Ex applied to deduct travel costs from child maintenance

Well if what OP says is true and he wanted nothing to do with his child for a long time and then had to be forced to pay maintenance, EOW is what I’d expect.

You only have to look on MN threads to realise there are a lot of non resident dads doing the bare minimum despite mum wanting and asking for more input.

Many, many, many men have no say in the matter. Until more mothers are prepared to switch roles and become the non-resident parent, EOW and half the school holidays is what Dads get.

It's not 2 journeys every other week though unless travel is being shared 50:50. It's 2 round trip journeys EOW which works out as 8 single journeys per month.

It's from his home to child's home, from child's home to his home on a Friday night. Then from his home to child's home on a Sunday, and from child's home back to his home. X2 per month.

That probably does amount to a fair amount of fuel if he lives 35 miles away.

Heaven forbid Dad wants a bit of extra money to buy his child a pizza or an ice cream during his time. What a deadbeat he must be!!!

Well EOW isn’t great is it ?

Because this is the way CMS works.

He will have been asked to calculate his average weekly travel costs.

CMS is calculated on weekly income.

Except he is not taking money from his child. He is paying for the fuel, tyres, oil, tolls etc. out of his own wage. He has asked CMS to allow him to pay these essential costs needed for his children to spend time with both parents BEFORE they run their calculation for maintenance. The outcome will be maintenance will reduce by about a fiver. It's a token of acknowledgement of the costs that non-resident parents have to pay.

The alternative is resident parents agree to meet half way. I can assure you that will cost more than a fiver at the distances stated though.

Maybe he had to move there because it's what he could afford. Maybe it's nearer to his work. Maybe it's nearer to family support.

Heaven forbid Dad wants a bit of extra money to buy his child a pizza or an ice cream during his time. What a deadbeat he must be!!!

My ex did this. Moved 400 miles away, left me to do all the work then sought, and got, a variation to cover his travel expenses for the high days and holidays he does have her. I’m thinking of challenging the ongoing need for it now as our child is older and travels there and back alone so costs are greatly reduced.

You would be amazed, stroked horrified as to how high the threshold has to be to withdraw contact from father’s
Excuse after excuse after excuse is made for them.

All to the child’s detriment.

That is surely evidence of child neglect in his care. I would be keeping evidence of that or reporting it to get sole custody.

Bloody hell if he let his child burn I’d raise it a child protection issue. I would send him the evidence that CMS is to cover costs whilst in your care and he has to provide whilst in his care and only send sun cream from now on.

Ps, given he’s not seeing your child weekly, I would start with that as a challenge back (has to be costs that exceed £10 per week).

plus work out the mileage (but assume will be there and back twice). Base that cost on Hmrc mileage rate.

also make sure that he is declaring income from rentals, dividends and investments. X

From what I remember despite tghe fact that my ex moved away and point blank refused to have anything to do with DS's transport while I could claim minimal travel expenses that would mean that I could not claim a reduction for the nights he spent with me

Sadly I think you only recourse is to check what is stated can be claimed as mileage and toll rates, and then evidence his journey yourself. Also if he only has care once a fortnight, this should be reflective of that too. It’s been a while since my husband went through all of this with his ex. In his case we were paying for phones, school trips, clothes and holidays, and regularly bailing out missed mortgage payments (never to be seen again), so we did seek a travel allowance deduction, as CMS don’t take that into account.

is he self employed or paye? Sadly he can throw extra money into pension pot reduce his income. If you know what time of year he may get paid bonus’s etc, then ensure you ask for a re-evaluation of income at that time of year.

Yep he’s an a*sehole.
How far away does he live? £70 a week is a lot

That’s what it costs him. It’s nowhere near what he’ll actually end up with. It comes down to a mileage allowance averaged out over the year, and then a minimum weekly threshold of £10 is applied, so he only gets the excess after another deduction according to the % maintenance he pays.

How is it 70 a week if he's only seeing them every other week? Or is that it averaged out?

Courts, sigh. :-(

So in that example that you give Friday is your day in theory but I would talk to the nursery and just say look this lunatic tried to kill me. I need a safe space to do a handover. Can you just charge me for an hour? Cause he’s gonna pick her up at 9 o’clock you shouldn’t be paying the whole day and the nursery managers should facilitate that for you. Even half a day would be helpful to reduce your bill.
However Monday is his day and he needs to pay for that day just basically remove it from your contract you don’t need it.
And then if he wants to drop her at 9 am or 3 pm that’s up to him
Yeah, that might save you a few quid over the course of a year

My ex did this, had the nerve to move 1.5 hours one way away. Then deduct travel
costs alongside a deduction for the new girlfriend’s menagerie of children 🫠

If I remember they deduct 13p per mile, and that comes off his gross income. Then maintenance is worked out from there, it actually ends up being not much at all. Pennies really.

He’ll have to provide evidence of his miles traveled and fuel costs forever and he’ll be spot checked. And of course you have the right to challenge it.

My ex did this. Had to provide receipts for ages. I think he still does get asked for receipts every so often. Gives him a 60p deduction every month. Petty.

What do you mean bill for his days? How is that not happening already ?
On the days that he has the child how he takes care of it is his business. It’s nothing to do with you. You need to get onto that tomorrow.

If the judge ordered him to travel you may be able to challenge this. My ex tried to do this but as it was court ordered he pay for half the costs he wasn't able to reduce his maintenance. I had to provide a copy of the part of the order that stated he was to pay so I imagine an order saying they are responsible for travel may have a similar impact?