Has anyone done the REMO route for child maintenance?

[Legaldispair]

So my ex husband is suppose to pay child maintenance, paid the minimum for a few years and last year I noticed CMS were using old information to work out what he should pay me as his salary had trebled and they have never recalculated, to cut a long story short I have a hearing soon about this as he continued to dispute it and HE took it to tribunal. THEN on top of that he moved to New York… has always threatened it, and has paid nothing for a year as he ‘doesn’t know what he is supposed to pay as there are no rules’ due to the fact him and myself are both UK citizens. Not even paying a contribution amount and not even bothering to look into it so I have had no choice but to go down the REMO route. Those papers have only just gone off to then as it took 6 months just to get these papers (CMS were dicking around in the mean time and not helping with this) so he owes me aLOT of money in under payments which I know America won’t be interested in and he hasn’t paid me for a year… has anyone actually had any success with the Remo route? I’m slowly running out of any positivity. I can’t afford legal help so I’m on my own.

can anyone share this experiences with me please? Anything I need to know that they don’t tell you etc?

@mommatoone I'm sure you've tried social media to locate him. What about the samaritans equivalent? Have you tried looking at telephone directories in Spain. Everything these days is on line. I've found so much. Agencies that can locate him. I'm sure there must be something.

@Mummyofj Hi, I'm sorry but I'm unable to answer your query. I am not legally trained. I also do not understand your query. Are you talking about the UK or Canada?

If your query is about CMS arrears, then you would have to talk to a UK solicitor. Rights of Women and the team at Single Parents Support and Advice Service can help as they have legally trained people.

@Mummyofj REMO provide a solicitor in Canada to set the child maintenance, which will take into consideration your income and that of your ex.

However, if you have a court order from the UK, they may just enforce this without making any adjustments.

3 years to get a response from REMO? This sounds like an overly long time to me.

Yes ive tried everything to find him. Hes pissed off abroad to avoiding paying maintenance, so keeps a low profile iyswim. Not thought about telephone directory? How does that work.Ive made complaint now about my application. Im not holding out much hope of finding him tbh, but i had to try something.

@mommatoone Has he moved to Spain? There must be an equivalent of our telephone directory online? Have you tried the equivalent of the Samaritans in Spain?

@mommatoone Telephone Directories: Spain and International - Spain - Angloinfo

@mommatoone have you tried getting in touch with a translator or interpreter, someone who has lived in the country and who could help you?

@sanchi
canadian court registered alredy U.K. order. Me ex appeal from that and ask to not register the order.

Have you tried Webmii? If not, it’s worth a shot.
The phone directory may work if he’s got a landline on his name.

Will the solicitor in Canada know REMO?

@Sanchi I put REMO in 2020 but was send in 2021. The same year my ex applied to CMS to open case and I appealed to the CMS in U.K. CMS said he pay tax here they will open CMS. I appealed that decision to the child maintenance tribunal and they refused my appellation as well in 2022 saying he pay tax here done. He did not says anything he is living in Canada from 2019.

order to REMO case is from 2020 where periodical payments are stated etc. and that is from Family Court order.

Canada: he put motion agains register the court order from 2020 agains me directly. REMO had no idea about that till I was informed them. He bring up the CM tribunal decision that CMS case will stay open and that he is resident here.

should I respond anything to the Canadian Court? I cannot seems find any legal advise. No where. I lost 1400£ to hear that Canadian Judge will not see that the case is from REMO. That I am stupid. That CMS and the tribunal decision is it. And Canada will drop the case not looking if he is living there or not. That I try cheat etc.

is it all that worth? He stopped pay any money at all.

is it my fault that the REMO case took so long?

wtf seriously.

😰😰😰😰😰😰😰😰

@Mummyofj Hi, sounds as if your ex is being a right b.....d. It is the Canadian court's duty to make a UK maintenance order legally binding. Yes, your ex might appeal the order, it should say that in your maintenance order, but then the judge should look at finances on both sides. REMO would appoint a Canadian Lawyer to work on your behalf as part of the REMO process. As he is now living in Canada, then he can't go via CMS however much he tries, as they have no jurisdiction. Obv, I'm not a lawyer.

@Mummyofj Don't know what the judge would have to say about that. What stage is he at with the appeal? The worst case scenario would be to start a new application via REMO where the Canadian judge would make the decision with regards to levels of child maintenance taking into consideration your finances as well as your exes.

Hi, my ex resides in France, he has not paid any maintenance, our child lives with me in the UK. I've made an application through Remo, will Remo appoint a lawyer to represent you, through the court process for free? Do they take into calculation your new partner salary or just your income when they look at the financial obligations the father is ordered to pay?
Thanks

As far as I know, the French authorities will appoint a solicitor to represent your case, a state employed solicitor. And you don’t have to pay anything.
And I don’t think your income matters, just the income of the paying parent. But I’m not sure how complicated things can get if the paying parent appeals, etc.

Thanks for responding. It is a given he will appeal, as he doesn't want to pay anything for our child. Will I be given the contact details the solicitor and liase directly with them or does all communication go via Remo? You said state employed solicitor, does Remo not have use a list of external law firms to represent you like they do in Hague relocation cases?

@lawyermummy thank you that is so kind but I can’t afford a solicitor… ironically today I have had another letter through saying the American system want his address but I don’t have it. They have given me the same form I have already filled in! It’s so frustrating! He is all over linked in etc and you can clearly see I job title and where he works, I have told them this information yet they aren’t interested, they want his address which I don’t have. I wish I didn’t need the money but he owes me so much money that it’s enough for me to finally have a deposit on a mortgage and give my kids some stability for the first time instead of getting shunted around in over priced rentals!

Which State is he in? My ex is in Illinois

@Serrina New York. I know for a fact they are much stricter there with child maintenance and pay it longer and will take away passports etc… but you have to be able to get into the system first plus I don’t know how it works when the person is not an American… he’s playing the system well.

In Spain, it’s the ‘abogados del estado’, which I understand as state-employed solicitors. But I’m not sure how it works in other countries.

In my latest communication with REMO, they wrote: ”Unfortunately, because of the nature of our work and the high volume of cases we administer we cannot normally pro-actively chase updates on case progress, we must wait for the authority to respond to REMO and for REMO to inform us of any updates. Furthermore the reciprocal process means only REMO can chase foreign authorities for updates, neither MEBC nor the applicant can have direct contact with the foreign authority in normal circumstances, and the foreign authority cannot be compelled to respond or act within a time frame.”
So no, you we should not have any contact with the solicitor “in normal circumstances”.

Is there any way you can contact REMO directly instead of going through the MEBC? Way too much gatekeeping in this system!

@Serrina I totally agree, the whole process of being passed from pillar to post is an absolute joke. It would be much easier to have one point of contact than 2 who tell you the same thing anyway!.
Following advice on here, i put a complaint in to courts service. It was answered straight away (acknowledgement type of thing). The next thing is an email coming from them asking something about my income that i put on my original applicaton 3 YEARS ago. Then another question about why i had asked for anonymity on the same form 3 YEARS ago. Needless to say , i feel like im back at square one. But im gonna keep on at them.

@mommatoone when they asked about your income and the anonymity thing, what did you say to them? Did you just say "please refer back to my original paperwork" or something to that effect? I'm quite early on in the process, having only sent the paperwork about 6 weeks ago, and all the experiences I'm reading on here are making me feel really anxious and worried about the whole thing!

Crikey, sounds awful. So just to be vlesr there is no contact with Remo directly, you can only ho through MEBC? Can someone take me through the step by step process. Like does all the information you send on your forms ho directly to the foreign court who make a calculation on what the father should pay? Are they solely just going by the information on your forms, what happens if your situation changes, if you remarry for instance?

Or your job situation changes and you earn a lot more money. Are they making the calculation on just the father income and how many children there are that he needs to pay child support for. We have no agreement in place gor our child and the child lives solely with me. Will the court back date from the date he has not paid?