Dad won't give consent letter for my daughter as he is bitter

[KindExpert]

Hi I have booked a holiday to Egypt for October 2024 with my daughter who lives with me. And only sees him when her can be bothered in all fairness. I told my ex partner back in January about the trip and he was fine with it. He hasn't been paying child support for over 7 months so I've decided to go down the csa route. He isn't happy about this and out of spite has now decided he won't give a consent letter unless I cancel the csa. I haven't mentioned anything about this to my daughter because I don't want to upset her as she's quite an emotional person and this will affect her. I have her birth certificate. Me and my ex both have custody of her so I feel this will be a issue when traveling. Can anyone help

Tell him you aren’t going to Egypt, lucky u had bought cancellation insurance & now doing a girls staycation in UK instead. Test him out and ask if he can pay for theatre/concert tickets for a show somewhere during that week, so it seems more legit. (Ask DD keep it quiet. )

Then just go. Bring passports, birth certificate but you won’t need it.

Well no, none of that is actually factually correct. It's best not to give legal adjacent advice when you don't know anything about the law.

I agree with all the PP that you should tell him you've cancelled it (& possibly your DD too if you feel she won't be able to lie to her father)

Let him deal with the wrath of a teenage girl!

However, I doubt you'll have a problem. As a widow I have travelled extensively with my DC and (obviously) without my DH, I have also taken their friends on holiday with us, all who had different surnames to me; I've never been stopped (even with teen girls).

Don't cancel your CMS claim. If you give into bullying once, he'll just keep pushing back harder every time.

Nothing. There are zero checks and balances. It's a law that is only applied when someone wants to invoke it.

If OP is in possession of the passport then she could contact the passport office and explain the situation. This would pre-empt any plan he might have about claiming the passport is lost or stolen.

"Not true, only if you have a child arrangements order"

I was about to say the same thing before I saw your comment.

"I've taken DS out of the country hundreds of times and never been asked."

I've never been asked when leaving the country, but I have been asked more than once on returning to the UK

I've also been asked once on arrival at my DH's birth country but we were entering with her passport of that country and my British passport.

Whoa surname does she have? This will be the thing most likely to get you stopped. Never had a letter for my eldest but he has my name. Youngest has both but we travel together. Not been asked once

"There are zero checks and balances."

There certainly are checks at times. I remember one occasion when my DD was returning to this country and was travelling with my MIL (her paternal grandmother) who is not British.

We had provided a letter for my MIL saying we give permission and also included my mobile number. While we were waiting in arrivals for them I got call asking for details of who I was and just checking that I was DD's mother.

She's 14. Tell her

I would tell him that, unless he gives his consent as previously agreed, you'll apply to court for permission and ask the judge to make a costs order against him for the cost of the application.

And then I would follow through with this.

I agree with the previous posts who described how issues arose when coming back into the UK. We took our DGS, (daughters DS, different name) then about 8, to France for a week. We took him to France with no questions asked, but coming back the British Border Force person at Eurotunnel asked him who we were. As it happened we did have a letter of consent which also consented to us us to seek medical help if needed so they just said fine and waved us through. I was more shocked not to be asked on the way out of the UK than I was to be asked on the way back.

Op is there a reason you can’t just agree to stop the CMS once he has given you the letter and then restart it after the holiday? That would be the least stressful option. Otherwise you might need to think about going for a specific issue order, you can apply for this yourself, you don’t need a lawyer to help you.

PS in terms of getting this recognised by court as coercive control, it won’t be. The threshold for that is really (unreasonably) high.

I mean clearly he’s trying to blackmail you, but honestly they don’t give a shit.

Shes has his surname. I may just be overthinking thinking it. It'll just be our luck if we can't go. I don't care if uk borders ask us when arriving back home but we don't want any issues when traveling out

I've travelled numerous times with my 2 kids (all 3 of us have different surnames) never been asked for consent letter

And how were they to know you were who you said you were? You could have been any woman pretending.

What a bastard.

My daughter has travelled abroad several times over the years with either myself or her dad (we are divorced). Neither of us has ever written consent letters - it's just never occurred to us to do so. And we have never been asked.

Not suggesting you do this obviously, as I imagine it would be highly illegal, but wouldn't such a letter be incredibly easy to fake? Almost to the extent that it seems to have no weight whatsoever....

UK border should be fine as long as you have a copy of her birth certificate however some countries can request single mothers produce evidence the father agrees to the trip.
It tends to be countries where women don’t have the same scope of rights as in the UK or Europe. Eg I know a single mother who went to Dubai and they wouldn’t let her in the country without a notarised letter from the child’s father agreeing to the trip.
I don’t know Egypt but it would be prudent to check entry requirements.
Your ex sounds delightful!

You could forge his signature? It will only be his word against yours.
I have to have a letter from my DP because kids have different name to me. They just read it and let you though.
Sod him

This is the most helpful reply so far.

You really don't want to lie or start forging letters, if you get caught doing that then you will be seen as the problem.

This isn't a holiday problem, it's a family law problem, so I recommend that you ask MNHQ to move this thread to Legal.

My daughter has my surname as her middle name, we went to Spain last autumn when she was 4. The woman asked her who I was. My daughter replied using my first name!! I panicked. Luckily the woman just laughed it off though 😂

I’m pretty certain you will be fine with her birth certificate. I have a different surname to my son and have only ever been asked once (and that was actually by an air steward when we had already gone through passport control). I always just carry his birth certificate. Just don’t mention the holiday to your ex again. Your ex sounds like a prize prick btw.

Best form of defence is attack

it took me a while to both realise and do this

tell him that as he is being coercive about the trip & blackmailing him - you’re going to send copies of the text messages to CSA and get their advice about dropping the case

Border control do this a lot. They check on whether you are the parents in a way that you don't often notice.

Manchester airport are particularly on this when you return to the UK. I don't know why. They've always asked DS who we are.

He has DHs surname but my name as his middle name. We are married and have never tried without the other parent with him.

But yes it's definitely stricter coming into the UK than going out.