Ex fired, wants to stop maintenance

[Lolocopter]

I know I am not unreasonable, but I am so sick of his shit. He's an abusive narcissist. He constantly sends me long, insulting emails insinuating that I am a bad mother. He constantly threatens to take me to court for more time. This is definitely only about reducing maintenance.

Immediately upon getting the sack, he emailed to tell me he wants to stop all maintenance for our little daughter.

He:

• was earning at least £200k per year and paying the CMS requirement for maintenance, absolutely nothing more
• is getting severance
• cheated me in the divorce, lying about the value of the marital home. He just sold it at a huge profit

I said no.

Literally the same day, he asked me to cover his days for several weeks so he can go on a holiday with his girlfriend (who is also vile - I tried to be nice to her at first but she has been horrible to me).

Aaaaahhh.

For your own mental health I'd step back as much as possible. Don't answer abusive emails other than very brief and basic responses to do with your child and arrangements. I'm predicting once you stop asking for him to pay CM the abuse and requests for time with his daughter will dry up. It's so sad for her, but he clearly is a shit dad and to be honest I'd rather he fuck off entirely and I pay for everything rather than and on and off relationship with DD where she is dumped on the girlfriend and just used as a tool to avoid giving you any money.
I honestly don't know how he lives with himself. I'd be counting the hours until I saw my child again.

You're a high earner. You presumably got at least a chunk of money in the divorce. He doesn't want to see the child and the child doesn't want to see him.

It seems like he's still in your life for the principle of the thing (that he should pay for your child) but this brings you a lot of stress and annoyance that presumably impacts your child as well.

Can't you just deal with whatever CMS gives you and forget about him?

That’s brilliant that you are able to fully provide for your daughter but I agree with you that he should want and have to provide for his daughter. How these deadbeats get away with choosing when to provide is crazy. No doubt when your daughter is old enough she will vote with her feet. If she ever asks when she’s an adult you will have his paper trail of what he tried to get out of and how you fully supported her.

Yeah, I mean the man man:

Earns over 200 grand a year and pays the minimum towards his child.

Sends the OP long abusive emails threatening to take her to court.

Gives up time with his child to take his girlfriend on holiday even though he’s apparently now too poor to pay towards his child.

I mean what’s not to love? Clearly the OP was a fool to let him go….

@NoCloudsAllowed he doesn't want to be out of my daughter's life - he just doesn't want to have to pay for her or do childcare. His ideal life, and what he tried to push me into, is one where he is the breadwinner patriarch and gets treated with great gratitude and servility by his family. He would hate not to be able to pat his daughter's head and take credit for being her parent on occasion.

But @NoCloudsAllowed you're right - it's probably not worth my headspace

Yes, I think I costs you both a little (him a lot) if you have to go to collect and pay but if he's being an arse and you have a good income you might as well.

That's far too much hassle to have to keep on doing. Do you claim UC? It takes 5 weeks to get the first payment.

Similarly though, it doesn't seem right that a RP, who receives £1000+ in maintenance is still entitled to claim full UC as if they were only getting nothing.

People receiving £1000+ in maintenance are in tiny numbers.

And the reason maintenance doesn't count toward benefits is because the government (successive ones) know how few people actually bother paying. They know this because the system used to be that if you got benefits you only got to keep the first £20 a week of maintenance. The rest went to the Sec of State to go toward the benefits bill. The debt owed to the Sec of State by non-payers got so huge it was decided that something must be done...

So they decided that RP's could keep the money... that being the money that mostly doesn't get paid. No government since has changed that either. Because none of them care.

I agree. Maintenance should be means tested.

What? There is nothing wrong with her attitude.

Why should a man who is capable of earning 200k be able to opt out of parenting?

I agree with previous posters, society demonises single mothers but let's these men away Scot free.

Maintenance should only ever be means tested if there’s political will for CMS to actually use their powers to collect it.

I worked there for 4 months and whilst training I asked about a couple of things we weren’t taught about. The trainers didn’t know about a whole list of their powers - how are the staff ever going to use them if they don’t know they exist?

There is zero political will to enforce maintenance payments and until then people shouldn’t be penalised for it.

My grandparents were entitled to £64 a week from my father. Back in those days it counted as income for means tested benefits. It counted even though the CSA, as they were, never got a penny from him. That put them, and my siblings and I, in instant poverty as they started the week £64 down.

@Lolocopter you can ask CMS to take account of his assets eg savings, pensions if they exceed a prescribed amount, which is about £32,000 IIRC.

They are deemed to generate an income at 8% .

His house doesn’t count or anything he uses for his business eg vehicles , machinery. A second property would count.

As soon as you get the letter from CMS telling you that you have a nil award, raise a variation due to his assets.

If you don’t get it, immediately as for for a mandatory reconsideration.

They need to actually enforce paying it first! The unpaid child maintenance bill is in the millions every single year.

This. The entire time my child maintenance application has been open my ex has had two well paying jobs. It's been done through collect and pay and I've received £0.00 from the ex in maintenance the entire time. A liability order was granted in my favour and I was told I'd get my first CM payment December once they'd done a Deduction From Earnings. He simply told CM the DCs live with him most of the time. Complete lie of course but it means they can't enforce the LO until it's been verified. Which means they can't enforce the LO this month either.

I was told recently Germany has a system where the maintenance is taken first before any tax bills etc. They should look at the same system here if it'd work. Seems its the only way to enforce the NRP to pay.