Merry Christmas - my ex has halved the maintenance

[Cutecat78]

We split 9 yrs ago. For that entire time he has paid £300 a month.

He is self employed so I never went to the CSA as when we got divorced he declared he was earning £800 a month

He is remarried and they have two businesses - I suspect both in his wife's name and one of his businesses he can be paid in cash - often.

DS is 18 and has left school and has a job and pays his way.

DD is 16 and ex has this month halved the maintenance to £150 a week. Her bus fair and A'level cookery in themselves cost me £30 a week.

What can I do (if anything) I know if I take him to the CSA I am pretty sure he is paying me in line with what he is declaring tax wise.

He went on four two week foriegn holidays last year - it makes me so

Is there anything I can do?

The OP is not "lucky" her ex has paid maintenance.

Honestly I despair at that attitude. No wonder so many NRP's get away with not bothering to pay when attitudes are like that.

Maintenance isn't a bonus. It should be an obligation that is shameful to dodge.

I think this man is no better than countless other men who don't help their children. Teens cost a LOT more to keep than small kids. He could at the very least give the 16 year old an allowance. He'd be giving her more than 150 a month if he lived with her!

He'd be halving the OP's bills with her and paying into school costs and clothing etc

Whoever asked why he's being put on a pedestal for paying 300 a month for 9 years was spot on.

He's not some hero!

If your dd's course is full time and you are reasonably certain he doesn't just have a contract over 20h/ week or something in his dw's company just go to the cms.

If you are not sure or dd's course is part time I wouldn't.

YANBU

Ugh, it absolutely shouldn't be this race to the bottom! Always shocked when I hear about how CS works in the UK. For all of those who say the OP should be grateful, here's what a NRP on a low wage would be paying where I live:

• Net income of £1080/month = a minimum of £317 CS/month for a 17-year-old (first child).
• The NRP continues to pay CS after A-Levels until the child graduates from uni / has finished an apprenticeship.
• No informal arrangements between the parents stipulating lower CS, so no bullying the other parent into carrying the financial burden by themselves or off-loading costs to the taxpayer.

My ex pays 10% of his income towards our 4 children. £285 a month. He bullied his way into keeping our 3 bed family home so he can rent out 3 rooms (he's created a 4th by splitting up the lounge) whilst I pay 1.5 times the mortgage to rent a 3 bed to accommodate the 4 kids that he never has over night.
Does that mean I think OP should be grateful for what she recieves from her DC's father towards their children? Obviously not! The idea the NRP is good to offer anything and RP should be grateful is ridiculous. YANBU OP.

I feel really really awful for PPs who get nothing from the NRP.

But while we take the "you are lucky to get anything" route nothing will ever change.

My own mother and sister think this

Seems like there are several issues which are getting conflated.

1. Bitterness over his contribution over the long term. £300 per month is derisory for 2 kids if he is/has been earning more. But you can't prove it, and you suspect he's covering his tracks, and what's done is done, so nothing to be done now except try to let go of the injustice. The system is not going to work in your favour (or you'd have done it years ago).

2. Reducing the maintenance by 50% now one DC is an adult. Go back and negotiate the point with him. You may as well. Point out that what the CSA would say is a reduction of 20% or whatever and see what happens. He may think it's reasonable to reduce by 50%, as other posters have done, but be willing to pay more when presented with the argument.

3. Bitterness over the tax credits/maintenance your DP has to pay. You can't control that. The system is not going to work in your favour (see above!)

You need a plan for the future if you will still support the DC post-18 and he stops paying.

It is shit, OP, but if he won't communicate with you at all, so you can't renegotiate, then I don't think you can do much other than just report him to the CSA and let them get on with it, and accept whatever outcome there is.

I'm sorry, it's shit.

It's shit that anyone tries to get out of paying for their kids (which I believe you is what he's doing) and there's no 'lucky' about it. I would contact HMRC. Don't warn him.

I won't go into detail sbout our situation i could write a novel but I would be very careful about going to the CMS behind his back. You don't actually know how much he earns or that he lies on his tax return.

My DPexw did that to him. He was paying well over half his actual income for his children and was just managing to keep a roof over his head having to rent a 2 bedroom property to house his children too. They had to share a room when they came to him. When we moved in together obviously his living expenses decreased and he was able to buy himself a car, go on holiday, buy the children more toys etc. She saw this, pressumed he was on the take, made our life a misery for months and when he refused to give her yet more money she went to CMS. The amount they calculated was A LOT less than he was paying. To teach her a lesson he paid her the CMS amount for a while in the hope she would realise the error of her ways and coukd pay me back some of the money I had to pay needless to say she did. He went back to paying what he did before plus all the extra stuff and now things are a lot better.

He still pays a fortune, but he can afford the extra because we live together and he is A decent dad. Not all are. If you can afford to loose the money he gives you then go to the CMS and ruffle his feathers. As long as you understand the risk is he may have to pay less. If you can't afford to loose it then just presume he isn't hiding money and is giving you what he can. The only person suffering is you. Perhsps your older son could speak to his dad about giving him money directly? Ir your daughter ask if he can buy a weekly bus pass? Or a store card for ingredients? He may be more willing to do that?

Op you have made this thread so confusing, you state you left him? What did you mean by this? That you left the martial home?

Also I understand that your upset and angry with him, however you have high expectations of a man who has no expectations, you need to accept this man is and will never be what you want him to be, it's like getting angry over something that does not exist!

The child who is now working, your ex has no financial responsibility towards him, the one in school he does, so it's not unreasonable for him to reduce payments, even tho you disagree with it.

You say your ex owes 30% of the home your living in? Do you have a contract to this effect, and did you get it valued at the time the contract was set up?

Sorry OP I know it's hard but this does happen as kids get older. My dd's dad stopped paying when she was 18. I was receiving some tax credits, HB and child benefit that also stopped. The whole thing was about £500 a month.

It's hard to swallow but all I could do was 1) see it coming in advance 2) plan to work more 3) reduce my outgoings wherever possible 4) sell a bunch of stuff on ebay 5) hunker down and get used to it.

All is OK and re-adjusted now

That is rubbish. As someone who has never received anything I don't think you should feel grateful to him or lucky. It's disgusting tbh and society's attitude needs to change. If you suspect tax evasion report him immediately.

He will have halved it on account of ds leaving. Unfortunately there's nothing more you can do. Dd is 16 and many 16yo work. A part time job would look great for uni or future employment. £20 a week for food for cooking is a lot! Is there a cheaper way to do it?

OP I think you need to decide what it is you are most upset about. Although thinking he is earning more, you have accepted the £300 pm for the past 9 years, now he is under the illusion that he is able to half that now that his son is an adult and paying his way. This is his error. Do you think you can point out to him that based on the CMS figures, he should still be paying £225. Do you think he will compromise on that?
If your main issue is that after 9 years you want them to investigate his income you need to contact CMS and hope that they can find he is earning more and maintenance payments go up. However, if he's been as 'clever' as he thinks he is, he'll have worked it out so he won't have to. But if he's been 'happy' to pay the £300 for the past 9 years, I'd imagine his declared income will reflect that, and you should be able to secure the £225 from the CMS. Would this work for you?

To be fair, you accepted £300 for years for 2 children without any CSA involvement. You'd think that amount would mean £150 on each child every month. Now that one of them doesn't need paying for, it makes sense to half that amount to £150 for the 1 child, so I understand his thinking. Why does your DD suddenly cost more than £150 now that your son doesn't need maintenance provided for him?

Also how are you going to cope when your daughter turns 18/leaves education? You'll get nothing then.

Csa take 20% for 1 dc and 15 for 2 so no it doesn't just half. Nor does it matter how much the dd actually costs. He should be contributing a fair amount of his earnings.

How I cope when DD leaves education is irrelevant and will be my problem.

Well seeing as the CSA haven't been involved then in my mind the way the CSA work it out is irrelevant in this case. This £300 he's been paying may be more or less than what he should have been paying according to how they would have worked it out, but the point is the OP accepted it anyway without going to the CSA... until now because he wants to halve the amount. That seems fair to me. The daughter doesn't suddenly incur more costs now that her brother has turned 18.

Of course the OP will probably be going to the CMS, so it may work out that she gets more than £150. I see that as throwing her toys out of the pram, but others see that as fair and just. But just a word of warning for the OP: It may backfire. You may get less than £150. Do you really think he'll still offer the £150 at that point?

When I say that seems fair I mean it seems fair that he halves it.

The fact that the ex refuses to respond to any communication is not a sign of his benevolence for me. I like to think that in his position I would at least contact my ex to tell her what I was going to reduce payments to and why. The refusal to do that spells contempt for her and for the whole process.

There are fixed costs of having children that aren't proportionate to the number of children you are housing. The OP houses the children the vast majority of the time, so those costs are higher than her ex's and he should pay a share of that. That's why CMS calculate the percentages the way they do.