Filing an uncontested divorce in Madera County

The courthouse on South G Street

The court's location page lists a single building, Madera Superior Court, 200 South G Street, Madera, CA 93637, and describes it as a full-service court handling all case types. The court's local rules say the same thing in rule 1.3.12: all departments are located at the Madera County Main Courthouse, 200 South G Street, Madera, California 93637. The Locations and Contact Information page gives the same building.

One court page words this differently. The Family Law Court page says family law cases in Madera County are heard at several locations, including the Main Courthouse, but names no other building. This page follows local rule 1.3.12 and the location page, which put every department at the main courthouse, and so names only that address.

Inside the building, the court's Divorce, Legal Separation or Nullity Packet tells a filer that the Civil Division, which takes family law papers, is located on the fourth floor, and that the family law facilitator and Self-Help Center are on the first floor.

The Family Law Court page sends filing questions to the Civil Division at (559) 416-5525, and the court's main line is (559) 416-5599.

Filing windows, drop boxes and court holidays

The court's location page, and its Locations and Contact Information page in the same words, post three sets of hours, Monday through Friday except court holidays, listed below.

The windows close an hour before the drop boxes do, so between 3:00 p.m. and 4:00 p.m. papers go into a drop box rather than across the counter. The telephone lines keep the windows' hours.

• Filings at the clerk's windows: 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
• Filings in the available drop boxes: 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.
• Telephone lines: 8:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.

What the Madera court charges for a divorce

The court's Fee and Bail Schedules page posts the Statewide Civil Fee Schedule effective January 1, 2024, and states that as of January 1, 2026 the 2024 schedule remains in effect. The Judicial Council has since published a Statewide Civil Fee Schedule effective January 1, 2026, in which the joint petition of Family Code section 2342.5 has an item of its own. The court's page and the Judicial Council's schedule therefore differ on which schedule is current. This page follows the newer statewide schedule, which was read on October 19, 2026, because it is the schedule that carries the joint petition fee the Family Code now requires.

The amounts for a petition and a response are the same on both. In the court's posted January 1, 2024 schedule the petition sits at item 96 and the response at item 97, and both are $435; the Judicial Council's January 1, 2026 schedule moves the same two fees to 97 and 98. The statewide schedule explains its asterisks: fees marked with one vary in Riverside, San Bernardino and San Francisco because of a local surcharge. Madera is not among the three counties it names.

The items an uncontested divorce can meet, as the Judicial Council's Statewide Civil Fee Schedule effective January 1, 2026 numbers them, read on October 19, 2026:

• Item 97: the petition or other first paper for dissolution of marriage, legal separation or nullity, $435, under Government Code sections 70670(b), 70602.5 and 70602.6.
• Item 98: the first paper your spouse files in answer to the petition, $435, under Government Code section 70670(d), due once your spouse appears in the case, whether by a response, by form FL-130 or by some other first paper.
• Item 99: $870 for a single joint petition seeking a dissolution or legal separation (a summary dissolution has its own item), which the schedule says covers both petitioners' appearance.
• Item 100: the joint petition that starts a summary dissolution, $435.
• Item 103: no fee when a spouse whose default has been entered signs a settlement agreement or stipulation that is made part of the judgment (Government Code section 70677(c)).
• Item 104: no fee for a spouse in the armed forces who files form FL-130, the Appearance, Stipulations and Waivers (Government Code section 70673).

How many first-paper fees each path pays in Madera County

Count the papers that start the case and the papers that answer it. On an ordinary petition where your spouse files nothing, your spouse's default is entered, and the defaulted spouse signs the settlement agreement, the court collects item 97 once, $435, and item 103 adds nothing for that agreement. If your spouse instead files a response, or signs and files the Appearance, Stipulations and Waivers (form FL-130), item 98 applies to that paper as a first paper, and the court's total is $870. A spouse in the armed forces pays nothing for FL-130 under item 104. A summary dissolution under Family Code sections 2400 to 2403 is started by both spouses on one joint petition and pays one first-paper fee, $435, item 100 of the statewide schedule.

Item 99 sets $870 for a joint petition under Family Code section 2342.5, and subdivision (h) explains why: unless each spouse holds a fee waiver, the joint petition carries both first-paper fees of Government Code section 70670(b) and (d). The joint petition does not save a court fee in Madera County; it pays both first-paper fees.

The office's flat fee is paid to the office, not to the court, and is separate from every amount above: $1,499 for an ordinary petition, $999 when the two of you file a joint petition, and $599 on the summary dissolution track. Law Offices of Rozsa Gyene prepares and reviews every document in a limited scope engagement under California Rules of Court, rule 5.425, and the fee includes the written filing instructions for the Madera court, one revision round of the settlement agreement and the first correction of a judgment packet the court returns. If you want another revision round after that, its price is quoted to you before the work starts. The fee is earned in stages, and if the representation stops early, you get back the part of the fee not yet earned.

You file the papers, not the office. Law Offices of Rozsa Gyene does not file documents, does not serve the other spouse, does not appear in court, does not provide a notary, and does not prepare or record deeds. It represents one spouse only: the other spouse is not its client in the divorce, receives no advice from it, and may consult an attorney of their own choosing.

Asking the Madera court to waive its fees

The court publishes a Fee Waiver Packet, revised March 1, 2026, that gathers the Judicial Council's information sheet FW-001-INFO, the Request to Waive Court Fees (form FW-001) and the Order on Court Fee Waiver (form FW-003). The packet's instruction for a paper filing is direct: turn in your fee waiver forms to the clerk at the Civil Division.

The standard is statewide, in Government Code sections 68630 to 68634. Those sections open a waiver to a person on one of the public benefits they name, to a household earning no more than the published limit, and to a person whose fees would otherwise come out of the household's basic needs, and FW-001-INFO explains each ground. On a joint petition, section 2342.5(h) lifts the second first-paper fee only when both spouses have fee waivers.

If you e-file, the court's e-filing FAQ says the initiating document and the fee waiver application will be processed at the same time, and its fee answers state that a party with a fee waiver is not charged the e-filing transaction fees. Only the court's fees are reached by a fee waiver; the office's flat fee is not affected by it.

E-filing in Madera: optional, with family law exceptions

The court's e-filing page states that eFiling with the Madera Superior Court is not mandatory at this time, and that it is open in family law to attorneys and self-represented litigants through an approved electronic filing service provider. Its e-filing FAQ, revised September 22, 2025, answers the question for people without a lawyer of record: self-represented litigants are not required to file documents electronically, though they may choose to. Paper or e-filing: either route is open to you.

Division 6 of the local rules governs e-filing. Rule 6.1.6 lists family law among the case types eligible for it. Rule 6.2.1 then lists the documents that may not be e-filed, and one of its entries names three family law papers: the Family Law Request for Entry of Default, the Notice of Entry of Judgment, and the Child Support Case Registry Forms.

E-filing runs through a service provider of your choosing from the court's List of Approved EFSPs, revised October 6, 2026. The court's electronic filing manager is Journal Technologies, Inc., and the FAQ states that the maximum charge for the manager is $3.50 per filing, with unlimited documents, on top of whatever the provider charges. Your filing instructions name the method for each step.

The local rules and the two Madera forms

The Madera local rules were adopted effective January 1, 2026, and the court's Local Rules page says that version was not amended and remains in effect as of July 1, 2026. Family law sits in Division 5, Domestic Relations and Juvenile Matters, whose first chapter, General, runs from rule 5.1.1 to rule 5.1.43. Rule 5.1.1 requires that family law papers be prepared, so far as possible, on forms approved by the Judicial Council, and the two local forms below are the additions a Madera divorce meets.

Rules 5.1.37 and 5.1.38 set a family law case status conference in a dissolution case within 120 days. The notice of that conference is form MAD-CIV-003, Notice of Family Law Case Status Conference, which the local forms page marks Mandatory. The rule says the form will be generated and completed by the court, and that it is to be served on the other spouse along with the petition, so the papers served in Madera include this local form.

• MAD-CIV-010, Confidential Declaration: marked Mandatory on the local forms page, revised September 25, 2025. Under rule 5.1.36, the party filing a family law petition shall submit it, and the rule calls it optional but strongly encouraged with a response. The court's divorce packet includes it.
• MAD-CIV-003, Notice of Family Law Case Status Conference: marked Mandatory, revised April 15, 2020. The court prepares it and the filing spouse serves it with the petition.

The court's form packets

The Form Packets page lists the family law packets the court assembles, each with its revision date: the Divorce, Legal Separation or Nullity Packet of January 1, 2026; the Response to Divorce Packet of January 1, 2026; the Default Judgment, Divorce packet of July 1, 2026; the Declaration of Disclosure Packet of July 1, 2025; and a Summary Dissolution Packet, listed as April 28, 2025, which holds the Judicial Council's Summary Dissolution Information, form FL-810, of that date. Local rule 1.8.3 allows the court to charge for printed forms and packets, and the Form Packets page says the court charges a fee for its packets, though not in every instance.

The divorce packet states the residence rule in Madera terms: you or the other party must have lived in California for at least the last six months and in Madera County for at least the last three months. That is Family Code section 2320. The Declaration of Disclosure Packet goes with Family Code section 2104, under which each spouse serves a preliminary declaration of disclosure.

The judgment packet in Madera County

Statewide rules set the frame. California Rules of Court, rule 5.405 lists the Judgment Checklist, form FL-182, as the measure of what a court may require for a judgment; rule 5.411 governs a judgment the spouses stipulate to; and under rule 5.415 the clerk sends out the notice of entry of judgment using envelopes the spouses supply. A judgment on a written agreement may be entered from the declarations, with no hearing, as Family Code section 2336 and rule 5.409 permit.

The court's Default Judgment, Divorce packet, revised July 1, 2026, gives the Madera details for a default. It asks for three envelopes, one addressed to you and two addressed to the other party, each stamped and with no return address. After the judgment is entered, the packet says, the clerk mails the Notice of Entry of Judgment (form FL-190) and calls the filer to pick up the Judgment (form FL-180). Local rule 5.1.20 adds a requirement for a party who asks for a default hearing: a proposed judgment and notice of judgment, prepared for signature, go in with the request for setting, and the rule has the calendar clerk set the hearing.

Two of the court's sources differ on how the packet reaches the court. The default packet invites e-filing and names e-filing or the Civil Division on the fourth floor. Local rule 6.2.1 excludes the family law Request for Entry of Default and the Notice of Entry of Judgment from e-filing, and the e-filing FAQ says filers may continue to submit judgment packets in paper via drop box, mail or in person, with self-addressed stamped envelopes. This page follows the local rule and the FAQ: in Madera, the judgment packet goes in on paper, at the window, in the drop box or by mail, with its envelopes.

Remote appearances, if a hearing is set

A judgment on a written agreement can be entered without a hearing. If the court does set a hearing or a status conference, its Remote Video Appearances page states that the court is utilizing Zoom as its preferred remote appearance platform, and a party asks for a remote appearance through the court's Zoom Appearance Request Form. The page names criminal, civil, domestic violence and gun violence hearings, and links the Judicial Council remote appearance forms RA-010, RA-015, RA-020, RA-025 and RA-030.

Division 10 of the local rules, rules 10.1.1 to 10.1.5, covers remote hearings and appearances, and it leaves the technology to the court: the platform on which remote hearings and appearances are conducted shall be at the discretion of the court. The office does not appear at a hearing for you.

The Self-Help Center and the family law facilitator

The court's Self-Help Center and family law facilitator share one office at 200 South G Street, on the first floor according to the court's packets. The self-help page lists its telephone, (559) 416-5520, and its email, facilitator@madera.courts.ca.gov. The same page posts the office's hours and its appointment days with a note that special judicial orders may be in effect that impact office hours, so read the page itself before you go.

The court's pages differ on what the facilitator helps with. The self-help page lists divorce, child custody and spousal support among its subjects, and the divorce packet tells a filer to ask the family law facilitator or Self-Help Center to review the paperwork. The Family Law Court page says self-help and facilitator services are available on child support, spousal support and health insurance issues only. This page follows the self-help page and the divorce packet, which are the court's two sources written for a person starting a divorce. Either way, the self-help page is clear that the facilitator does not fill out forms and cannot represent you.

Some cases fall outside the flat fee: minor children or a pregnancy, a divorce the two of you have not yet agreed on, a restraining order or a concern for anyone's safety, a business or professional practice, a pension that needs a qualified domestic relations order, real property outside California, a legal separation or an annulment, a spouse who cannot be located, and spouses who are not both proficient in English. The State Bar of California's Lawyer Referral Service directory, at calbar.ca.gov/Public/Need-Legal-Help/Lawyer-Referral-Service, lists the certified lawyer referral services for every county.

After the judgment in Madera County

Filing the petition does not end the marriage, and neither does the passing of six months on its own. Family Code section 2339 keeps the marriage from ending before six months have gone by from the date the other spouse was served with the petition or first appeared in the case, and form FL-107-INFO puts the first day the marriage can end at six months and one day. The judgment states the date your marital status ends (section 2340), and nothing filed in Madera County shortens the six months.

When you change a name or a title, the agency handling it may ask for a certified copy of the judgment. The judgment counts as the marriage dissolution record under Government Code section 70674, so its certified copy is priced by that section: $15 for an applicant other than a public agency under item 195 of the Judicial Council's January 1, 2026 statewide schedule, and $10 for a public agency under item 194. The court's posted January 1, 2024 schedule lists the same two amounts at items 190 and 189. The e-filing FAQ says certified copies may be requested from the Civil Division by first class mail or in person, but not through e-filing, and the court's Records Search and Copy Request form, MAD-GEN-001, lists Judgment/Dissolution among the records it covers.

If the settlement agreement gives a California house or other real property to one spouse, the deed that carries it out is a separate step after the judgment. The office does not prepare or record deeds, so that step falls to a title company or another attorney.

Every source below was read on October 19, 2026. The addresses, fees, rules and form numbers above are drawn from those sources, and anything the court's pages did not state has been left off.

Rozsa Gyene, State Bar of California No. 208356, 3500 W. Olive Ave., Suite 300, Burbank, CA 91505.