My ex refuses to follow the court ordered visitation schedule...

Joy, legally you can fight it by petitioning the court to sue on the grounds that your ex is in violation of the court's order and is in contempt.  That gives the judge lots of potential remedies.

 

I'd suggest having your attorney do a "Come to Jesus" letter to your ex stating specifically how and where he is violating the visitation order and telling him if he doesn't stop the sheningans, you'll consider filing contempt charges against him.  It might avoid actually having to file and run up more legal bills.  (But trust me, a letter from your lawyer will work five times better than one from you.)

Good luck.

I'm going thru this right now with my boys, but my divorce was final March of this year!!  He has already been inconsistent, not coming when he's supposed to, and when it's his weekend telling the boys he can't take them this weekend and it's been going on for a couple of months now.  I bet the boys haven't spent much time with him this summer at all!!  I know his tramp (who he cheated on me with) and she's living with him, is partly to blame--probably too busy with her and making sure she doesn't cheat on him that he needs to watch her and not spend time with his kids.  I'm also stuck with a loser and he'll always be a loser and one day he'll wake up and wonder why his boys want nothing to do with him.  My 15 yr old is already telling him he doesn't want to go with him, when he finally does show up for visitation!!  So sad!!  But you know what I'd fight and let him know he needs to be responsible and he needs to give your kids consistency and stability in their life.  Basically I told my friends that my ex needs to grow a pair and act like a father instead of a teenager in lust and be a dad to his kids before it's too late.  I was told I would have to take him to court and have custody changed and visitation enforced, because we supposedly have shared parenting right now--which is a joke if you ask me.  There's nothing shared about it I take care of them 98% of the time!!  Anyways I would fight it and see what you can do thru court or mediation.  The kids need their dad but my attorney told me you can't make him want to see his kids, he has to want to do that on his own!  Which I think stinks and is unfair, but what can you do other than fight for your kids.  But you know what, your kids will grow up knowing that you are their rock and you are their stable parent and they will always come to you for that security, and not their dad.  Hang in there and good luck to you!

I would fight it. It is not good for the kids to have such an unstable schedule. They need to know when they will be with what parent and be able to rely on it.This is barring an emergency though.. He needs to follow the rules but  you need to be writing his inconsideration and inconsistancies down with dates.
You should try my bf's situation. He shows up when he is supposed to to be told he can't have the kids. He shows up and waits , thinking they have ran into town and the neighbor tells him they are on vacation. He gets his visitation "revoked" by his ex( she has sole custody with visitation at her discretion) for things such as not rolling his window all the way down when she tells him , for having a sports pic of their daughter that she paid for.She schedules things that are not regular things ( practices etc) on his visitation days, does not switch so then he just loses it. Sounds like you have a similar situation. No consideration...no consisitancy.

i totally relate.  my ex did the exact same for a year. we wen to mediation and they wrote up a thing telling him he can't do that anymore and has to follow x rules like give me 24 hour notice if not coming, etc.

he followed the rules for one week.

that was a year ago.

basically for me, he's a loser and always will be and i'm stuck with him.

for you.  i'd fight it every single time...maybe he will learn.