Child maintenance payments... Wtf?
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I feel that. We have my partners 2 boys 50/50… a week on week off. They have one extra kid, we have two and still pay £220 as they’re registered living with her🥲 of course that means she gets the child benefit and as they’re soon to both registered disabled (thanks to the forms I’m filling in) due to being autistic she will also receive disability allowance😤it really really infuriates me!
More than likely. I get around £250 a month for one child but dad isn't as involved, well he's hardly involved. If they're saying it's around £250 for the 2 children and you've put in your 2 other kids and how many nights you have with the children, it will more than likely be around that amount you have to pay if she goes through CMS.
Child maintaince don’t care about your household circumstances. They do reduce the amount you pay significantly due to how many days you have the child (overnight only not day care) but also they do a small reduction for the additional children you live with in the house but it’s only a tiny reduction. I wouldn’t go through CMS if I was you, they are awful and so rude and bias. They sometimes add in frictional arrears you have to pay for no reason then you have to fight them to get them removed it’s awful
@Anais really??! My partner is a bit too chilled about it and doesn’t wanna cause a fuss (she’s not always been the nicest in the past) so we haven’t looked too much into it… I wouldn’t have thought we’d be able to claim for one of them!
@Jade I did delete my comment as you sorta have to go through court I believe. Not 100% sure on the ins and outs! Yeah I read on a step mum Facebook group that you can try and claim for one of them. (Step mums uk) on Facebook is great! Use their search bar to read previous posts about this topic!
@Anais Thankyou!!🙌🏻🙌🏻
Cms don’t care about household issues (except you having two kids gets a deduction on it a slight one but still) Ultimately the argument is she has to provide for them more and therefore he has to pay the maintenance - a lot of the time in situations like this the NRP has the child friday - Monday meaning they don’t need childcare, don’t provide uniforms, don’t provide lunches, don’t provide snacks, don’t facilitate extra curricular activities etc so of course maintenance should be paid! The child benefit etc is irrelevant I’m not saying the above is your circumstances I’m a big believer in a bank account for all the children’s costs that both parents contribute to 50/50
@Jade if you have the child exactly 50/50 overnight stays then you don’t have to pay anything but you need a court order to prove that you have the kids those nights so you would need to pay £255 for a court order as that’s the only thing child maintenance take as proof because the mother can say no and then they believe her because she has the child benefit. It has to be overnight stays though not 50/50 during the day
CMS is definitely a system designed for absent fathers who don’t give a shit, but fathers who are actually involved in their children’s lives are absolutely shafted by the system! Avoid getting tangled up in the CMS web at all costs, they’re a vile organisation to deal with!
@Angel oh wow okay!! I like the sound of that🤣 x
It is honestly the biggest load of rubbish ever. My partner pays £379 a month for his daughter who we also have 3 nights a week. We also have a daughter at home, mortgage, car to run etc. Its absolutely ridiculous!! Its basically the harder they work the more they get absolutely rinsed! The mother to my SD just works the minimum so she can still get all her benefits! Winds me up so much!
@Jade if you have them 50:50 you do not have to pay her anything! My ss mother tried to say my husband owes so much a month, he contacted cms and explained we done one week with us one week with mum, we didn’t have to go through court. They called her and asked how often we have ss(maybe if she said never or once a week we would of had to), but luckily for us she said it’s a week on/off, they asked who does doctor, hair, dentist appointments and he told them whoever’s week it lands on, also that my husband is paying half school dinners and uniform, they said to him she’s entitled to nothing then as both equal time. Also that if he didn’t want to pay for the school stuff he didn’t have to, only on his time,(he does, otherwise my ss would wear clothes that don’t fit him). I’m all for a father to pay their way, but when we you can see the money isn’t going onto the child or the mother stops contact (unless a valid reason to why)to get more, it makes me soo mad! Sorry for the long reply xx
Thank you for all the replies, guess we'll just have to suck it up and pay it for the next 10 years! Absolute joke of a system
Would mum be open to some kind of discussion? Eg split the cost of childcare 50/50 or split extra curricular activities 50/50? Or split all the kids costs 50/50 if you explained your situation and said it will benefit the kids.. you’re paying less than £30 a week per child over the year so it may end up costing you much more though that’s the only concern :/
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250 for 2 kids seems like a nice price. My other half pays 250 for 1
@Amy no we've tried in the past but her argument is we have two wages coming into our home so we should be paying what CMS tells us to pay
@Hollie it's not the amount as like you said £250 is a nice price, it's the fact that we pay for everything here for them 3 nights a week and have to pay that out as she has them 1 extra day .... With child benefit and child maintenance it works out his ex gets just under £5k a year to go towards the kids for having them 1 extra night a week, it just doesn't seem fair
You have to stop looking at what she has etc she has the children 52 days more than you a year (on average) it could be more or less some years but roughly based on your agreement it’s that - so of course maintenance is due! It wouldn’t matter if she was a multimillionaire he should still contribute to his children! My advice would be see about splitting it properly 50/50
Sorry but that’s outrages that she has them 1 night more and they have to pay all that and they still have to pay for things for the 3 nights a week they have them. It’s wrong. I don’t think £250 a month is fair for having the kids one night extra
@Amy don’t you think he’s still contributing to the kids the 3 nights he has them
@Angel yeah he absolutely is BUT if it isn’t 50/50 then he still has to contribute to mums house too
@Amy £250 for one day is not right I don’t know how that can be reasonable just because she has an extra day. Maybe £60 . He has other kids and child maintenance don’t consider that. It’s not fair one kid is worth hundreds when the rest are worth pounds (according to child maintenance) when the dad is already contributing by taking care of the child in his household too
@Angel it isn’t £250’for one day It’s roughly £30 per child per day that they’re with their mum
@Amy £30 per child per day is ridiculous for having them one extra day. £250 a month is not reasonable at all for having them one day extra. There are other kids to consider and the fact that they actually have a home with their dad where he has to pay all expenses for. I’m saying it should be about £60 a month tbh and I think that’s generous
@Angel we don’t know the situation, how much dad earns, what days he has the kids, if mum pays for everything (childcare, uniforms, lunches, extra curricula activities) we don’t know if the kids go to mums and then literally sleep at dads etc! Not saying that’s true but in some cases it makes sense
@Amy We don’t know if dad has financial struggles, loans he has to pay off, on the brink of being homeless and child maintenance don’t care about all that. The £250 a month still has to be paid no matter what for that one day extra they are with bio mum. They also don’t care who pays for the uniform, lunches childcare activities. It’s not a fair system and it does not consider all children
@Angel I agree that the system is broken Parents shouldn’t need it to contribute and provide for their kids 50/50 and if that’s not in way of time then it should be financially £30 a day per child could end up being £15-20 childcare, £5 lunch, £10 gymnastic class.. add in the uniform costs/food costs/extra costs Yeah we don’t know dads struggles but the kids don’t care they still need providing for 😫
I think you can claim back fuel costs travel costs out of the child maintenance also, worth looking at possibly if your really struggling with the cost of things maybe x
@Amy child care is reasonable for dad to contribute but everything else is unfair to put the tab on dad just because he has them one day less. Dad also has to get uniform, food for when they’re with him and all the other extra costs including his other kids. And the kids do care about dads struggles because they’ll notice especially when they also live with him for the other 3 days. It’s unfair to suggest they only need providing for at their mums house. I’m not saying he shouldn’t put money towards the extra day she has them but I just think £250 is a lot for an extra day
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@Angel no but the costs should be split - if the kids wants to do extra curricular activities they should be split, if they need childcare that should be split.. some dads aren’t buying uniform, and yes dad has food costs but mum has more so he absolutely should contribute to them at mums too for the extra day… I don’t think £30 per child per extra day (roughly) is an awful lot of money or an unreasonable amount depending on other things!
@Amy I do think he should contribute but I disagree on the amount. We’ll just agree to disagree then because for me I’m not just looking at the two children he has with ex but all the children that he has that all need to be provided for and household bills expenses and everything else that costs to keep the ship moving. I don’t agree with £250 a month for one day extra a week in this cost of living with other children and the fact that they partially live with him too and she has the child benefit.
@Angel I think there’s a lot to consider to decide if it’s good or bad I don’t think there’s enough information to decide either way! I’m a firm believer that all child related costs should be split 50/50 and then there would be no need for child maintenance
CMS is the worst outdated thing ever! Try your best to keep your private agreement as CMS take hardly anything into consideration and will take the money before your husbands wage even hits his account. Maybe go to court and see if you can get 50/50 so you don’t have to pay her anything.