installment agreement, offer in compromise, or currently-not-collectible status.

For defaulted federal student loans (generally 270 or more days past due), the Department of Education can order your employer to withhold up to 15 percent of your disposable income through an administrative process, with no court judgment required. You must be left with at least $217.50 per week. You’ll get a 30-day notice before the garnishment starts, during which you can request a hearing or enter a repayment agreement.

Your Job Is Protected From a Single Garnishment

Federal law prohibits your employer from firing you because your earnings have been garnished for any single debt.¹¹ An employer who violates that rule faces a fine of up to $1,000, up to a year in prison, or both. The protection covers one debt only. Multiple simultaneous garnishments from different creditors are not shielded, which is one more reason to address the problem before it multiplies.

How to File Your Challenge

Once you’ve picked your approach, get your paperwork moving:

Prepare your documents. For exemptions, draft a written request for hearing (bank garnishments) or a motion and affidavit for exemption (wage garnishments). For judgment challenges, prepare a motion to vacate. Attach supporting evidence such as bank statements, benefit letters, and proof of prior payments.
File with the court that issued the garnishment order. Most Ohio courts accept filings in person, by mail, or electronically. Ask the clerk about fee waivers if you can’t afford the filing fee.
Serve the other parties. Send copies to the creditor and the garnishee (your employer or bank) by certified mail or personal delivery. The clerk can confirm the required service method.
Attend the hearing. Bring originals of all supporting documents. If the court accepts your exemptions or challenge, it can reduce or eliminate the garnishment.

Keep copies of everything you file and every mailing receipt. If the garnishment continues after the court rules in your favor, those records are what you’ll use to enforce the order.

1
Ohio Legislative Service Commission. Ohio Revised Code 2716.13 – Proceedings in Garnishment Other Than Personal Earnings
2
Bowling Green Municipal Court. Collection By Garnishment
3
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1673 – Restriction on Garnishment
4
Ohio Legislative Service Commission. Ohio Revised Code 2329.66 – Exempted Interests and Rights
5
United States Bankruptcy Court. April 1, 2025, Ohio Exemption Increases
6
Legal Information Institute. 31 CFR Appendix C to Part 212 – Examples of the Lookback Period and Protected Amount
7
Ohio Legislative Service Commission. Ohio Revised Code 2329.07 – Judgment May Become Dormant
8
Ohio Legislative Service Commission. Ohio Revised Code 2325.18 – Limitation
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 362 – Automatic Stay
10
Federal Trade Commission. Debt Relief and Credit Repair Scams
11
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1674 – Restriction on Discharge From Employment by Reason of Garnishment