To think he should still pay maintenance if he takes a 'career break'

[PIPERHELLO]

Just that really. He's very well paid (six figs) and planning a career break. I am struggling to find a definitive answer online as to whether he can be forced (by court / Child Maintenance service) to continue paying maintenance if he voluntarily leaves his job.

Thanks.

This sucks. Where I am (not the UK anymore) you cannot willingly make yourself unemployed while you have children requiring child support. Same with switching to self employment - you're expected to support your children because their needs haven't changed. But where I am it's done in a two factor approach - partly based on which parent has the children what percentage of the time and the discrepancy of incomes of the two parents.

Has he re-married? If so, it might be the case that his wife's income can be taken into account when it comes to paying maintence.

That doesn’t happen anymore. And even on the old system if he had no taxable income it wouldn’t have made any difference as the new spouse’s income only meant the NRP couldn’t claim all of the housing costs etc - they are no longer taken into account and CMS is a straight percentage of income.

If he takes a career break, he must still have some kind of income to live on, like savings or interest off shares. Would that not still count?

The system is bullshit, unless a man is medically signed off sick and cannot work they should go the fuck to work and provide for the children they brought into the world. Why should they effectively be able to choose.

Unless for health reasons every adult can work, even if it's in Tesco. Shameful.

Has he actually said he won't be paying any maintenance?

I thought that CMS could look at lifestyle incompatible with income?

Presumably if he's taking a career break he must be living off something!

DW reluctantly contributes about an eighth of her income to pay a quarter of the household bills. On the odd occasion when she's contemplated giving up work, she's looked at me challengingly, and said that of course that would means she would have to stop her contribution. (She has enough saved and invested that the dividends alone could pay all the bills even if we lived forever.)

Sorry, not really relevant to the thread, OP's subject line just made me think of it.

You can't take a career break from your kids can you? He has a responsibility to feed his children. What a dead beat.
My son's fathere never paid a penny. He ran off to live in Germany and came back when my DS was 18.
He was surprised whend my DS didn't want a relationship with him.

Legally he doesn’t have to pay anything on a career break. The morality of doing so is a different question.

I thought that CMS could look at lifestyle incompatible with income? -Presumably if he's taking a career break he must be living off something!

• savings ?
• new partners income?

That would prevent every person ever from moving on and having a second partner and family if the new partners income were taken into count. New partners are not responsible for past families.

How can this be the way in 2019. That a parent can swan off on a career break and not contribute towards their children's upbringing. It's a disgraceful state of affairs.

If he takes a career break, he must still have some kind of income to live on, like savings or interest off shares. Would that not still count?

In short, no, only the earnings (or profit) from investments would qualify, not the investments themselves. You do not have to take dividends, and of course the interest rates are so low at present there would be no interest gained to speak of

How can this be the way in 2019. That a parent can swan off on a career break and not contribute towards their children's upbringing. It's a disgraceful state of affairs.

I am poking the hornets nest here but this would be the case for the majority of SAHPs with no income. In a nut shell - no job, no income, no financial contribution - that applies both ways

He is a cheeky bastard.

My friends exH did this. Decided to quit work and take his arse of to college. Wanted to ‘work on him self’ Paying zero for his two kids

PlainSpeaking yes I get that but this man is a high earner and has the luxury to live off savings for however long and just drops their children. That is wrong.

He may take the opportunity to restructure his career so that he becomes self-employed afterwards, free-lancing via a company he owns. In other words, I would not rely on him ever going back to his six figure salary for CMS purposes.

I am poking the hornets nest here but this would be the case for the majority of SAHPs with no income.

Err really? You're equating an NRP who doesn't contribute financially to a SAHP who contributes in literally every other way they can?

*So can’t he take rp while on his career break? He isn’t working, he can parent his own kids while you work

What? Uproot the children from their primary carer, their home, potentially their childcare and/or school, friends, family? How would that work? How would it feel for a child to suddenly not see the one person who had been caring for them everyday just a few times a week - or less? What about what the children want?*

Really interested in this. I have an exh on gardening leave (I.e. six months I'm full pay to find another job) and his first move is to try to take over the kids so he doesn't habe to pay maintenance.

No thought to the fact that a. He caused massive dramas when he does anything b. They don't want to be there c. They are used to spending most of their tome with me (especially while we were married) d. Their behaviour goes to shit when he has them more e. Our nanny left partly because his house wad always filthy, full of mice and he never had enough food in.

Had legal advice on it but really interested that other posters see these arguments- a twat can't just become the main carer to save himself money!

As others have said CMS payments are based on his income so zero income means zero payments.

But my god it’s disgusting that someone can behave this way and just opt out of parenting their child in this way thereby allowing their own child to go without. It seems to be far too easy for these types of utter bastard to walk away from their responsibilities.

Also he's just had a massive bonus.

But his FIRST port of call is to just stop court ordered maintenance.

what a weasel, to save up for a career break but not take into account the kids

I thought that CMS could look at lifestyle incompatible with income?

They will, but he still has to have a taxable income.

So if he has massive savings then if there’s any taxable interest on it they’d count that.

CMS can’t touch anything else.

@blackteasplease if that bonus was taxable then it counts toward maintenance. Ask cms to look into it.

If I have to resort to cms I will! But because the court ordered payments are more than cms minimum I will. But good to know if it comes to the cms!

I think child maintenance should br paid to the RP by the government and claimed back from the NRP. Then the RP could rely on the money and any attempts to evade payment from the NRP to the government department could be treated as a criminal offence like tax evasion.
I am sure this would make government departments look at closing some of these loopholes nrps exploit so as not to pay.

If I have to resort to cms I will! But because the court ordered payments are more than cms minimum I will. But good to know if it comes to the cms!

If it’s court ordered then go back to court. You might actually be better off in court if he’s got good savings (although he warned 1 year and 1 day later he can apply to CMS to supersede the court order).