To think my friend is truly awful for doing this?

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Excellent post!

THIS 👏🏼

Have you been a single parent, having your child with you every single night without fail because their dad couldn't be arsed?

Another typical sexist thread on MN!

We get numerous threads from women complaining that their ex is manipulating the business accounts and lying about his income to pay less maintenance and all agree that even if he still pays a large amount above the financial needs of the children, he is a bastard for doing so, even if he has the children regularly.

But twist the situation around and the guy just deserves it!

Of course, these posters are always right all because, aren't all men bastards anyway?

Where did I say she isn't wrong?

She shouldn't be doing it, but knowing how the system works he will be screwing her over soon enough (and already did for her pregnancy and the newborn days) so I can't bring myself to care about what she's up to.

I wouldn't be the slightest bit arsed about this.

Why are you more shocked about her actions rather than this shameful man who has shirked his responsibilities towards his child and his child’s mother?

It doesn't say anywhere that she's more shocked.
However. her friend is her friend, and she will spend time with her. The child's father is nothing to do with OP, she probably won't ever see him.

You are joking aren't you?

Why don't you sit down with a pen and paper and work out how many hours your friend dedicates to raising her child.
Include the evenings and nights too of course.
Give her an hourly rate for this (living wage)
Then include the additional housing costs/bills.
Then include all the extra food/clothing/meds/toys/activities/petrol etc

Then divide by 2 (two parents)

Then include the year/months of back-pay & interest.

Then tell me she's quids in, cos I bet she fucking isn't.

The way she's expressing it might seem gauche, but if you took the time to do the maths rather than running your friend down online you'd be a better person for it.

Your friend needs to find better friends.

It isn't fraud, because she can claim it irrelevant of what he is paying. They do not take maintenance into account for means testing benefits.

Yes, on MN women are almost never in the wrong! I would be tempted to tell him what she was doing, as I would a woman who was being cheated by an ex.

I think the point here is that she’s claiming free childcare, funded by the taxpayer, when those costs are already covered by her ex. On every MN benefit thread, those who are perceived as cheats are considered a scourge on society. How is this any different ? It’s fraud.

Why are you more shocked about her actions rather than this shameful man who has shirked his responsibilities towards his child and his child’s mother? It’s a sad situation all round and while I can’t admire her dishonesty nor her faffing about booking fancy mini breaks with pals when her life is in a shambles, it seems insignificant compared to this appalling man.

Your moral codes don’t align. I’ve known someone a long time whose morals are growing further and further apart from mine. Again it’s about money and duping a man. Karma will sort her out

@Jamye Maybe in your mind but maybe in her mind his behaviour his relavant to the dishonesty. She's your friend, instead of putting her here for all to judge why don't you talk to her instead and make her aware of the issues of being dishonest... maybe have an honest convo with her seen as you are all about honesty. I realise this is a place to vent but you are already confident in what you feel about it all and if the exact details are true you've ousted her over something that doesn't even concern you and youre not looking for advice you're just looking to bad mouth her.

I'm not going to ask why your husband doesn't want to do those things but clearly OP is the girlfriend of a man who thinks he is being mugged off by his ex, despite the fact he has had fuck all involvement with his child.

How is the mother getting more maintenance than the pittance they normally get not good for the child’s quality of life? How is her spending a
day a week (when the other parent is nowhere to be seen) with the child not giving the child a good quality of life?

I would argue the father sticking around might have given the child a good quality of life (though that’s debatable if he’s an arse). Now the Mum is doing what she can as a single parent - and if that means a bit of extra cash then I can’t see how that negatively affects the child?

A knob gets screwed over, cry me a river.

Normally it's these men screwing their children over and no one seems that upset by it.

Yes, it's dishonest and yes, I wouldn't do it myself. But like posters have said, she's probably trying to get some payback and is exploiting his lack of interest in his child to do this. So it's "targeted" dishonesty at someone she thinks owes her. As her friend, I'd think she's a bit outrageous but leave her to it.

Doesn’t the child deserve better though because yourself and the OPs friend seem to be missing the same point. The crux of the issue isn’t really about the man at all or getting one over on him it’s about the child having the best quality of life which neither are giving.

I don’t think you’re being unreasonable to feel uncomfortable about it, but I also think it’s not so black and white and you are being quite judgemental without knowing the full history of their relationship (even if you think you do).

This is almost certainly not about the money but about your friend trying to mitigate against other perceived losses.

I would focus on trying to understand the behaviour and support your friend in moving to a place where the lying doesn’t feel necessary anymore.

I think men like this deserve far worse.

We don’t know why he doesn’t have the child overnight but his maintenance will reflect that and as the OP says his maintenance is high unless the OP would like to correct me it sounds as though he probably pays over the odds for maintenance or at least that’s how it reads to me. Even people who earn well over the minimum wage per week get to pay pitiful sums IME. It’s still no excuse to misrepresent your position and brag about it. It’s a disgraceful moral role-model to be to your child, distasteful at the very least. She should be spending his child maintenance on their child not weekends away with her friends.

It’s clearly an arrangement that suits them both. It would be very easy for him to check how much nursery costs. He probably feels guilty and happy to chuck a bit of extra money at the situation so he doesn’t have to deal with any part of parenting.

Like another poster said - he’s paying for his freedom.

If someone claimed expenses from their employer they weren’t due, that would be fraud. They might say their employer treated them badly or they weren’t paid for working over their hours but that wouldn’t change the fact it’s fraud.

The dynamic’s obviously different as he’s her ex-partner and the father of her child but in my eyes it’s still fraud. I wouldn’t want to be friends with someone who committed fraud to have more nice things and/or punish someone else because I wouldn’t trust them.

This will create serious animosity if he finds out too and their child will be the one who feels the impact of that the most. Poor thing - their dad’s a dick and their mum’s a thief who prioritises her bank balance over them.

His own stupid fault. If he was more involved he’d know what’s going on wouldn’t he.

He’s paying for his freedom.