Federal Restitution Payment Plan: Amounts, Changes, and Penalties

A federal restitution payment plan is a court-ordered schedule of payments toward the total restitution amount set at sentencing. The sentencing judge decides the schedule based on your income, assets, and obligations; payments go to the Clerk of the U.S. District Court, which forwards them to victims. The total itself is fixed by the victim’s losses and does not shrink because you cannot easily afford it. Miss payments and the balance grows through interest and penalties, and the government has collection tools closer to those of the IRS than an ordinary creditor.

How the Court Sets Your Monthly Payment

The court orders the full restitution amount based on what the victim actually lost. Your ability to pay the total has no effect on that number.¹ Someone ordered to pay $500,000 owes $500,000 even on a minimum-wage income.

Ability to pay matters when the court sets the schedule. Three factors drive it: your financial resources and assets, your projected earnings, and your existing financial obligations, including dependents.¹ The U.S. Probation Office typically does the financial work-up after sentencing. You’ll file an affidavit covering all of your assets, income, expenses, and dependents, and you should expect to hand over pay stubs, bank statements, tax returns, and a full accounting of what you own.

The monthly number that comes out of this process is the maximum the Probation Office believes you can pay while covering basic living costs. Meeting the schedule is a mandatory condition of supervised release, not a suggestion.

Paying While You’re in Prison

If you’re incarcerated, the Bureau of Prisons runs the Inmate Financial Responsibility Program (IFRP). Staff help you build a financial plan during initial classification and expect you to pay from prison wages or UNICOR earnings.²

The IFRP is technically voluntary. Refusing to participate carries consequences that reach into nearly every corner of prison life:

Removal from UNICOR and a six-month bar from the waiting list.
No performance pay, bonus pay, or vacation pay above maintenance-level wages.
Monthly commissary spending capped at $25, not counting stamps and phone credits.
Placement in the lowest available housing status.
No furloughs, community-based placements, or outside work details.
No release gratuity, absent a warden’s exception.

Those restrictions make refusal impractical for most inmates, even though the BOP cannot force payment outright.²

Where to Send Payments

Payments go to the Clerk of the U.S. District Court that handled your case. Not the Probation Office. Not the victim. The Clerk’s Office processes payments and distributes money to victims on a pro-rata basis when there is more than one, meaning each payment is split in proportion to each victim’s losses.³

Most federal courts accept checks and money orders made payable to “Clerk, U.S. District Court.” Online payments run through the U.S. Treasury’s Pay.gov site, which accepts checking accounts, savings accounts, and debit cards. Include your case number on anything you send. Some districts restrict personal checks, so confirm the accepted methods with your Clerk’s Office.

What Late Payments Cost You

Restitution orders over $2,500 accrue interest automatically unless you pay the balance in full within 15 days of the judgment date. The rate follows the weekly average one-year constant maturity Treasury yield published by the Federal Reserve for the week before interest begins, and interest compounds daily.⁴ If the court finds you genuinely cannot afford interest, it can waive it, cap the total, or limit how long it accrues.

The law separates delinquency from default, and the gap between them is expensive. A payment is delinquent once it is more than 30 days late. It becomes a default after 90 days.⁵ Penalties:

Delinquency: 10% of the late principal.
Default: an additional 15% of the principal in default.

These stack. A $10,000 payment that slides into default triggers $2,500 in combined penalties on top of interest.⁴ Once a payment enters default, the entire remaining balance becomes due within 30 days of notification.⁵

Asking the Court to Change Your Payments

Your restitution order requires you to notify the court and the Attorney General of any material change in your finances that affects your ability to pay. A job loss, a disability, or a major medical event qualifies.¹

To actually change the schedule, you file a motion with the original sentencing court. Telling your probation officer isn’t enough. Only the sentencing court can adjust the payment terms, and before it rules, the Attorney General must certify that victims have been notified.¹ The court can lower payments, or, if your finances have improved, order immediate payment in full.

Documentation is what carries a motion like this. A filing that says “I lost my job” without termination letters, bank statements showing the impact, and evidence of a job search rarely succeeds. Either side can request an adjustment; the government and victims can bring changed circumstances to the court as well.

What Happens If You Don’t Pay

The Financial Litigation Unit (FLU) inside the U.S. Attorney’s Office enforces restitution orders. It can pursue collection for 20 years from the judgment date, plus any time you spend incarcerated, or until you die.³ While you’re on supervised release, your probation officer also monitors payments and reports shortfalls.

The order automatically creates a lien on all of your property and rights to property, functioning much like a federal tax lien. The lien takes effect on the date judgment is entered and lasts 20 years or until the debt is paid. Beyond the lien, the government can use any civil collection procedure available under federal or state law, including wage garnishment capped at 25% of disposable earnings under the Consumer Credit Protection Act.⁶ It can also intercept federal tax refunds through the Treasury Offset Program. Property exempt from IRS tax levies (basic clothing, school books, undelivered mail, and limited personal property and wages) is also exempt from restitution enforcement.

Non-payment on supervised release can lead to revocation. If the court finds by a preponderance of the evidence that you violated a condition of release, it can send you back to prison for up to one year for minor offenses and up to five years for Class A felonies.⁷

There is a constitutional guardrail. Under the Supreme Court’s decision in Bearden v. Georgia, a court cannot imprison you solely for being too poor to pay. If you’ve made genuine efforts to find work and pay what you can, the court has to consider alternative sanctions first.⁸ If the court finds you willfully refused to pay or didn’t make reasonable efforts to earn, prison is on the table. “Can’t pay” versus “won’t pay” decides the outcome. Courts can also enter restraining orders, order the sale of property, or require a performance bond.

How Long the Obligation Lasts

Restitution liability ends on the later of two dates: 20 years from the entry of judgment, or 20 years after your release from imprisonment.⁶ Someone sentenced to 10 years followed by supervised release could face 30 years of enforcement from the original judgment.

Death does not clear the debt. If you die with a balance owed, your estate stays responsible, and the government’s lien continues until the estate receives a written release of liability.⁶

Bankruptcy doesn’t clear it either. Federal criminal restitution is explicitly excluded from discharge under the Bankruptcy Code.⁹ Filing Chapter 7 or Chapter 13 will not reduce or eliminate the balance, and anyone thinking of bankruptcy as a way around a restitution order should know that going in.

1
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3664 – Procedure for Issuance and Enforcement of Order of Restitution
2
Federal Bureau of Prisons. Financial Responsibility Program, Inmate
3
U.S. Department of Justice. Restitution Process
4
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3612 – Collection of Unpaid Fine or Restitution
5
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3572 – Imposition of a Sentence of Fine and Related Matters
6
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3613 – Civil Remedies for Satisfaction of an Unpaid Fine
7
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 3583 – Inclusion of a Term of Supervised Release After Imprisonment
8
Legal Information Institute. Danny R. Bearden, Petitioner v. Georgia
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 11 USC 523 – Exceptions to Discharge