EW and CMS

[kitchen123]

NC for this as could be outing.

DH has two children. One in junior and one in senior school. I get along really well with them and exchange pleasantries every time I've seen his EW.

Things has got bad between DH and his EW and they haven't spoke for months, only email.

EW went to CMS to recalculate the CM as she wanted more. DH provided documents and CMS reduced his payment significantly. Turns out he was massively overpaying and they told him to reduce. He decided to reduce as EW was being extremely difficult and was threatening him with all sorts of legal action / reporting him to HMRC (false allegations). He asked her to stop, she didn't so got the solicitor involved.

EW is now preventing DH from taking children away on holiday but still allows contact EOWend. EW tells children they could go away with EH but then changed her mind when he went to double check with her. EW tells kids EX isn't paying the right amount of CM (he is, but it's not the high amount she wants). FYI no access order in place.

EW now threatening she will lose house as can't afford it but has somehow managed to book two week villa holiday and tickets to an expensive event, all in the space of the last few weeks.

I will support DH but want to be fair too.

EW works and EH wants to actively
have DSC more, without the threat of reducing the CM she would receive.

What advice would you give? He does listen to my opinion.

Thanks

She said he pays £500 thru CMS, meaning he paid £700 previously

According to the details OP has posted her DH seems to acting in a very fair and responsible way. But still someone has to turn themselves inside out to find a reason to post a nasty comment

I am not sure how fair it is to reduce maintenance because the other side has asked for an assessment by the CMS. That’s game playing. It’s also not unreasonable not to expect an ex partner to tie themselves up in knots managing contact. The OP has clarified that isn’t the case. Nothing nasty at all.

The part I find the most difficult to accept is He decided to reduce as EW was being extremely difficult and was threatening him with all sorts of legal action / reporting him to HMRC (false allegations).
Nothing to do with whether it is affordable or not! Just that the XW was being difficult iyo! She is as entitled to report to HMRC or the CMS as he is to make the bare minimum CM payments, but neither is putting the welfare of the DC first is it?
I honestly dont think you can claim the moral high ground here.
This isnt just about what's legally correct, this is about the future of the relationship you and your DH have with his DC.

I am not sure how fair it is to reduce maintenance because the other side has asked for an assessment by the CMS. That’s game playing.

If you go for a reassessment it could go 1 of 2 ways - the amount goes up or it goes down. Both parents have to live with the outcome.

If he went for the reassessment himself because he thought he’d have to pay less but it turns out he’d have to pay more, would you say just stick to the current arrangement?
So why is it ok for the ex to go for the reassessment because they think they’re entitled to more, and still get the same amount as before when it didn’t go how they thought it would go?
Surely the new figure just reflects the fact that the nrp isn’t earning as much as before, there isnt’t liable to pay as much in maintenance. The nrp might need that extra money to pay their own household costs. I think it’s 100% fair to pay the new figure. It’s nothing to do with game playing at all. It’s about what’s fair.

Actually sorry. 1 of 3 ways. It goes up, goes down, or stays the same.

In this case it’s gone down because his income is lower. Logical outcome really. Same as if he was earning more he’d be paying more.

But the op has not said he's struggling or can't afford the higher payment, so to reduce it because of her being difficult is game playing. There really is no such thing as 'overpayment' unless it is causing the payer to struggle.

@HugeAckmansWife
What you’re suggesting is that if the paying parent isn’t struggling then they aren’t paying enough? Is that right?
Never mind that he’s still paying for all sorts for the children directly and has to pay to provide for them when they are with him, too. It’s not as if he’s paying the CMS minimum and not a shiny penny more towards the children.

But the op has not said he's struggling or can't afford the higher payment, so to reduce it because of her being difficult is game playing. There really is no such thing as 'overpayment' unless it is causing the payer to struggle.

He’s not reducing it because she’s being difficult. He’s reducing it because she went for a reassessment (which does come with risks). How do you know what the op’s household budget is like? The extra £200 could benefit them greatly and it could more to do with that than getting one over the ex.
When and if he gets a pay rise she can always go back.

No, I didn't mean the payer should divert every pound of disposable income, I just meant that to suggest x amount is 'too much' implies it is obviously being misused or is not needed.

If he went for the reassessment himself because he thought he’d have to pay less but it turns out he’d have to pay more, would you say just stick to the current arrangement? So why is it ok for the ex to go for the reassessment because they think they’re entitled to more, and still get the same amount as before when it didn’t go how they thought it would go?

A family based arrangement is just that. If it works, it works. Reducing payments just because you can get away with it is game playing if you can afford the higher amount. Similarly, I wouldn’t personally say it would be necessary to pay a higher amount just because legally that was the assessment - plenty of parents are able to make arrangements that work for them. You made assumptions about me based on a few lines of something I wrote.

It is game playing to reduce maintenance based on anger, mistrust and just because you can. That is clearly the case here - at least, that is what it reads to me.

Thanks for clarifying!
In this case, if she’s spending her cash on expensive holidays instead of rent/mortgage, I’m not sure I’d be happy just handing her £££ more than I had to for her to use at her own discretion either to be honest. She’s either financially incompetent or a blatant liar, and a blackmailer to boot.

If it works, it works.

The nrp will paying it but it doesn’t mean it’s working for them. As I said, the new amount could benefit the op’s household greatly.

Hi, back now. To reiterate I am comfortable, but bear in mind I am not related to the the children aside from marriage. I have a good income. My DH earns c. £40 and pays c. £500 pcm with half of additional activities for DSC. His EW approached the CMS and asked them to reassess as she thought she was entitled to more. Turns out she isn't but thinks otherwise.
I continue to contribute towards the children's time with us eg taking them away on holiday and activities when they're with us. But that is an aside as I'm happy to do this.
Does anyone have experience of mediation and how to achieve the best outcome from this?

funinthesun19
He’s not reducing it because she’s being difficult

OP says "He decided to reduce as EW was being extremely difficult"

This is exactly what he has done!

For clarity's sake let me just add that the EW takes home c. £2k pcm with a fully expensed car, plus the CMS money and the additional money for extras that my DH contributes. I'll let you decide how that would work for you under your own circumstances

@Bagofworries are you slating my DH for reducing the excess money he pays his EW? Just trying to clarify your comment? Thanks

Bagofworries

She also threatened to falsely report him to the HMRC and get solicitors involved. They cost money. Maybe the extra money would have been a safety net for him if she decided to cause a load of shit.

Have you posted about this before? Was your DH previously a very high earner and has dropped income to take a much lower paid job whilst still enjoying the high life on your salary? This sounds very like a previous thread!

@redastherose no but I'm sure there's a lot more than one woman with a much higher income than her DH out there! I very much doubt we're that unique!

Before I sign off for the night just want to stress I'm really interested in understanding how peoples experiences of mediation have gone. Hoping for a positive outcome from this learning from experience

On those figures, the ex will feel the loss of the maintenance..an RP is actually allowed to have some disposal income too, for holidays etc. This idea that she's cheeky for having a holiday, or anything non essential suggests that rps should use 100% of their income on the household and nrps should only pay the absolute minimum to make up any gap between that and the rps household needs whilst they get 80 odd % of their own income all to themselves. Also, someone said 'falsely reporting him' to HMRC. Given the number of self employed nrps who fiddle the figures for maintenance, it's not an unreasonable suggestion that he might be doing the same (OP, I'm not saying he is, just that it's hardly unknown.) As far as mediation goes, my experience was that it showed my ex he needed to pay a lot more than cms if he wanted the kids ' household to remain in a similar situation.. He disliked this intensely, refused to and accused me of manipulating the mediator. Relations between us are poor and I work full time, run up debt and make sure the kids don't know what a selfish shit their dad is for not paying a penny over cms.

As I said, my DH did mediation with his EW to ease tensions.

Mediation was easy to book and sort, he arranged it half way between our homes and, whilst the cost can be covered however, she refused to pay her half so he had to pay it all. It was about £80 per session.

The mediator asks questions around what is happening/why things have changed/what they would like things to look like etc

I would say it wasn’t massively pleasant to go through for DH and EW but the DC were not involved/aware at all.

Mediation was also very female biased if I’m honest BUT it did help them to work together in the end. I told DH he doesn’t have to be right and work to get to be right, he just has to work to get what he wants. I say female biased in that, for example, we had been having the children every other weekend, she dropped them off and he took them back on a Friday. As soon as he pushed for mediation she started to get nasty (Calling him a C* in front of the kids for instance and refusing him contact on the phone) a week before mediation she denied all contact and refused to let them come up. She told the mediator she wasn’t comfortable letting the DC go to our house anymore and she wasn’t comfortable splitting journeys. The mediator doesn’t say “that’s ridiculous to stop all contact” instead they asked my DH “what will you do to make EW more comfortable”. However, the mediator set a plan of 6 weeks limited contact and after that, unless EW had a good reason it would return to eow. They did that and now we have them eow again. She also refused holidays but now we can take them away but only to a small limited number of countries until “they are older”

Return on a monday*

And they did 3 sessions of mediation so in the end she denied his contact for 2.5months. It was really hard and so unfair on the DC as well as DH. It hugely effected his relationship with DC bit that is not an necessary part of mediation, just that it made her behave like that.

He also tried to look at finances but she wouldn’t disclose them.

HugeAckmansWife
You say rps are allowed some disposable income, well so are nrp’s believe it or not.

In this scenario, somebody’s disposable income is going to up and somebody’s disposable income is go down. The person who’s disposable income is going up just happens to be the person who you don’t agree with it being. Because in your eyes the rp should be the one with the nice little luxuries in life like holidays - whereas the nrp is begrudged having anything nice. But if the rp ended up with an extra £200 in their pocket a month you’d be saying they’re entitled to it. Well so is the nrp. And I hope he enjoys the money tbh and books a holiday himself.

whereas the nrp is begrudged having anything nice.

And I say that because the impression I get from these threads is that every spare penny the nrp has should be thrown at the rp.