Guest post: 'We overhauled the Child Support Agency precisely because it wasn’t working'

[MumsnetGuestPosts]

1. Does the service actually use the powers it has to make parents face consequences for non-payment?

Yes. As many of you know, we overhauled the Child Support Agency precisely because it wasn’t working. Over time we have made our consequences tougher and importantly, we are using them more and more.

The powers we can use include deducting money from the non-paying parent’s earnings through their employer and accessing funds from bank accounts, including joint accounts. We can register the debt with a credit reference agency, which can impact their credit rating and ability to get a mortgage. We can also grant court action for liability orders, which means Enforcement Agents could come and sell their property to pay unpaid maintenance and any costs. If that doesn’t work, we can also disqualify them from driving, confiscate their licence, take their passport away, or send them to prison.

Because of the changes we have made, our service is improving year on year - and the numbers show we are using the powers we have to help families. The amount of maintenance arranged for the benefit of children has increased by 20% compared to last year, and £1 billion of maintenance is expected to be arranged this year alone.

Currently, there are 48,300 deductions from earnings orders and requests in place; and 3,500 regular and lump sum deduction orders in place. During the quarter ending June 2019, £26.1 million was collected from parents undergoing a deduction from earnings order or request; and £2.9m was deducted directly from the paying parent’s bank accounts.

2. How much effort do you put in to finding a non-paying parent?

A huge amount. We can use all kinds of sources to find an individual, from HMRC records to someone’s phone bill information. We’ll do everything we can to contact them and contact their employer if we need to.

If we’ve made reasonable attempts to contact them and given them enough chances to pay, we can start enforcement measures using just their address - regardless of whether we’ve been able to talk to them or not.

Before that point, we’ll use our administrative powers to encourage them to pay, such as the deduction from earnings order (if they are employed) or a deduction order, where we can freeze and collect money from a bank account that we have evidence they use. If this doesn’t work, we’ll move on to tougher legal action.

3. How does it work when non-paying parents have other children they owe maintenance for? How does that affect what my child will get?

We split the payments on a pro-rata basis so no child is favoured over the other.
These calculations seem complicated because they involve three households: yours, the other household with children, and the paying parent. You can use our online calculator to work out how much you should be getting. It’ll show you what we’re likely to work out for you.

How many children the paying parent has affects how much they pay you for your child. How much they earn is taken into account to make sure they can afford it, and reflects how much they’d pay for their child if they were living with them. For example, if the paying parent is on the basic rate of child maintenance, then how much they have to pay you depends on how many other children they’re paying for as well. So, in this case, if paying parent is paying for one child, then they’ll pay 12% of their gross weekly income. If there’s two children, they’ll pay 16%, and three or more children is 19%. This is assuming that your child stays with you all the time.

4. Some parents are using job-hopping to avoid paying. What are you doing about that?

If a parent changes jobs, unless their income goes up or down by 25%, the maintenance calculation will remain the same until the annual review – but rest assured that we have access to real time earnings information from HMRC to verify current income figures.

If you’re concerned about the paying parent deliberately job-hopping to avoid paying, you can request a mandatory reconsideration where your maintenance calculation will be reassessed and their earnings are looked into in more detail.

It can be difficult to get a small minority of parents with complex incomes to comply. That’s why we have a new compliance and arrears strategy, which includes proposed changes to target loopholes.

This is in addition to working more closely with HMRC and dedicating more resources to the specialist financial investigation unit, who have the power to look more closely into individual circumstances to see if parents are actively avoiding their responsibility.

We can’t force a paying parent to stay in a certain job, and people who do job-hop are difficult to pursue. But we’ll use every power at our disposal to get them to pay for their children.

5. Some parents use self-employment to hide their earnings and pay less. What are you doing about that?

If someone suspects their ex-partner of avoiding paying child maintenance, fraud, or not declaring their earnings, they should inform us straight away so we can refer the case to our Financial Investigations Unit (FIU) and investigate the situation fully.

They can check the accuracy of the information that the paying parent has given the CMS. When it comes to assessing how much a self-employed person should be paying, we receive their gross income and gross taxable profit of their business for the most recent tax year from HMRC – and they can charge penalties for inaccurate reporting if the FIU finds out that tax hasn’t been paid.

6. What about parents who deliberately aren’t registered as UK taxpayers, but have a home in the UK?

We’re aware of a small number of parents whose payments don’t match up with their finances and resources, because they can choose to support themselves via a complex arrangement of assets rather than taking a salary.

We have new powers to deal with this. It means that assets from a specified list can be taken into account when calculating child maintenance, including houses. If the total value of those assets is above £31,250, we’ll calculate what’s called a notional income of 8% of the value of those assets. This aims to be effective in targeting a parent with a wealthy lifestyle where their income is complex or can’t be pinned down.

7. Why aren’t the additional costs of raising a disabled child taken into account for the calculation?

CMS goes off the paying parent’s income which takes a percentage from their earnings based on the number of children they have, rather than the specific circumstances of a child.

Through the welfare system, there’s financial support available for parents raising children with disabilities such as the Disability Living Allowance (DLA), which can provide up to £148.85 a week to help with the cost of looking after a child under 16 depending on the level of help needed. You can find more information, such as the eligibility requirements and how to claim, online.

When your child turns 16, DLA becomes Personal Independence Payments (PIP). We’ll write to let them know, as usually they’ll need to apply for it. A claim can be started by calling the DWP on 0800 917 2222, with the information provided in the PIP claimant guide. This system also provides up to £148.85 a week.

8. Why do payment amounts change, and often without notice?

We’ll set the payment amount for the paying parent and you’ll be informed if we changed that.

If you don’t get the amount we’ve told you, or you don’t get anything at all, let us know and we’ll chase them. We can use our enforcement measures, or move them on to the collect-and-pay system.

9. Inconsistent advice is a big problem. Why can’t I have a dedicated case worker?

You will get a dedicated worker who will oversee your case if it’s particularly complicated. But, in most cases, our trained staff have the right level of understanding and expertise to help you. We regularly train our staff to make sure they are equipped to handle the variety of cases that come their way.

We’re continually looking at our service to make sure we’re delivering the best outcomes we can. For example, we’ve changed the way we route calls, improving how many land with the right team straight away. Colleagues know they can take action on customer queries, and that they should give clear, consistent expectations on how long things may take so you don’t feel in the dark.
And, no matter how you choose to contact our department, we will work hard to provide you with an effective resolution and, importantly, get money to your family as early as possible.

10. Why won’t I get maintenance for my child past the age of 18?

Sometimes you can, because of how we legally define a child. Your child is eligible for CMS if they’re under the age of 20 and in full-time education, or you’ve registered for child benefits for them. To be eligible for child benefits until they’re 20 years old, again, they need to be in approved full-time education or training, and live in the UK. If this isn’t the case, when your child turns 19, the paying parent is no longer liable.

Baroness Stedman-Scott will be returning to the post on Thursday 10 October

[MissB83]

I had twelve months of idiocy and downright rudeness from call operators who did nothing to progress my claim. On the one occasion I lost my patience and told the operator that she was talking nonsense and that the CMS was failing my child through incompetence, she told me she would cut the call off and not deal with me because I was too rude! I wish we had the luxury to choose not to deal with the idiots on the line. They have no empathy and no competence, they push you to breaking point and it's really hard when you need the money.

[Crusytoenail]

Nice story, but it's no where near accurate. And most who've dealt with this situation will know that. Those who haven't dealt with it will believe it and there's another stick to beat single mums parents with because we'll be told CMS can and do use their powers but we're not trying hard enough.
And what about parents like me who were chasing payment when you were even worse than you are now and had those debts written off? I owe on my council tax, don't get that written off do I?

[NeverTwerkNaked]

@MumsnetGuestPosts I think this thread merits a response please. The original post was hugely insulting to all the mothers parents who know how toothless CMS are

[Iwantacookie]

I know what else I want to know. Why do you not understand that I have NEVER contacted you about my older 2 dc yet every 5 years I get a letter of you about them demanding I provided evidence?
Why do I constantly have to tell you we have a private arrangement for them and that will not change because their dad actually gives a shit.
All these responses and none positive (well a pp did say it was a positive experience however after reading her post I would disagree it was a positive experience) noone thinks your system works so why do you keep thinking it does?

[RowanMumsnet]

Hello

Thanks for your comments.

We knew this topic was a real concern for lots of MNers which is why we thought it would be a decent topic for a ministerial guest post. One of our aims with these posts (from ministers and other powerful figures) is to give users an opportunity to interact directly with people who are in a position to improve or change things. After all, this is the kind of unvarnished feedback ministers may not always see.

The baroness will be coming back on to the thread on Thursday to answer the points raised. We will reiterate to her that this is an unusually strong response to a guest post and that your points merit a serious response in turn.

[AnyMinuteNow]

Yes, all the snarky stuff from tue call centre staff is abusive.

Then they have the absolute brass neck to start telling you off and threatening to end the call, and cut you off.

[DuchessMinnie]

Here's my story for the Baroness when she returns on Thursday. My ex and I have a consent order for him to have 10 overnights a month. 12 months after the consent order was signed he reduced his overnights to 4 per month. I went to see a solicitor and was told you can not enforce a consent order, best to just accept it.

Four years on I have just made a claim to the CMS today as my ex has further reduced his overnight contact to zero- his choice. He still pays me the rate for 4 nights a month plus has a discount for his gf's children. The CMS advises that if my ex denies he is not having them overnight and provides a copy of the consent order, that will be the final day- ie that the order which I could not enforce is the evidence of him having the children 10 nights a month and my maintenance will go down not up. Apparently the texts and emails I have from him stating he does not wish to have any overnight contact mean nothing as there is a legal document in place. My ex is an arse, no doubts there, but the system is a bigger arse for allowing this preferential treatment of NRPs.

FWIW my consent order also gave a maintenance figure of almost £200 more than he gives me but I cannot enforce this because the court will default to the minimum CMS calculation.

Honestly, you could not make this up.

[DuchessMinnie]

Actually yes, the rudeness! And the patronising advice, I had one lady in the call centre advise me with a big sigh that really it would be far better if I could speak to my ex myself and make a private arrangement. Like that's something I hadn't already tried and failed hence holding to speak to a call centre to help me.

[cookiemonster5]

The minister needs to contact each of us directly and ask how she can rectify our situations personally and the bring this up in PMQ to get a new investigation started and a plan on how to rectify this disgusting situation that should never have happened to us all in the first place.

Our kids deserve better. The counties future deserves better. They are being let down by an incompetent service backed by a government who doesn't appear to care.

[OneLuckyLady]

All the Baroness needs to do is go into one of the call centres and pull up a chair next to an agent, plug a headset in and listen to some calls. She'll hear callers saying what we've all said, all day long.

[Marinetta]

As far as I can see CMS is a government department that generates little to no income but requires a lot of financial investment in order to function. As such I would assume that within the department the focus is very much on keeping costs to a minimum which is why CMS is so reluctant to persue parents that aren't making their payments as the costs of persuing these parents are high and when the money is recovered CMS does not benefit from it as it is paid to the family to who it is owed. It would seem that the CMS approach of waiting and waiting and hoping the parent pays up, writing off debts and expecting parents to reach an agreement privately is the preferred approach as it is the lowest cost approach. It would also seem that the incompetence of staff can be attributited to a lack of training as it is again a cost which CMS is attempting to minimise and staff do not have sufficient knowledge of the system or of how to appropriately communicate with the public. As a whole I would alledge that the general approach of the CMS is to take the cheapest option rather than the most efficient.
There are without a doubt a number of children living in poverty due to one of their parents refusing to contribute appropriately to their upbringing. Numerous studies have shown that it is those children affected by poverty who in later life are more likely to need more support from the government. In the long run, would it not be cheaper for the government if CMS recovered the missing payments as soon as possible to help these children now rather than other government departments having to pick up the cost and deal with the effects of poverty further down the line?

[Smotheroffive]

I wonder, after your analysis, whats the point in all that investment when theres such poor return /efficiency.

I dont really care what the return is to them.

Its their duty to make NRPs pay up, and they can't keep ahead of the NRPs! Pah!

Some of their staff are vile amd judgemental and cause serious harm to families.

Its a horror that they are not being held accountable for.

Like most things in life its the most vulnerable who suffer the most, including suicides, and death from perpetrators.

Lets face it, good fathers want to financially support their dc.

Its abusive NRPs that try to avoid financial responsibility and care for their own dc.

This, I, predict, based on the fairytale OP, will be another Penny Mordant

[cookiemonster5]

One more thing I want to address is how mothers are put through the wringer when the fathers deny parentage.

My ex decided to try this when we switched from CSA to CMS despite admitting parentage and paying previously.

I was utterly humiliated. I was asked about my entire sexual history from when I met him up until the youngest child was born. Some strange man I had never met nor spoken to before was asking me who I had had sexual contact with and how I could be sure who the father of my children are.

I was not the one who cheated. I was cheated on. I never willingly had sex in order to conceive the youngest child (the one he denied being the father of) but here I was being forced to recount it all because my ex and abuser felt like playing games.

In the end he admitted he was the father but not before he held the process up for weeks on end and caused me huge trauma. My now-husband (just dating at the time) took the after noon off work to come look after me because I was in such a state recounting it all and the CMS did nothing except tell me he can do that as many times as he likes because he had the "right" to dispute parentage. Even though he is listed on the birth certificate, paid child support previous after admitting parentage, has signed court documents relating to divorce and residency and everything else.

That needs addressed and fast. Women shouldn't have to suffer this time and time again.

[Smotheroffive]

Some strange man I had never met nor spoken to before was asking me who I had had sexual contact with and how I could be sure who the father of my children are

This is revolting and I'm saddened for you cookie

No operative has the qualification or authority to speak to women this way.

You are not the first though to have mysogynistic interrogation and judgements handed down to them by some who work these phones. I have heard many similar type commentary and interrogation.

Its wholly inappropriate.

The shutting down of the csa and dropping all those vulnerable families gave rise to a lot of this when cms got going. They were revolting to some.

If they treated their employers this way they'd be jobless, and their landlords this way, they'd be homeless.

[MissB83]

Choking in to agree with the comments about intrusive questioning of the female parent. It's completely inappropriate and very sexist. Just send out the fkn DNA test then we will see who the father is! (Not that I didn't know already!!)

[cookiemonster5]

Exactly @MissB83 but no they do the questions and then let the father decide if he does or doesn't want a test, then leave him with the ability to do it all over again in 6 months, a year, 2 years time and forever more till he is no longer liable for child support.

[Smotheroffive]

...and if the DWP gave an actual toss, they'd be oayin compensation for all the very real damage they have done to women and children trying to survive on thin air thanks to abusive absent fathers who really dont give a dick about their dc.

All these things said in the OP have been spouted despite whats actually happening irl.

[Shessobrave]

My ex FINALLY stopped the 'job hopping to avoid the Attachment of earnings from his wage' rubbish and after one month of paying arrears & the ongoing amount, rang up CMS and told them he was "going to Las Vegas so could (he) please stop paying arrears and reduce ongoing amount?" "Why yes of course Mr Ferguson!" I then get a phone call to INFORM me of this - 2 weeks later - after I'd already received the £1.12 for the month......from TWO HUNDRED AND EIGHTY FIVE POUNDS! Yes, you read that right! One phone call and they approved his amount to reduce by £283.88!!!! So he could go to Vegas!!! I had to sit in the Food Bank and be served a bag of cheap food by my old school teacher. Whilst he was gambling in Vegas

[Shessobrave]

Correction - My ex FINALLY stopped the 'job hopping to avoid the Attachment of earnings from his wage' rubbish and after one month of paying arrears - This was after 19 months of job hopping -

[Smotheroffive]

? Very quiet on here?

Isn't today the day, very interested to read response.

Seriously.

[Shessobrave]

Same here

[DuchessMinnie]

Same here, waiting for a response. I'm not sure the Baroness was expecting this.

[cookiemonster5]

I think she may be off taking advise on how to respond because I am sure she had no clue things were this bad or hoped we all wouldnt resound.

[Babymamamama]

I’m waiting with baited breath.... maybe the Baroness has “flounced”....

[BaronessStedmanScott]

Hello everyone,

Having read through your comments on my earlier post, I am pleased to have the chance to respond.

Before I get to it to however I want to sincerely say how important it is to me that we improve the way CMS works - especially for those difficult cases like the ones raised on this thread.

Let me assure you we are doing all we can to make sure that the correct people get the money they are owed.

New powers are helping us do that and now it’s about making sure more payments get through.

We’re working tirelessly to do just that. While we are continuing to make improvements we still know that in 33% of collect and pay cases payments are not being made, I am however, encouraged that the CMS is achieving the highest ever compliance rates for maintenance payments.


Use of Powers

Firstly, I read a lot of comments expressing concern that we don’t take serious action or use our powers. Here is what we have done since we got our new powers:

• From April to June this year we were working on more than 2,000 sanctions to take away passports or driving licences, or pursue a prison sentence
• In the same period, in excess of 9,200 payments were made through enforcement agents

And to be really clear, every day we use civil enforcement actions, like deductions from PP’s bank accounts, to secure maintenance as quickly as possible.

We’re also doing much better at getting child maintenance debt legally recognised (through Liability orders) – and that’s important because once that happens we can take really strong action like forcing the sale of property. In 18/19 we granted 11,800 Liability orders, more than double what was granted in 16/17.

But we also have to make sure that we are using the right power, at the right time to give us the greatest chance of securing money for your children.

For example, sending someone to prison is something we can seek to do in extreme cases – but that doesn’t guarantee any payment and indeed can make it difficult for the paying parent to make future payments if their means to earn money has been removed.


A New Era

As I said in my first post – we closed the CSA precisely because it wasn’t working. Writing off the debt accrued under that old system was not an easy decision – that’s why we consulted about whether to do it in the first place.

In taking this route we are focusing on the collection of maintenance that will benefit today’s children.

Almost half of the outstanding debt relates to children who are now over 20-years-old, and to recover between £0.1 billion and £0.6 billion of that would cost the taxpayer £1.5 billion.

We’re in the process of writing to parents with debts at a certain level to confirm whether they want us to make any further attempts at collection. Many parents have already told us to continue our efforts and of course where there is a chance of success and where it’s cost effective, we will do so.

And now under CMS, we have stronger powers and better resources to tackle non-payers and avoid debt building up.


Service

I’m sorry to hear that some of you haven’t always experienced the service you’d expect when coming to us for help. Your feedback is really valuable when it comes to this and I can assure you that many other colleagues at CMS have also read your feedback.

We’re constantly improving training for our staff, processes to handling cases and IT systems to help us deliver the most efficient service we can. As I have said, it is important to me that we improve the way CMS works and we are moving in the right direction.

I’m sorry I can’t reply to each of your personal cases on here in detail but of course we take all your comments seriously. There’s detailed information here on how you can get in touch with us if you wish to discuss your concerns or ask us to relook at decisions about your case. You can also access our online portal here.



Financial Investigations Unit

In many of your comments you’ve described complicated circumstances where a paying parent is deliberately hiding or manipulating their earnings to avoid paying their maintenance.

Let me be blunt: we know this happens, we want to stop it and we are.

We’ve invested more money to grow our Financial Investigation Unit which exists specifically to tackle this kind of behaviour. They’ve completed more than 1000 investigations that have resulted in a positive change to a maintenance calculation in the last year alone. And we’re investigating more and more cases every day.