Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think that maintenance SHOULD affect benefit entitlement?

363 replies

IJustCantBelieveIt · 15/01/2015 23:12

Don't want to drip feed, but don't want to go on and on.

My dh and I have been together for 4 years (married for 2) he has a 7 year old ds from a previous relationship. He has always paid maintenance, even though his ex is very difficult with contact. When we met, it was £53 a week. It is now £78 a week (these are based off of the statutory amounts, but elevated a little) We don't have a problem with paying. It is after all his ds.

His ex has had 2 more dc since they split, both have different fathers, who she is also no longer with. She works part time (well 24 hours a week) at weekends when her dc are at respective fathers' or with her mother. Both other fathers pay maintenance for their respective dc.

Now what has got me thinking is that we have just reviewed payment amount and increased it. I said to dh to make sure she lets her benefits' offices know as we don't want her getting stung. She got back to us saying that maintenance has no impact on her benefits.

How can this be? Out of curiosity, we did a benefit calculation with her circumstances and it shows as eligible for almost £500 a week. Plus her weekly earnings and maintenance payments from dh (haven't a clue what the other fathers pay, so we didn't include it) she is getting over £3000pcm.

Surely, maintenance payments should be counted as an income for her dc if nothing else. I thought benefits were calculated to make sure that families had enough money to live on. I don't begrudge that we pay maintenance, but she shouldn't also be receiving money to pay for her children from the govt, as I believe over £10 per day is sufficient for keeping a child? I don't know what to think. Anyone understand why this is like it is? Or am I just BU?

OP posts:
Babyroobs · 15/01/2015 23:45

yanbu. I do not understand why the state continues to pay large amounts when the 2 parents can adequately pay forthe child themselves. There should be a safety net whereby the rp can access benefits if the nrp doesn't pay and more effort needs to be put into making sure the nrp pays as the current system seems to be a bit of a shambles.

GraysAnalogy · 15/01/2015 23:46

No because what she's getting shouldn't have any impact on what he pays towards his own children.

And vice versa.

PiperIsTerrysChoclateOrange · 15/01/2015 23:48

£10 a day is not a lot.

For example my DS school meals is £2.00 per day. Then there is child care cost ( I pay mil fuel) washing his clothes and then breakfast and evening meals. Then it's the electric for him to play his computer games. Add the gas so the house is warm and there is hot water to have a bath plus the shampoo and body wash and tooth paste it all adds up.

He also wets the bed, so clean sheets every day ect.

DixieNormas · 15/01/2015 23:48

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

LadySybilLikesSloeGin · 15/01/2015 23:49

I'd happily cancel my child tax credit if my ex paid more maintenance... then again... don't children of married couples get this too?? It would be a little unfair then, no?

Viviennemary · 15/01/2015 23:49

I agree with a safety net. But on the whole maintenance should be taken into account. Why is it always somebody else's responsibility to subsidise when people are earning more than enough to support themselves and their children.

SantasLittleMonkeyButler · 15/01/2015 23:49

Going purely from the experience of friends who have been lone parents and supposedly in receipt of maintenance, I would say that the amount could only be deducted from any benefit payments if the maintenance was somehow guaranteed.

For example, the maintenance paid by the state somehow & then the maintenance paying parent pays the state back.

I say this because one friend, who springs to mind, received no maintenance at all for 10 years - despite repeated promises to pay from her DCs father & CSA involvement. I wish all non-resident parents were responsible, decent, adults who wouldn't see their children go without due to their own failings. But they are not. Had my friend had the amount her ex was supposed to pay deducted from her weekly benefits (well, taken into account for her tax credits as she had always worked) her DCs would have spent 10 years living in poverty.

DixieNormas · 15/01/2015 23:49

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Original poster
IJustCantBelieveIt · 15/01/2015 23:51

VivienneMary, that is more the point I was confused about. The govt are also paying (partly) for her dc. But, as I mentioned, I hadn't given thought to non paying parents.

OP posts:
Ludoole · 15/01/2015 23:53

I work 16 hours and get some housing benefit but still have to pay just under half my rent...

LadySybilLikesSloeGin · 15/01/2015 23:53

I claimed income support when ds was born, Dixie. A woman from the DWP came to my house to fill in the forms and I had to fill in one for the CSA, I had no choice. It took them 2 years to sort the claim out, by which time I was no longer claiming income support as I was working. I never did get any arrears though.

gobbynorthernbird · 15/01/2015 23:53

£10 per day to keep a child? My friend who has just had to move from a studio flat to a 2 bed place would beg to differ (Her rent has doubled). And that's before any extra bills, food, nursery, clothing, nappies, etc.

nousernamesleft · 15/01/2015 23:54

As others have said, it used to be counted, except for a £5 disregard iirc.
My exp was meant to pay £40 a week maintenance, so £35 was taken off my income support every week.
More often than not, no maintenance would arrive, and I'd be left up the creek. I'd have to trail into the job centre to try sort it out, which then cost me £10 in bus fares. At least once a month I'd be begging for a crisis loan. I got to the stage where I budgeted to live without the maintenance, and if it appeared I'd buy some extra food so that I could eat reasonably well other weeks.
That was the year I lived on the kids leftovers, and the odd slice of toast. I'd hate to think of it happening to others if it was changed again.

DixieNormas · 15/01/2015 23:56

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

OldLadyKnows · 15/01/2015 23:57

I understand your POV, OP (and your regret at starting this!) and I'm sure that you can also see why paying regular maintenance cannot, and must not, give a NRP "rights" over the dc. When CSA was first introduced, I was working with dc in a Women's Aid refuge; we were "consulted" (and totally ignored, of course) before the measures were introduced, I said back then it wouldn't work.

Ludoole · 15/01/2015 23:58

Nouser I could have written your post. Dreadful times they were....

LadySybilLikesSloeGin · 15/01/2015 23:58

I lived off packets of biscuits for 4 months until my father gave me some money to buy a cot, nousernamesleft. I didn't buy a cot, someone gave me one so I used the money to buy food.

LadySybilLikesSloeGin · 16/01/2015 00:02

Sounds about right, Dixie. Mine left the UK once the assessment was done and got a better job. I didn't find out how much he was earning until I took him to court a couple of years ago after he stopped paying because I 'wasn't grateful'. Turns out he'd been massively underpaying for years, so tens of thousands. The court could only backdate it to the date I filled the forms and I'm still waiting for this to be paid. CSA don't have jurisdiction outside the UK and when I called to say he'd stopped paying they were very quick to close the file as it wasn't their problem.

Paddleslowly · 16/01/2015 00:03

Yabu

superpoodle · 16/01/2015 00:04

YABU I know too many people who don't get paid at all or the dad makes payments every now and again when he feels like it.

Would they need to keep constantly phoning the benefits office "he gave me £60 this week", "didn't get anything this week" etc

DixieNormas · 16/01/2015 00:04

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

FightOrFlight · 16/01/2015 00:05

A woman from the DWP came to my house to fill in the forms and I had to fill in one for the CSA, I had no choice.

That was another very upsetting part of my job - pretty much having to demand that the CSA was involved in chasing up their ex-partners with no regard to circumstances. This is going back to when the CSA was first introduced in 1993.

Some women had simply been abandoned, others were fleeing abusive relationships but didn't have any official proof of that.

I used to advise them (on the quiet) to say that either ex-P had left the country or that they didn't know who the father was (which was horrible).

OldLadyKnows · 16/01/2015 00:07

Yes, superpoodle, and add to that a RP on a zero-hours contract...

Original poster
IJustCantBelieveIt · 16/01/2015 00:07

I did not mean his payments give him 'rights' just that it is right (not wrong) for him to have a stable relationship. Well it should be a 'right' too as his ds is his ds. I know she is RP, but does that mean she is entitled to a better relationship with dss than dh is?
Anyway, this thread will most likely continue. I am glad that I have a bit of perspective and see that I was BU.
Thanks all and goodnight!

OP posts:
CheeseandGherkins · 16/01/2015 00:09

How lucky you are to have a husband that pays for his child/ren even though his ex is difficult, well done him. In case you had any doubts, there is no "we", it is him that has to pay and not you. He had a child/ren that he is responsible for. Nothing else matters.