Reduced Child Maintenance

[Intothesunshine]

Best give some background:

I have had a good job and decent pay for many years. When married was classed as main breadwinner although my ex wife worked in a local school as a fulltime TA.

We have a DS who is now 15.

We divorced in 2021 so dear son was 11.

Divorce was messy and financial settlement used my pension pots as capital versus value of house and ex wife's income, outcome was that I had to sign over the house to her in full, a painful experience.

I also agreed £750 a month child maintenance for our dear son, plus £15 a week pocket money paid into DS's bank.

Last year I became severely ill and had to take 5 months sick leave, some paid and some unpaid. I maintained the £750 child maintenance payments throughout my sick leave, however in the final month I could only afford £300. When trying to discuss this via text messages my ex became quite rude and obnoxious.

In the final few weeks of my sick leave my Dr said there was no way I could return to work in the same capacity and suggested I apply for Ill Heath Retirement.

I completed the application process and to summarise the story the pension provider agreed to Ill Health Retirement.

My pension is now a 1/4 of what I used to earn and therefore I tried to explain this to my ex wife and my offer of £250 a month. That went down like a lead balloon. My response was for her to approach the Child Maintenance Service at DWP.
She has now done so and the calculations are being checked.

I know it's a huge drop in payments but at age 64 I really didn't forsee having to take Ill health retirement.

Am I being unreasonable???

If youre no longer working surely your son can live with you at least 50% of the time so you can make a proper contribution that way. Teenage boys are very expensive to feed.

Just clearing up a few points:

A year before our separation my mother had died and I had an inheritance. I paid off the mortgage and settled our other debts. I am now convinced my ex planned the separation !!

On signing over the house my ex was debt free and had 100% equity in the property with no mortgage.

My ex was 40 and I was 49 when our dear son was born. I have 2 older children from a previous marriage.

I dont think that the ex comes out of this smelling of roses..............

@Intothesunshine you’ve still not actually cleared up when you told your ex you were dropping payments? are you purposely avoiding that?

you sound a bit bitter with the whole “she planned it” comment

It's completely irrelevant what you did in the divorce settlement. That will have been negotiated and signed off by a judge who will have thrown it back if deemed unfair. You said you were a high earner before so the split will have been based on need. How often did you see your son after the split? Im assuming nowhere near 50/50 given the CMS so that will have impacted your exes ability to work / childcare costs.

@JohnofWessex the ex has been raising their joint child so that he can continue to earn his large salary up til now. It's quite probable she dented her own career prospects in order to further his when they were married.

The issue is about what the op can reasonably contribute NOW and I would ask him again, what other areas of his life has he cut back on that would allow him to maintain his contribution closer to what it was? Is he downsizing to reduce his mortgage? Taking a look at other outgoings? Or just jumping straight to this as the easy way to save £500 a month?

He was almost 60 when they divorced and the settlement was that ex got the house. His inheritance paid off the marital home mortgage and debts. The likelihood that he has walked away being able to purchase a new property himself, with a mortgage when his retirement age was 8 years away (at that time) isn't likely, even with a good job. Where would he have got the deposit from? Has op said he has a mortgage? It's more likely he is renting. With a £250 maintenance calculation, he's not on a lot of money. Covering the basics of housing himself ( and dc when there), bills and the maintenance of £250 may well be as far as his money goes.

If I read it correctly he was more prepared for retirement. A lot of his pension was taken into account for the settlement.
And in a normal, good marriage a younger wife would pick up the ball if the husband was too ill to work, and get herself a job. It sounds like the divorce has changed the goalposts a lot.
We’ve had our lives change financially due to serious illness. It sucks, but you have to pick yourself up and all do the best you can. The ex wife here sounds grabby.

To be honest, we don't know most of the pertinent details...perhaps most importantly the amount of actual parenting the OP did / is prepared to do. As a pp said, if he is now retired, perhaps the son would like to see more if his dad and that would be a way to make things better.

My ex would probably describe me as "grabby" because whilst he does pay the CMS amount he has a lot more of his salary for himself than I do (we earn the same). I don't get to ringfence a % of my income. If our kids need something, it's needed and it's waaaay more per month than double what he contributes. Occasionally I will ask him to contribute to a particular thing and about 1/10 requests are granted. But he pays CMS so that's it. Anything above that is me being "greedy".

I think you’re fine OP, of course things need to change. TBH I can’t stand women who rely on these payments, they aren’t forever and life happens and things change. I get £750 from my ex but could happily function without it if required. Do your ex work? It’s up to her to manage her finances, as long as you support your son as much as you can in your circumstances

@MellowPinkDeer you can't stand women who expect the father of their children to contribute a decent amount? Women who most likely do 98% parenting if not 100% and have fewer earning options as a result? Ok then. No wonder there's no impetus to improve enforcement of non payment or you change the system so NRPs actually pull their weight. (Also fine to reverse the sexes by the way, but you specified women).

I think it’s incredibly irresponsible to rely on money from your ex that could stop at any time, for any reason.

edited to add that I don’t believe women have less earning opportunity as a result of parenting, they only have less opportunity if they choose to.

You could say that about any household though surely? Or should married couples only take one income into account for which mortgage or car they take on? Of course I get that life happens and it may well be that belts gave to be tightened but what I object to is the idea that maintenance is the first on the list to go. It's seen as expendable and it should be the opposite.

I think in the circumstances you describe there is lower risk or certainly more opportunity to influence and discuss.

I say this as a single parent myself. What has the mother been doing with £750 every month for 1 child? She's had a good run and she should of planned to save some of that money in case of a rainy day. At the end of the day it's tough OP is 64 and I think OP should contact CMS himself and speak to his son himself like you say.

For info I am now renting, unable to raise enough capital for any kind of deposit and therefore unable to have any kind of mortgage.

I'm quite bitter that she walked away with our house - mortgage and debt free.

Someone sort of said I was irresponsible for fathering a child at 49, let me say that my ex had no children and was desperate to have a child. Anyone who has been in that situation will know all the guilt trips you have to suffer because you have children of your own. I'm not saying I forced to have intercourse but it was close, and I really really did not want or need another child at that point in life.

Life is pretty shit to be honest !!

Good question - If the circumstances are as they are now with my deteriorating health then I would not be able to work. With the small pension I have I am unable to claim any benefits so we would have to survive as is.

Honestly @Intothesunshine you don’t need to reply to these. You gave your ex a Mortgage free home and £750 a month whilst you could. Your circumstances are beyond your control, you’ve not just decided to quit. You do not have to justify yourself, at all.

So what should be the first to go?

housing? Food? Heating?

most people don’t spend more than they need to on these things. It costs money to move or downsize. Chances are a smaller property will mean no space for his son’s bedroom. Sell the car and he can’t pick his son up any more. He still needs to provide his son with food and heat when he comes to stay.

the ex is living mortgage free in their family home. No childcare costs. She works full time. she’s likely now better off than o/p with a much larger disposable.

it isn’t “the first to go” in this case. It is being reduced in line with income.

i’m married but we have several “plan b’s” should one of us lose our income. Death, divorce, critical illness, and age are all part of life. My dad dropped dead in his 40’s and that was our household income gone as my mum was a sahm- it happens. it could have happened to o/p, then her maintenance is £0.

if she is so reliant on cm she can’t manage without it then that’s her issue. She’s had 4 years living mortgage free with a FT income plus £750 a month. That’s plenty for 2 people. If her finances really don’t stretch she should have looked into an insurance policy for o/p that would cover CM in case of illness or death.

i swear some women would see their ex on the streets if they got to keep their money.

As soon as became ill I explained the situation to my ex. She understood and I gave her an assurance that I would continue paying £750 for as long as I could, even when on zero pay.

My pension provider took 4 months to commence payments and during that time I gradually reduced the monthly payments.

Don't worry about her being pissed off, she was always a moody person and would start world war 3 if I spilt my coffee!!!

She went to Las Vegas with our DS last May plus Spain in the summer - that's what she did with his maintenance !!

If the mum’s eligible for benefits she’ll have been claiming them already. Child maintenance money isn’t included for means-testing.

OP this isn't really a debate. Just call CMS yourself. At 15 your ex wouldn't have many years left of CMS. You are still going to pay just a lot less.

At 16 your Son can get a little job. Honestly what I'd give for my child to be 15 and I could work a lot more hours during the week! It's not like your ex is left to juggle a 7 year old!

I think the key things are when and how you informed your ex of your proposal.

The ideal thing - in a non acrimonious situation- would be to both sit down together and decide how you can both make the unexpected drop in your earning capacity work for your son.

You’ve commented that she took your son on holidays - that’s not inherently a bad thing to do for a child! She might of course have done this with other money and used the maintenance for essentials, if you want to look at the maintenance as separate from her own earnings.

I think a collaborative approach- with a decent amount of notice - to the way forward would be best. Can you make cuts in your lifestyle to free up more money for your son? Can your son live with you more now that you’re not working to free up some money at her end? It shouldn’t be “well I can only pay £250 pcm starting from now” and then a brick wall. It’s bound to have a huge effect on her ability to provide a good life for your son.

It’s bound to have a huge effect on her ability to provide a good life for your son.

It’ll reduce her holiday budget that’s for sure.

Judges aren't really known for pandering to "grabby" women. If the judge deemed that the house was a fair comparable to the pension pots then I think we can assume that split was reasonable.