Child Benefit Rival Claim Ex Partner Earning Loads!!!!!

[ProlongedAffair]

Me and my ex share 50/50 of our two children, it’s not court ordered but has been in place for the past few years. A few months ago I put in a claim for CMS and was awarded it, they see me as the primary carer because I get both children’s child benefits. I also discovered my ex is earning a 6 figure salary.

Last week I got a letter from child benefit saying that he is challenging my claim. I said to the lady that he earns too much to claim and I suspect he’s only claiming so he can try to get out of CMS. She told me that because he has the children for half the time and child benefit isn’t means tested, the likelihood is they will award child benefit one each! Surely that can’t be correct, can anyone advise who has been through their rival claims process?? He will then be able to claim CMS from me!!

There's definitely a minority of women who think that having a baby with a man entitles her to be supported by him for life. I have encountered a few in the wild.

Because it's not actually means tested. If you have a child then the parents can claim child benefits.
What is means tested is the tax implications of receiving said benefit. So if he claims it then he will have to pay it all back through tax.
It does not mean he can't claim it. It means there's no point in him claiming it financially but if he wants to annoy you he can

👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻 you took the words right out of my mouth!

Wow, this is really scummy behaviour from you. Are you planning to lie to CMS and say he doesn’t have 50/50? They will ask you outright and will only require evidence if you say it’s not 50/50 … so are you planning on lying?

Why should you expect maintenance AND child benefit just because he earns more than you when you have the kids 50/50?! That’s so entitled. How about you look into getting a higher earning job rather than trying to extort money out of your ex.

He’ll be claiming the CB in order to challenge your CMS claim and rightly so. He’ll likely be awarded it, and I hope he does. You’ve made your bed by being greedy and trying to claim CMS on a 50/50 arrangement.

Honestly OP the way you’re going, he’ll end up taking you to court for a CAO and getting the 50/50 in writing. That’ll be extremely expensive and stressful, and he’ll succeed.

@ThisOldThang no I was entitled and was found to be so despite his appeals

@Temporaryname158 Did you have 50:50 childcare with your ex?

Christ OP.
I think we can all see why you're an ex...also, you're doing a cracking job living up to the money grabbing ex wife stereotype. 👏🏻

We has no court order either but both acknowledged it was 50/50 so he wasn't entitled to CMS from me. He could easily take you to court for a court order. This just sounds like a money grab and that you just want extra money.

I hope you come back and update us OP. There's a lot of people on this thread rooting for your ex.

Given that I have never worked a day in my life and have been fully supported by my doting husband since I was eighteen years old, I highly doubt it. I am certainly a rare modern case where a husband wishing to divorce me would be obliged to continue supporting me for quite some time.

Agree. Although I’m unfollowing the thread. OP and her greed, entitlement and lack of appreciation of how generous their kids father is winding me up.

If you’re not making this up, this will backfire on you massively. If he has already got legal advice, and like another poster that mentioned it earlier I strongly suspect he has, then he will also be looking to establish 50/50 by way of a court order. He’ll get that, too.

Do not think that your ‘strategy’ hasn’t been seen thousands of times before. It has, and it’s transparent. You will, correctly, be viewed as acting in your own interests rather than those of your children who have been cared for well prior to this, with their parents having an amicable co parenting relationship. That you have now decided to go a hostile route and blow this up because of your own greed, and again they’ll know that’s exactly what this is, does and will not reflect well on you. Lying especially won’t. You’re wasting your own, and most importantly their, time.

He already has your written word, evidence of own expenses relating to your shared children that will reflect the amount of time in which they are in his care (clubs, and childcare for example), and likely other correspondence that can and will be used to back up his claim. Also, considering that he already finances private medical and dental care on top of whatever else he pays for during his time with them, I would not be surprised if his expenses exceed yours proportionally too, so don’t think “I bear the greater burden” is even necessarily to be an argument that you can use, if they were even inclined to entertain it at all (unlikely). This is simply procedural, and not something they’re going to be at all interested in wasting their time with.

By all means go ahead, as I’m sure you will, no one hear actually has any vested interest in stopping you from shooting yourself in the foot. Tbh I think you should go ahead, a hard head makes for a soft ass and it’s going to be a useful lesson.

Yikes OP ....claiming CMS despite ex hubby having 50:50 childcare screams greedy, grubby ex just because he's a higher earner than you! You give us women a bad name!

They won’t take into consideration his earnings for CB. As far as they are concerned, he is eligible as he has care of a child. He then has to pay more tax because of his earnings, but this has nothing to do with CB. They won’t know anything about this and nor will they care. Legally, if he’s eligible, he will get it. If he can show he’s been picking up the kids from school, dropping them at school, paying for items for them, possibly having them on a ring doorbell or CCTV attending his house, you’d have no chance, unless you can disprove that he has them 50/50. You’ve openly said you can’t as he does have them 50/50. It’s a closed case and you have no chance.

If you’re proved to be a liar, trying to fraudulently claim money you’re not entitled to, you may find that he applies for more than 50/50. You’d lose all CB and any UC you get for both of them. Be very careful when thinking you’re being clever.

Wow, imagine admitting to being so completely pathetic.

Why pathetic? It’s like you think the only thing that validates a person is paid employment. I find it very sad that you value people only by what they do as a job.

Just curious why would someone be obliged to support you if you divorced?

@Laura95167

I think she's saying that she'd claim to be so pathetic and incapable of providing for herself, that her husband would have to keep doing it.

As people have told you about 150 times now, it's literally irrelevant that he would have to pay the money back. (He absolutely CAN get it, he just has to repay it in tax)

1. him not getting the money this current tax year doesn’t mean he won’t get it in the next tax year starting next month, HMRC can’t predict the future so your point 1 is irrelevant.
2. he can prove 50/50 care in various ways, school can provide a statement, the kids can speak etc. plus you’ve already spoke to HMRC about how the care is 50/50.

All you can do is wait for the result anyway, wouldn’t bother kidding yourself that the world just owes you something all the time though, you are just setting yourself up for further disappointment.

This is not true, my partner does 50/50 with his ex, they both have one CB each and they still have to pay each other CMS. Because he is the higher earner, she won't close the claim. It's actually quite an unfair system as he shouldn't have to be providing for her now they are divorced but CMS just advise you to put a claim in each.

I knew someone in almost that exact same situation and was left for a newer, shinier model. He did a good job of hiding a lot of his money. Courts ordered a "clean break" and assets were split 50/50 and he paid bare minimum child maintenance on his declared income, which was considerably less than his actual income, and she had to get a job.

I hope exes partner is a mumsnetter and has copied the thread :D

It does not appear that OP was married to her ex, so for a start child maintenance was not dealt with as part of a divorce.

Your partner’s situation seems strange, however, taking it at face value. When care is truly shared 50/50, and the higher earner does not have an income that exceeds a specific amount (which applies to OP’s ex), the higher earner will be not liable to pay maintenance.

Your partner, if the situation reflects the one OP has detailed, would be best served getting legal advice.

This has been a LONG ongoing battle spanning years with the CMS - just because he has 50/50 and can prove that, they don't instantly declare no maintenance. They still award it but to both parents. To get a nil charge on both it needs to go through the court, the claim will get rejected and then will need to go to a mandatory reconsideration and even then it's not guaranteed.
It's impossible to prove that there is exactly 50/50 day to day care of the children - one week they may need to be taken to the GP and if that falls on her day then she is classed as doing more of the care yet he could do the same 3 weeks later. It's the most ludicrous system ever. It's been looked at with a fine tooth comb and also from a family lawyer and unfortunately as stated above, they won't just close a claim down even if it is 50/50 - they just advise you to both claim from each other.
There is actually a Facebook group where thousands of people do 50/50 but because they can't prove the equal day to day care, they still have to pay CMS.