Child Maintenance and Extras

[Peppette]

I was wondering what everyone did to pay for extra things that aren't covered by child maintenance, such as school dinners, keyboard lessons, clubs and activities?

My husband and I are planning to have the children 50/50 (we will see how that goes but that's the plan at the moment), we did the child maintenance calculator and it turns out he should pay me around £200 a month even though we're 50/50, I assume because he earns so much more.

My understanding is that child maintenance is to ensure that the standard of living in one property is the same as the other, essentially it can be paid on whatever for the children but it should stop things like "I don't want to go to mums because it's always cold" because I can't afford to put the heating on for example.

But how do you work out the extra stuff above, and things like clothes that will end up being mixed up between the houses? And how is that stuff split? My husband says that we should each pay 50% of that but that seems unfair seeing as he earns 3-4 times more than me.

My idea was we each put a percentage of our pay into a joint account and use that to pay for the extras but he says no he doesn't want to do that and if he did we should each be putting in the same amount.

Sorting it out each time you pay for something just seems so much faff. So what do you do with your ex partner and does it work? What happens if one of you gets a pay rise? Do you re-evaluate every so often? If so, how?

How much more than you does he earn? Splitting things 50:50 sounds fair enough to me, but it is hard to really advise without knowing your situation. Given he has agreed to split costs and split custody down the middle, surely the £200 per month from child maintenance is going some way to make up for the disparity in your earnings?

I earn 18k per year and he earns 82k per year. I only rejoined the workforce 3 years ago after looking after the kids.

Yes these should be split equally, and you would be getting child maintenance to equal up the household income. Who will be claiming child benefit?

For 18k you must be working part time? You would have the kids 50/50, enabling you to also work full time.

Has he always been so tight!

I hope you are getting the uneven pensions sorted as part of the divorce.

I would say 50:50 on general everyday expenses but I would tell him that it's likely you won't be able to afford expensive extra curricular and school trips etc and if he isn't able to find those the DC won't be able to do them.

Let him have the glory of paying for them tbh. Be honest with the DC that you can't afford to contribute.

With that disparity in earnings your ex should pay that and possibly more.

However at the same time why not increase your hours (if you are part time) or plan for increasing your salary if possible through a promotion or new job.

It's hard but you will struggle significantly on that salary. £200 extra will not go far.

I am increasing my hours starting next month up to just under 25 hours a week, the 18k isn't definite and I will be pushing for more as I'm still talking with my boss but I saw him write that down in his notebook when we were agreeing on extra hours. I would do more hours but they're just not available right now. I may be trained in extra duties sometime soon in the future which would mean more hours and pay but not quite there yet.

Good legal advice might help you more here - I think you would be better off focusing on your split of the financial settlement. It's likely you would be entitled to a higher percentage of marital assets to allow you to house you and your family while you rebuild your career/work life. If £200 is what the child maintenance says then that is all he is really required to pay (as long as he is having the kids 50% of the time), so you are relying on his goodwill for anything above that - and it does not sound as if he is all that good and willing. Presumably you would be the claimant for child benefit? Given your salary, you may qualify for other supplementary benefits. As others say, you'll need to work to boost your own income as quickly as possible.

For what it is worth, to answer your original question: my partner and his ex provide their own clothes, toys, food etc (with the understanding that toys and clothes may end up across houses from time to time). They might discuss splitting the cost of an expensive Christmas present. They also split specific costs which also makes them both accountable for keeping on top of what the child needs (for example: one is in charge of replacing jackets, while the other one replaces shoes), rather than one parent doing all the shopping. If one of them takes their children on holiday, there is no expectation that the other would pay towards it.

It might be worth drawing up a list of your children's expenses and suggesting your ex takes on some of the costlier ones. That way you're not suggesting joint finances, you're literally putting him in charge of a specific list of the children's needs/wants that are within his budget.

Have you considered a second job? Not to work mad hours but just up to the usual 40 full time hours? Not many people can run a household on part time money. Could be an opportunity to try something new you might like more??

He actually hasn't been, it was always this is our money, you don't have to ask about spending it etc etc but now it's all I paid for this house and you need to leave. He actually hid his pension statement to me and lied about how much it was but I caught him out and have the statement now. He said he had 27k less in his pension than he did.

What would you count as general everyday expenses? Also with my hours at work I am able to move them around to not need to use after school club (by starting earlier, working longer on days he has them) but he will be using after school & holiday club and he says we should be going 50/50 on that too which doesn't seem right.

Everyone is different, I would never ask my ex for any extra money as he has no contact and pays £7 a week for 4 kids.

My understanding is that child maintenance is to ensure that the standard of living in one property is the same as the other,

I didn't think it was to ensure this at all. It's to ensure that a reasonable cost of raising children is contributed by the party who has them less

How old are the children? I do think 50/50 of costs is fair. It's not his fault you earn so much less?

My ex husband earns not much more than you and I earn about what your ex husband does. And I request 50/50 for extras like uniforms and school trips. The children genetically morally and legally are 50% each of us.

Nope he pays for childcare and holiday club on his time and you pay it on yours. Do not move on that.

I'm thinking uniform, general clothes. Anything moving from house to house. Their hobbies/clubs and associated clubs.

After a divorce you’re on your own. 50/50 is a fair split. It would be nice if he wanted to pay proportional to earnings but most men don’t. A lot won’t even pay anything for extras. It’s shameful really.

This just seems really over thought tbh. You both have them 50/50 and if he gives you £200 a month could that be used for clothes or extras? If you need clothes you buy them or if the dad wants to buy clothes he buys them. I wouldn’t dream of going to my ex to let him know I’ve just been shopping and need £50 transferring

I'm not saying it is his fault but there was an agreement between us that I would step back from the workforce and look after the kids because childcare was so costly. Of course being a SAHM has it's benefits but also that sacrifice and in that time I have supported him in his career a huge amount and he wouldn't be where he was today without me whereas I had to start from scratch 3 years ago. So while it's not his fault there is some level of responsibility there. I also accepted this agreement with the understanding that he would support me when I was a SAHM and when I inevitably joined the workforce on a lower wage because we were married and my plan was to stay married.

That's not true good Dads that are higher earners often want to see their DC have a decent standard of living, able to do hobbies etc.

One I know used to pay "pocket money" to the DC that was for their hobbies/activities. So when one carried on with dancing she subbed her costumes and competitions from her "pocket money".

The ‘compensation’ for being sahm and lower earner is likely to be in the firm if higher % of assets. If you get that and ge also shares 50:50 childcare / access etc then child maintenance should be £0. Then it’s up to you to work full time, claim child be benefits

what assets are there and what is the proposed split ?

I don't know the full assets because he is still hiding stuff from me but I think with pensions and everything included it's about £600,000 and the proposed split is 50/50 there as well. I have spoken to a lawyer with what was the initial offer which she said was good but I was waiting to get all the information before I go back to her for more advice.

Well you need to be getting more than 50:50 to compensate for the fact your potential earnings are lower due to stepping back to look after the DC whilst he could build his career.

You need a damn good solicitor that gets good results for divorce situations lien yours.

Do you think the 50:50 is about finances? Do you think he will leave the lions share of the mental load and parenting to you still?

I hope you are already claiming child benefit for them?

You shouldn’t have joint accounts once you’re divorced

A 50/50 split of all extras sounds right. You should be working full time, whether that is innyour current job or a new one to cover the other half

So there's two things here.
Asset split: if you have given up work for a number of years to look after the kids, then this should be reflected in the asset split. The start point is 50 50 and you adjust from here. So if, say, you were both earning 25k pre kids, you gave up work and continued to work and you now earn 18k and he earns 80k, I'd be assuming that you get larger part of the house to reflect your lower mortgage potential compared to his

Maintenance: if you have kids 50 50 then that's one thing but then you need to be truly 50 50. So that means his time he sorts out childcare and you for yours. If your hours mean you don't need after school club then you don't pay for it. How he sorts after school is his problem, yes he will pay for the full term every day if that's how the school works but again, not your problem as you will be picking them up at 3 yourself. True shared expenses we put on a spreadsheet and true up each month or if they are the same for each kid e.g a club they are both at then I would pay for 1 kid and he pays for the other. Be careful on true up that you don't always end up paying, I try to organise so I pay some things and he pays others eg I pay school dinner and he pays bus fares

He’s right OP, his child maintenance is the acknowledgement that he earns more despite having 50/50, any extras should be 50/50.

I think you should be looking at slightly higher asset split to offset different mortgage /housing capabilities, then ongoing costs are your own with you working full time and sharing 50:50 care and costs