to not split the discount?

[schoolsaving]

Regular but NC as outing.

DS currently attends private school and fees split 50:50 with XH amicably but specific line 'school fees to be split 50:50' is in financial order. No maintenance paid as 50:50 care and clean break split with us i.e. no further claim on each other. Further relevant info is that since split I've reduced working hours and covered school holidays and XH has continued to work FT.

I've got a new full time job which includes 50% discount on school fees. Which of the below scenarios do you think is fairest?

A: fee discount reduces both our share and we split the cost of additional holiday childcare
B: fee discount reduces my share to nil and I pick up cost of additional holiday childcare
C: fee discount reduces my share to nil and we split additional holiday childcare

Thanks!

worried why do you think that?

BrandNewHouse

Not obvious to me (or the judge in the case of a pp sister ). Imagine the 60% (or indeed 100%) are received as vouchers in 10% increments

If you read my post you'll see you are agreeing with me re vouchers or cash. The part of my post you quoted was about a discount being applied (the OP used the word discount).

In other words, if the fee was £100 and the OP received £50 in cash or vouchers she could quite legitimately use this to pay her half while her ex pays his as usual. However, if the fee was merely reduced to £50 the OP couldn't in good faith tell her ex that his half was £50 because that would imply the fee was £100. That point is driven home when one considers discounts in excess of the OP's liability. If the fee was reduced to £40 how could the ex pay £50 and this be explained as him paying half???

Update - have spoken to XH. He's agreed it would be unfair for his share to be reduced on the basis of my work perk. From this thread I can see that it's so open to interpretation that I will cover the additional holiday childcare. We've both agreed to put this in writing and not bother with an amendment to the legal agreement. I trust him and vice versa, we're both keen to keep everything amicable for DS.

The way I see it is he could have challenged and I'd lose half my 'saving' so paying probably 10% of what I save in the year as a 'goodwill gesture' is not a problem. Equally he could have a court rule it's my saving and then he'd have to pay extra for 50:50 holiday childcare.

I think he has done well out of this deal. Well done to both of you behaving like civilised adults though.

I think that's a great outcome. It's so much better to work these things out amicably. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Great outcome op

OP I really don't think you should be covering the holiday care, but be careful that the expectation of you covering it doesn't extend beyond this job.

Will the bill say

1. School fees of £2000 a term; 50% staff discount applied = total payable £1000 a term

or

2. School fees of £1000 a term = total payable £1000 a term

Oh, sorry for the x-post. Glad you have reached an amicable agreement!

I think what you have discussed is fair.

other side to this is, if you both shared the discounted bill and then you wanted to leave the job for whatever reason, your ex might put pressure on you to stay, as he couldn't now afford half the full fee etc etc.

This way, you are compensated for lower than standard wage by discounted fees and have the freedom to make your own job choices in the future without ex having a say/impact on what you decide.

In bet he's thrilled that you're taking on the extra holiday childcare

He's done VERY well out of this

Agree that he has done well.

That 50% discount is part of your package, so you should have considered it salary that doesn't pass through your hands.

Ideally you'd both be paying 50/50 for holiday care but as resident parent (I assume) you are responsible for care on your days so would legally probably have to cover it anyway.

Maybe revisit in 12 months to make sure it's still working for both of you, and ask what happens if you change jobs and no longer get the discount? Will you be back to half school fees out of pocket AND holiday care? Because at the moment that's effectively what you're paying...

You let your guilt about an in work benefit cloud your view on this.

YOU have earned the discount by securing a job in that school.

HE needs to pay 50% of childcare since if you were together the childcare bill would be split between you as it's a family expense.

If you have 50/50 care, 50/50 education costs then it's 50/50 holiday care REGARDLESS of your discount, because the discount covers half the fees ONLY as a consequence of YOU working there.

The 'confusion' on this thread has come from people being wrong illogical.

Maybe you should consult a lawyer and see how a court would interpret it, you don't want him dragging you back to court over fees.

Once you know everything's clear cut.

I bet the responses here would be so different if it was the father that now worked at the school and received this discount.

How do you mean Bibidy? I would say the same if the shoe were on the other foot.

My response would be the same. The key thing for me is, is it costing them both the same and yes it is. She is earning less than she could in another job but gets the discount in lieu. If she shared the discount she would be worse off than if she took a non school job, so it would be costing her more than him. If he was getting the disount then he should use it and she should pay cash.

It has nothing to do with gender and everything to do with fairness.

I haven't read ALL the posts but make sure you realise you may be taxed on the discount as it is a benefit in kind? Something to research maybe?

C

It's your discount and if you weren't getting it, you'd probably be paid more actual cash which would then go towards your half.

ExH would then still need to pay his share of holiday care.

Why should exh benefit from your wages which comes in the form of a discount.

C.

How you pay your share of the fees is irrelevant in my opinion.

He should be paying half the holiday childcare regardless

@schoolsaving nice update - glad you both behaved so well :-)

@PeabodyTheGreat & @ Bombardier25966 huzzah glad I haven't lost all my tax knowledge! :-)