I think my son's dad is deliberately taking him more to avoid paying out in a financial settlement

[Namechange596]

Call me cynical, but my son's dad has started taking him a lot more since he received the divorce petition. I think it has dawned on him that I will require a financial settlement and he is now taking our son on more overnights.
I suspect this is to enable him to pay less if it's 50/50 custody, if it went to Court etc.
Has anyone's ex ever done this? I don't like the idea of him doing this because of financial reasons, like he's trying to thwart me.

It’s funny how he’s only now decided he loves his child since the petitions come through. Who wants to bet that he drops his child like a hot potato once the settlements been finalised? Unfortunately the op is damned if she does and damned if she doesn’t when it comes to contact. No doubt she’d get called all sorts on here by people like you if she restricts contact to what it always has been to prevent her ex from screwing her and her child out of money.

She has no right to restrict access to get more money, what a ridiculous statement

You think it’s ridiculous that he’s suddenly upped his 20% parenting to 50% while the financial settlement is being decided, and the op should be happy about this? And she’s not even doing this. She said she’s glad he’s spending more time with his child and is grateful for the break, but you’d have to be pretty dimwitted to not see that he’s only miraculously finally decided to do some parenting when there’s now a cash incentive for him. I feel sorry for the child when the divorce is done and the inevitable happens.

It’s irrelevant why he’s done it the fact is he has & that’s a good thing for their dc, her outgoings aren’t as high if he’s with his dad 50% so she’s not entitled to more money out of him, it’s not her money anyway it’s for their child. It’s certainly not her right to start restricting access should she want to especially just to get more money.

I do too

although expect this to be challenged on here…

Again, she’s not actually done that. And you don’t seem to be grasping the fact that he’s using his son as a pawn to get a bigger payout from the divorce. Of COURSE it matters why he’s doing it! Once he gets a bigger share for temporarily pretending to be father of the year for a short period of time, no doubt it’ll be back to the op doing the lions share. Just imagine if a mother on here said ‘I only have my son 1 and a half days a week, but now I’ve upped it to 4 so I can get more money divorcing my husband’? Like fuck would you be saying that’s ok as at least she’s making the effort for now

I grasp exactly what you are saying but I don’t think it matters; what does matter is that dc is getting to spend more time with his dad & that’s worth more than money in my experience & opinion

Why?

The suggestions that men who ask for more childcare always do so to pay less or that women try and stop them to get more money are just sexist stereotypes. There might be some men and women who do these things but most parents choose to do what is best for their children.

The circumstances of the OP really will bear no relation to anyone else's circumstances.

Noone is doubting they have the capacity in the abstract. It's just that, at a population level, they do a lot less of it in practice. I know there are honourable exceptions but less than a third of households report sharing this equally, so you'll understand the level of sceptism at divorce suddenly triggering conversions to 50-50%.

And that's before considering the consequences of that for who is the primary attachment figure, which some of these new converts appear strikingly indifferent to.

There are great dads and there are shit dads, just like there are great mums and there are shit mums.

But come off it... If someone has actively avoided their children prior to a relationship break-up, has taken up the sort of hobbies which require whole days out of the house to dodge doing actual parenting and has refused to do their share of the day-to-day running around, then of course demanding 50/50 begins to look like either an act of revenge or a money-saving exercise.

Why does it matter the reason? If he's having him, he's having him, he doesn't owe you money for the sake of it. You don't get to govern his relationship with his child.

I guess because looking after kids properly is quite hard work? For parents who care about their kids, it must be hard if you know they're being ignored, stuck in front of screens the whole time, fed shit or unhappy without you, when they're with the other parent. Parenting as a cost-cutting measure is unlikely to be good parenting.

His parenting was seemingly fine until they broke up. I love how women suddenly decide that the person they knowingly procreated with is a piece of shit parent once they split up. A child is not a possession, they have two parents, and whether one agrees with the others parenting style or not is irrelevant.

Call me old fashioned but kids should be with their mums.

Op I am with you

I think it’s a good thing for the child to have equal time with both parents.
OP probably did most of the parenting before because her ex couldn’t stand to be around her and so stayed out of the house.
Now they have split up, and he has a second home, he can interact and co parent his child without worrying about horrible atmosphere or rows with OP in front of the child.
(and OP can too now he is gone, not suggesting she’s been causing rows or the toxic feelings just that they obviously had to have existed between the two of them otherwise they would not have split up.)

You are old fashioned. I hope you have hubbies dinner on the table when he gets home every night and put on your best come hither eyes at bedtime.

I’ve noticed men often do want to step in when the child is older than 5, the hard yards have been taken care of by the mother including the pregnancy and all the career, loss of earnings issue. Once the child gets to school it’s the demand for 50/50 in the best interest of the child they didn’t bother with before. I really feel for the mothers who go through this and their feelings are dismissed with the old the child should needs equal access to the frankly uncaring father.

Ah, a woman’s natural place is at home mothering her lovely children.

Forget calling you old-fashioned, I’m embarrassed for you.

It’s 2023. Men are just as capable as women at raising children and being good parents.

In regards to the OP, your post screams of “I don’t want to have 50:50 as I want him to pay me”. If you do 50:50, you are in a much better position to earn your own money to take care of your child. In addition, your child will build a stronger relationship with their dad (who you thought was okay to marry so I assume can’t be completely useless). 50:50 seems a like a win-win to me 🤷🏻‍♀️

Ok, you need to put your child first BUT if he was not really very interested in the past and is now that the divorce process has commenced… I would say that he has found out that if he has him for one more night a week than you in average, you will have to pay him child maintenance, he will keep the child benefit and would be able to claim universal credits as a single parent, he would also get support to pay for nursery fees if certain conditions are met. You won’t be able to claim for anything even if you earn far less than him and end up struggling to provide a safe place to enable overnight contact with your child.

If he is the main career (or resident parent), he will have a much higher chance of getting a larger percentage of the assets than you.

I think you can test if he is really interested in the kid or the financial benefits if you allow for as much contact as he wants but insist that your kid sleeps at home with you for at least 4 nights a week (be mindful of considering holiday nights when checking the split, if you are doing 50/50 a holiday can easily make the other parent the resident parent). Don’t be the parent that takes the lion’s share of the responsibility of raising, feeding, clothing and caring for the kid during the day but doesn’t get any sort of financial help because goes to sleep at dad’s house at the end of the day.

Trust your instincts… if he never cared that much, why is he caring now? Is your child spending most of the contact time with his dad’s relatives or his girlfriend? If so, put your child first and pick a fight if you know your child is better cared for spending most of the time with you. Some children just go for contact to be ignored, neglected or abused and contact patterns are not easy to change at court at all once they have been established for a month or two.

Is there nothing that can be done that says that the level of contact must continue for a certain amount of time post divorce, or the order can be revisited? Some kind of clause?

They must see this all the time.

No, there isn’t. You need to go back to court, it will take months or even years for the court to make a decision and cost £10,000s in solicitor fees, unless the child is in danger, and proving that the child is in danger is also very difficult to prove (the courts won’t take your word for it)

I didn't mean in a danger sense, but using OP's example, if she can demonstrate exH has only been having DC 1.5 days a week for 2yrs, then "coincidentally" has upped this to 3-4 days the second he is served with papers meaning he gets a cheaper settlement if he has the DC more often, can she not say that she hopes very much this is not a ploy, but on the basis she suspects once the order is signed, he will renege on the arrangement, that should contact drop in the following 12mths, then the order should be adjusted accordingly?

Surely if an order is drawn on the basis of contact days, then he goes back on his side, he is making the order void.