DP unemployed, should i pay his CSA payments to his ex?

[shouldipayHIScsa]

DP lost his job in January.(long story unfair dismissal case)

DP has been going through the CSA route, as his ex was refusing to give bank details. when he lost his job and she could not get payment through his employer she has had to give up the details and now we pay direct through internet payment, and we now have proof we are paying it.

DP would prefer to keep paying her the amount he was paying from his last job. reasonably well paid before so it is a decent amount.

I do get a reasonabe income. But i am at present paying all household bills, my owns bills and debts, plus now dp debts and bills.I could afford her payments.I still have to pay childminder while dp is off work as i cant afford to lose my place with childminder (she is a fantastic one, and we know how these are to come by)

having just sorted out this months finances, if i pay her, then we will literally be eating beans on toast type of food for the next month.If I dont then will be able to get something better, tuna/fresh meat ,and some half decent bread. my son is lactose intolerant. an example is that if we pay her, then my DS will have to be told he can only have milk with cereal, and just water to drink. If we dont I can get enough of his more expensive milk that he can drink milk as a beverage rather than just water.

His ex as a bit of a twunt. Our kids go to the same school. She purposefully steers SD away from me if we cross paths at school. Walks past me and ignores me. When she calls the house and I answer she used to hang up(she has finally seen sense on this and asks if she can speak to dp rather than hang up and try again)

I need a little bit of a reality check here.

Should i be stumping up and paying her?

I think dp should just contact the csa and have his figure recalculate his figure.I think he should also back date his unemployment to when he was actually unemployed.

Dp is also in a right mood because he's a smoker, and i refuse to give him cash for ciggies. I have had to give up too. although i am very much a social smoker so it isn't a problem. He is saying as he has an "addiction" as he cals it that he is in a foul mood.he has 2 packs of nicotine patches and refuses to wear them.

he also had a wobble as me and kids are members of gym. kids have swimming lessons and membership is cheaper than lesson prices.I rarely drink, dont smoke anymore, it is my one luxury to myself. he feels its unfair and he gets moody if we go to gym as he doesn't have any money to go.

so he's off now trying to get one of those cash convertors places to sell a guitar and his wedding rings. With his big sad face on and I am the bad guy in all this

what happened to whats yours is mine? you wont give him ne of YOUR money to by ciggarettes? tight arse!

piecenjam - sorry about your tale , but i wouldn't get in that state. this really is his only chance. i dont have the patience to give anyone a chance time and time again. life's too short. he's had his warning, there wont be a repeat of the discussion. he will just be asked to leave. i have made it clear thats how it stands at the moment.

he's never been unemployed in his life before. left an extremely well paid job in september, for one which was supposed to have a share in a partnership of another enterprise with his new boss. he was there 5 weeks and the owner sold up, the new owner gave him a pay cut, and demoted him in favour of his family. then when my partner caught pneumonnia and took 1 week(just a week) off sick , he returned to be told he had been replaced.

he is very supportive in lots of ways. i think he does need this kick up the backside to realise he is sponging off me and trying to live in luxury as if he was still earning his large income he had when we first met.

i dont mind being the breadwinner and bringing more into household and him doing more of housework.

but its quite difficult in this situation.

my wages and his will be equal with his new job. but then i will have my additional income from my maintenance, which enable me and dc to be comfortable. it means dp will never have to bare any of costs which some would see as family expenses.. for example. childcare costs are all mine.

and i have found myself havng to buy a seperate shopping for food, so that i can by fresh fish/smoked salmon or steaks for the kids(another factor of my maintenance is a request that they eat 1 meal a day of either fresh fish or meat). but they have not have anything other than fish fingers and chicken nuggets since xmas. if my ex finds that out he will go balistic.

it segregates us as what happens is i buy food for me and dp out of joint income account. then need to do a seperate shop for dc. and there's obviously lots of lavish foods in fridge that are only for my dc.

due to dp saving me in childcare costs i have used the maintenance for the treat things for all of our dc(his dd included), i have bought her school clothes and clothes for our house.

i used to buy her food which was healthy too, but so sick of seeing expensive meat and veg being tossed and her refusing to eat it that i wont any longer. this has forced dp to get her to eat her dinner and stop wasting it. it's now completely his responsibility to prepare the meal when she is her.

so i also need some advice...i might post in step parent.

what should we be sharing/splitting? and what should be seperate?

its very hard to be like a family, when the financial dynamics are all split like this.

nailak - here's the problem. whats mine... is not mine. my maintenance i receive from ex is for MY DC! not for me. my wage does not cover the bills/rent/debts etc, i am already using some of the DC'S money to pay dp share of the bills.

we are a new couple. moved in on an equal basis.. to share living costs

we are not married.
i am not , nor ever really interested in marriage.

i never at any time agreed that what mine was his, nor do i want to be sharing his.

another question.. should i be expecting dp to do anything for dc birthday? i pay that, and i pay about half of his dd birthday gift. and at xmas i bore a chuck of his xmas gift cost to his family and dd.

he has never contributed to dd or ds birthday. except maybe a choclate and homemade card from his dd to my dc.

i have never mentionned as i supposed that should come from my maintenance finances.

but.... friends and a partner(who had never even met ds, just knew i had one) have done in the past.And a friend of mine thought that he should.

Getting his payment reassessed by the CSA is really the only fair way to do it.

the result of his chat with csa earlier was that he is to send in his p45, and copies of the bank statements showing any payments we have made, and they will adjust the figure. they advised in the meantime to pay £5 per week. and he is to contact then when he gets his first payslip and they will recalculate again.

NO WAY NO WAY NO WAY.... Its disgracfull that you should pay his twaty ex with your money .. consequently you losing out you must be mad...

My DP has an ex and we are currently disgusing CSA payments..

If he is unemployed then i dont think he has to pay only minimum csa which i think is £5.00 a week..

Good Luck

and i have found myself havng to buy a seperate shopping for food, so that i can by fresh fish/smoked salmon or steaks for the kids(another factor of my maintenance is a request that they eat 1 meal a day of either fresh fish or meat). but they have not have anything other than fish fingers and chicken nuggets since xmas. if my ex finds that out he will go balistic

wtf????? smoked salmon or steak? fuck that... how can any absent parent insist on that, or even monitor it...

I wouldn't pay. Think of your own children first. Their needs are your priority.

it segregates us as what happens is i buy food for me and dp out of joint income account. then need to do a seperate shop for dc. and there's obviously lots of lavish foods in fridge that are only for my dc.

this has to be one of the most crazy things I have ever read on here, it really is..

do you have any idea how ridiculous this is?

squeaky- i am on very good terms with my ex. we have an informal arrangement. he initially asked how much it cost for dc to afford certain things. i gave him a figure. he stick to it as much as possible. we have avoided ever going through court or arguing with this.

all he asks is they eat one "real" meal a day. meat and 2 veg variety with fresh produce.

they learn how to swim(ex older ds had a near fatal accident where he was dragged out to sea as a young lad,)

he does not insist. it is a request that have agreed to.

ex has dc from friday till sunday night. they are old enough to tell them what they are eating at home.

shepherds pie is a "real meal"

fish fingers with mash and beans is a "real meal"

what sort of warped message is it giving your children to see you eating tesco basics while they tuck into fillet steak... sorry but that is completely barking mad...

i dont think you should be paying his csa payments as is not ur responsibility, if the csa is based on his income then it should be taken out of his jsa at the moment. i understand that his xp may be upset when she sees your kids eating what they eat etc and her maintenace being cut and that is the issue.
How would you feel if your xps sc were doing all that when yours were suffering? i know in reality the situation is more complicated then that#!

maybe you could come to a compromise, and you could be reassessed by the csa and ontop of the amount taken out of his jsa also pay a small affordable top up amount out of your joint account? and if dp has a strop tell him that he has to take any job if he is that bothered and all the expenses shouldnt come down to you.

just out of interest does he do all the housekeeping etc now he is a sahd?

No you shouldn't give his ex money. He sounds like a freeloader.

Your food situation sounds bonkers.

You can have a perfectly good 'real meal' without meat or fish. In fact most people eat far more meat than is healthy for them. That aside, I think it's very odd to be doing separate shopping and cooking for the children, surely that's less cost-efficient than making a single family meal for everyone?

Don't think your ex has any business micro-managing exactly what you are/aren't allowed to feed your children when they're living with you, that's ridiculous.

Personally I think you should go to court and get payments etc sorted out properly, rather than getting into 'informal' arrangements conditional on you jumping through whatever hoops he devises for you. It doesn't need to be an unpleasant or acrimonious thing, just best for everyone to get responsibilities set out officially.

i dont think it is a hoop i think it is something that he would prefer his kids to have so he has expressed his views and has been allowed to be involved in the basic decisions or parenting.

as to why he feels this way that is his business.

I just wonder what would happen to the maintenance payments if he found out the OP wasn't complying with his 'views'. That's the problem with informal arrangements.

I'd be pretty pissed off if I was paying money towards my children's food etc. and it was spent on my ex's new partner and his child.

Very pissed off in fact.

housekeeping. - he does most. i still do the ironing, tiled floors and bathroom.

squeaky - kids were raised on continental diet. they will probably have steak 1 night the week, chicken breast another. often it will will be one steak and veg spread through pasta for us all. but dp wont eat anything european anyway. or in particular anything that originates from my ex homeland as .. well.. as its where he comes from. so we often eat different anyway. due to ds lactose issues it suits his stomach beter to have seperate things like meats and veg than shepherds pie with milk in the mash, or fish pie. which of course would be cheaper, but disagrees with him.

dp doesn't want steak the way we eat it either. we have frying quick cook steak. he insists on fillet steak if he has any. he cant do things with a compromise. i can buy me and kids frying steak for under £3, whereas if dp wants steak it is a £10 fillet, just for the one fillet.

dp doesn't like fresh fish.

i make lasagne(special recipe using boiled eggs instead of white sauce) for all of us, and dp wont eat as its from ex homeland.

anyway, of the point. i was only bringing this up to point out what money should be spent on. last week dd had to go to childminder with cuppa soup, fruit and raisins.would be nice if i could afford to give her soup with real veg instead of whatever those sachets are actually made of. i'm actually too scared to look at the label. all i know is its cheap and keeps her from being hungry. thank goodness for 10p super noodles too. it has become a main meal in her house recently.

Sorry but I think this whole situation is crazy, and OP I think you need to stand up for yourself much more.

On the one hand you have your current dp sponging off you and taking money that has been put aside for essentials and blowing it on stuff that isn't a necessity then expecting you to pay his way for him, and on the other you have your Ex P who gives you money for his DC with a whole host of conditions attached and has you jumping through hoops to provide certain meals. I cannot imagine living that way and feel sad for you that you don't seem to feel that this is not a healthy situation.

Fwiw our position is not disimilar in that both DH and have kids from previous relationships. We look at everything moneywise as a "family pot" - I was a sahm for a while which meant caring for my own children and also his when they stayed with us in the hols etc. He supported all of us financially for that time. Then, when he lost his job, we both looked for work and I secured a better paid job and he is now a sahd. I support all of us financially, which includes paying child support to his ex, even though we don't "have" to in theory as he isn't earning.

We both trust one another to spend sensibly and with consideration for the needs of everyone. When money is tight, essentials are paid for first and then we can decide what luxuries we can afford (if any).

If my ex even attempted to dictate what his child support was spent on I would tell him to get stuffed. It's impossible to ring fence it just for my DC's - it goes into the family pot and is used wherever it is needed. If that is rent, bills, car running etc then that's fine as my DC's benefit from me paying all of those things.

We eat a proper cooked meal every day but manage this fine on a budget - shepherds pie bulked out with lentils, a hearty soup with pearl barley and home made bread, baked potatoes with tuna and sweetcorn and beef casserole are just some of the low cost meals we eat.

In my opinion the issue of whether or not you should pay CSA for him, is masking far bigger problems. Perhaps not what you want to hear but honestly I read you posts and was stunned.

excuse typos. can feel a migraine coming on.

its not hoops jumping. as nailak says. we parent well as a team. i have requests that he abides to in his house. my dc have 2 biological parents. both allowed to make decision how their joint dc are raised

IMO No you shouldn't pay the CSA for him. However I think it would be fair to warn his ex that he is unemployed and has been for a while now and that, while you have tried to continue them hoping this would be short term, the payments are going to have to reduce as a result until he gets another job.
Nothing worse than money you're expecting to come in being late and only finding ouit several weeks later that actually you're not getting it at all. So please do warn her.

Presumably your partner is on JSA at the moment? SO he'll have to pay something like £5 from that for his dc.

we told her back in january he was unemployed. She knew i would be paying it as long as i could afford to.

dp wont claim jobseekers.