To be angry with friend's soon to be ex dh - advice / opinions welcome

[sitdownpleasegeorge]

A close friend is divorcing and she and her dh are trying to sort out an amicable child maintenance payment for their three sons.

The boys will live with her Mon-Fri and go to their father's new home every other weekend and some of the school holidays too (yet to be agreed on).

They are a pedantic couple and it appears that they are calculating things in a fairly detailed/serious manner.

My friend is quite frugal and into recycling/make do and mend despite the fact thay they had a VERY good joint income. Her soon to be ex-h on the other hand generally bought the best of everything in his clothes/gadget/car buying (she had no problem with this, just accpeting it as averaging out overall in terms of their total spending) She buys a great deal of hers and the boys' clothes secondhand on ebay or accepts hand me downs from friends with older children. She has also bought secondhand home furnishings although they look new. We do have fun shopping trips together when we need new stuff for say a wedding or something for the children but we really only buy new what we can't acquire second hand (on my part out of necessity).

I know that this and other frugalities are how they have managed to pay off their mortgage in the run up to the split (indeed I think she was waiting until it was paid off to announce her desire to divorce).

Her dh is trying to calculate the maintenance money on the basis that she continues to acquire everything for the boys secondhand and a proportion of it for free from friends and her and their sons continue to live this frugal life. She argues that the money they saved doing this was split jointly with dh by paying off the mortgage and enabling him to have top of the range cars, shoes gadgets etc whilst still paying off the mortgage and funding family holidays. She wants to calculate a clothing budget based on mid-range brand new prices as she doesn't want the sons to think "mum dresses us in second hand stuff and dad buys us nice designer/new stuff" as her dh will contine to indulge them at weekends, he already does. The sons will soon be getting to the age where, I've warned her, they will become more aware of shops/different clothes so sooner or later they will be reluctant to have a wardrobe full of second hand clothes.

Her dh also says that the out of school childcare costs are her responsibility alone and is not planning on contributing to them in any way.

Is she being unreasonable in her expectations of funding a clothing budget at a mid-range new cost and expecting him to pay for half of the childcare costs ?

I don't want to take sides on this because I am totally unsure as to what is reasonable to expect in a divorce settlement. They are both reluctant to get a solicitor involved until the last minute when everything is practically agreed between them as this will keep legal fees down and if they can't agree on this matter it may cost £££££££ in letting the legal eagles (vultures) correspond back and forth on the matter.

What does the MN jury think is reasonable child maintenance wise ?

[Twiglett]

percentage of salary

and tell them to stop being twats

[scorpio1]

CSA would take 20% and i think that is fair.

[CarGirl]

Follow the CSA guidelines.

[TillyScoutsmum]

Get her on to the CSA website - it has a calculator which how much maintenance should be. Its often on the low side - but at least she'd have an idea of "worst case scenario"

FWIW - dp pays maintenance (about 20% above CSA rate), plus half dsd's childcare costs, plus gave 80% of the equity of the marital home. We have dsd every other weekend (Fri-Mon) and every Tuesday night and half holidays (approx)

[yorkshirepudding]

Message withdrawn

[sitdownpleasegeorge]

What percentage of salary and is it a percentage of his gross or his net ?

I don't want to bounce this off my dh as obviously he is friends with her dh and I can't ask anyone else in RL as we have mostly mutual friends.

What would happen if they went to the CSA instead, does it operate on falt rates or take into account the size of the husband's salary. Does all the money paid to the CSA get passed on to the partner with whom the children live or do the CSA levy according to income and pass on an agreed flat rate to the other parent ?

I think they are trying to follow the Heather Mills type calculation by including housing costs, living costs etc

[littlepinkpixie]

If she chooses to economise by buying second hand clothes then well done to her, but I dont think that her husband should be expecting her to do so, not when he is earning a good income.
He will be the one loosing out when his children get old enough to work out what the situation is.
I think it would be fairer to split the childcare costs, as I assume that they are both working and so are both in need of the childcare.

[scorpio1]

you can use the site calculator. also it can be a private arrangement without involving them at all.

[duchesse]

He sounds like a complete sh*t.

It sounds to me as though he thinks he is getting mid-week nanny/housekeeper.

Childcare definitely half and half (anything less makes her somehow more responsible for their care). I also don't think it unreasonable for him to pay maintenance based on sensibly priced mid range clothing. The alternative of course is that they agree that HE will buy all the clothing etc... I imagine he'd back down pretty quickly.

[mumblechum]

It's 20% of his net salary after tax ni and any pension contributions.

If he has the kids for more than 52 weeks per year there should be a deduction (but he may not bother). Say if he has the kids for 2 out of 7 nights per week, you take the weekly figure, divide by 7 and multiply by 5 to get the correct figure.

(I'm a legal vulture btw)

[sitdownpleasegeorge]

If the CSA take a flat 20% this is very broad brush and may not be applicable to their circumstances so seems a crude last resort.

I can't see how trying to calculate the child maintenance is detracting from attending to their children's needs during the divorce. It's not as if they send the boys over to our house whilst they slug it out with calculators and pens .

I can see my friend's point of view that she is trying to avoid being the pauper in the relationship leaving her dh to be the fount of all things new and exciting.

[mumblechum]

They don't have to get the CSA involved at all, just use their formula.

[sitdownpleasegeorge]

Apologies to you and your profession Mumblechum.

I know it seems like they are a bit anorak-like over this but if you knew them I think you'd agree they are basically really nice people and remaining amicable so far so the boys don't suffer emotionally any more than they need to. My friend has lent me quite a bit of emergency money over the years we have know each other, whilst I was a single parent before I married dh, with no pressure to repay quickly and never chased up on it because its petty cash to them.