My ex wants to stop maintenance payments

[taylorellen]

My ex called me yesterday to say he has split up with his new wife. She wiped out the bank account and took their child from him. He has been paying maintenance payments for our child for the last 7 years. He said he will have to stop payment me or split the money that is already being paid between the two children. Can he do this? I feel that my sons maintenance is being penalized because of his new circumstances and dont really see why this should affect the payments. In theory if my maintenance is halved then that means I am paying his wife her maintenance out of my agreed share. (not through CSA, agreed amount when we got divorced via solicitor). Can someone please let me know if this is normal for a payment to reduce or stop in these circumstances? Hope ive made sense. Thanks

If you use the CSA rules to work it out it's complicated.

For one child he would have been paying 15% of his wages. However this would have been reduced as he had a child living with him.

However he now has to pay for 2 children so the % increases to 20% and he receives no deduction as he has no children living with him.

So in short, under CSA, he now pays 20% of his wages, which is split equally between the two. So you would be entitled to 10% of his wages.

hi, thanks for that. It still works out that he should be paying me the same amount of money if its 10%. He says takes home £600 per week and he's paying me £60. Im hoping at the moment he's just panicking at the moment and it can all be sorted. Nightmare! :)

Were the child maintenance arrangements just agreed in formally between you? If there was a child maintenance agreement included in a consent order settling the overall finances on divorce strictly speaking your ex is liable for the amount stipulated in the order until the order ceases to have any effect. One year after the date of the order either party can apply to the CSA and the court order would only then cease to have any effect. Either way and the CSA rules would apply and the CSA rate would be shared between the two children.

The other thing to note, taylorellen, is that the CSA rate would reduce if he has your ds for overnight stays.

www.cmoptions.org/en/calculator/calculator.asp This is the easiest way to calculate it

It was agreed with a solicitor but not a court order. Thanks for all the info I think he is still liable for the same amount, im hoping he just dosent stop payment all together or reduce them as I really dont want to go down the csa or court route unless I have to. :)

Going through the CSA isn't hard to do, and you shouldn't feel the need to shy away.

Update - my ex has now decided that he is going to make himself bankrupt to avoid paying child maintenance. My question is:- if he is still receiving his £600 per week take home pay surely the csa can still take the money?

Yes the CSA can set up a Deduction from Earnings Order and get the money straight from his employer. He is barking up the wrong tree.

Sounds like you need to open a case with the CSA. More info here .

Even if he does go bankrupt he will stay have to pay CSA, so don't worry about that.

He doesn't seem to be very well informed.

Apply to the CSA then you won't have to put up with any more nonsense.