Child Support Agency - Tribunal

[scoobydoolady]

I thought I'd put my experiences with my ex & the CSA on a thread (which may help others) whilst asking if anyone had to go to a tribunal to get their maintence resolved.

Over 3 years ago my ex got a good promotion at work and therefore a good pay rise. Up until this point we had a maintenance agreement set by the courts when we got divorced. A solicitor told me to apply through the CSA and OMG did life get stressful!

Within 2 months of the CSA assessing what his maintenance payment for my 2 DD's should be, he increased his pension contribution to nearly 40% of his earnings. This meant he had less income and therefore had to pay less maintenance - tight git.

To be fair the CSA have been OK. I have continually kept on top of them and have a 2 inch thick file but they are hindered by bad organisation and crap legislation which does not help in difficult cases.

After nearly 2 years of appeals etc I was told that I now have to attend an tribunal and I'm absolutley dreading it.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated in this ongoing saga - and if anyone needs help on dealing with the CSA direct please ask me cos I've become unwillingly knowledgeable.

Ta

Get off her lazy backside. Well aren't you a peach. Bringing up your husband's child wasn't done by the childcare fairy.

Oh wow. Are you for real.

No she doesn't have to declare anything about her finances. Obviously. She is not the one being assessed.

You have married a man who is happy not to support his child. You're ok with that?

Why would it matter whether or not he was ever in a relationship with this person? The child is the point.

Somehow I doubt she was living it up in £230 a month.

Hi need some advice if possible. I am going through a tribunal with ex. Long story so I'll try and be straight to the point ish. My ex has paid not paid etc usual really. In 2013 I asked Csa to review ( not been done for years) at this point ex was paying £6 a week for his daughter. Payment went up slightly but he was claiming he earned less than me. As I knew he had his own business I applied for variation for income not taken into account. He then submitted evidence to prove he was being paid dividends. An assessment was made on this but then he claimed that he was no longer getting this. Him and his wife are directors of the company. In the meantime he changed the share allocation to a b shares and started up a new company. He claimed his company was in trouble and he had had to take a loan out which his wife was paying. Anyway got to tribunal stage as I feel he is diverting income. He sent on a long letter claiming I had info on him which I shouldn't have ( all available on companies house). He did turn up at court for first gearing so judge made a directions order for all his bank statements including joint accounts and his business accounts. He has just replied saying he hasn't got any bank statements and the bank can't get them as 2013 is too long ago!. He has also stated his wife's bank account is irrelevant in this case and had only submitted a brief accounts for his business. There is no reference to dividends on these although he would have been earning them at the time. We are now awaiting further directions from the judge. Just wondering if anyone been in a similar position and has any advice. I'm actually not wanting to fleese him just want a fair contribution he seems to be ring awkward at every turn. :(

As a Dad, I fully expect my comments on this to be shouted down, but I think the tribunal achieved a good result for both me and my ex wife and our daughter. Admittedly this was 20-odd years ago, but the scars of our dispute with the CSA have not completely healed.
Essentially, my wife (who is now a semi-retired solicitor, by the way, but was newly-qualified when out CSA saga began) and I had an amicable separation and divorce, and had worked out a sensible private arrangement all properly rubber-stamped by the courts under which I paid a relatively small amount of maintenance, but I paid the entire mortgage and various other regular bills on the house that we used to share. It suited us both, it kept the bank happy, and she actually received more than the CSA assessment would have been.
But then she was (briefly) unemployed between jobs, and we fell into the clutches of the CSA. They refused to take account of the mortgage or the bills that I was paying, and came up with what we both knew was an outrageous figure for maintenance. If I had paid it, I would not have had enough left to support myself (even at DHSS subsistence level!) unless I defaulted on the mortgage on her home.
By that time, she had got herself a well-paid job, but the bank refused to transfer the mortgage to her because she was newly qualified and didn't have enough track record of earnings.
The CSA hounded me to the point at which I was suffering severe depression and contemplating suicide because I simply couldn't afford to go on living, but they would not relent. This went on for years, during which time my ex wrote to them several times telling them that they were NOT acting on her behalf, and would they please leave us alone.
Eventually, our case went to a tribunal, at which it was revealed that the CSA didn't even know her address -- never mind how much she was earning (which by that time was quite a bit more than me!)
She wrote to the tribunal, telling the judge that she could not spare the time to attend, and that in any case the CSA was not acting on behalf of either her or our daughter.
The tribunal dismissed the CSA's case, ordered it to repay some of the money it had collected from me, and not to contact me again.
A few years later, the CSA defied the Tribunal, and started hounding me again -- without telling my ex wife. She was furious, and put me in touch with another solicitor who contacted the CSA on our behalf and successfully scared them off.
I'm sorry, ladies, but in my opinion the CSA is an evil organisation, that was never intended to help women or children. It was never anything but a cynical attempt by the Thatcher government to grab money from soft targets. It seems, from your stories, that very little has changed: it still doesn't bother going after the runaway dads, or those who are out to fiddle the system, but continues to harrass those who do love and care for their kids, who do stay in regular contact, and who do pay their wack towards the care of the children that both parents (together!) created.

Why didn't you just transfer the mortgage money to her account and call it maintainence??

If only we could! But the bank would not transfer the mortgage to her name. She was (at the time) a newly-qualified solicitor who had no track record of earnings. The only legitimate way we could keep the mortgage going was by direct debit (or standing order -- I can't remember which) from my account.

As soon as she was able to get a mortgage in her own right, we sold the house. She used the entire equity to buy a place of her own, and I free of the mortgage was able to buy a place of my own instead of renting a flat.

What we were doing was the only practical way (that we could see) to get all the bills paid. And we were both happy with it. It was fine (for all of us) until the CSA pokied its interefering nose in, and tried to siphon off most of the money into the government's coffers.

I am still 100% convinced that what we did was in the best interests of all three of us. I am still in regular contact with my little girl (now 30 years old, and married) and exchange Xmas cards and occasional phone calls with my ex-wife. I recently asked her if she could re-write my will: the only reason she declined was because of professional ethics (her daughter would be a beneficiary of it).

The findings of the Tribunal proved that what we were doing was legal and that what the CSA was doing was not.

OP you could contact the new CMS and ask if they will calculate on gross.

Yup. SLOW CLAP. You have helped yet another father join the massive numbers who don't bother paying a penny to support their own children. Your post is one of the most shameful and depressing posts I have ever read Brightgirl123.

ZOMBIE THREAD

Brightgirl123 was criticised by others when she posted over 3 years ago. She doesn't appear to have been on Mumsnet since so I doubt she will read the latest post.