If the ex, who is not the resident parent, insists in keeping the CB, what can you do?

[Orangerie]

Ok, the problem is as follows, there is a shared residence/contact order in place. Child spends 60% of the time with mother.

Mother doesn't receive maintenance yet. Father, who was in receipt of CB during the marriage, refuses to give officially or directly, any money he receives as a child benefit.

Mother is the one with the smallest income, dad earns more and has kept the family home.

BTW, taking him to court is NOT an option, as that will easily cost more than a year of CB payments, she simply can't afford it.

What else should/could she do?

What if the guy refuses to give her the CB reference number and his own national insurance number?

Has mum tried telling Child Benefit the rest of the usual details (such as names, addresses. etc) to see if they can just trace him anyway?

They will be able to find him from name, DOB & address.

Stewie is correct, they will suspend payment until the matter is sorted out. The court order showing the time split will be v. important to their investigations as to who will have CB.

It took about 6-8 weeks for mine to be sorted out.

Prepare for fireworks tho. The ex will go ballistic.

We had to do that when Dsd came to live with us, we had no details but Dh rang CB they suspended payments to mum and after a couple of weeks the payments and back payments came to us.

Thank you, that has been very useful. Was not expecting that it was going to take that long, but surely court will take even longer...

This is not a matter for the courts. This is a matter for the CB people.

In this case, they will be both judge & jury.

Also children's tax credits are awarded to the person who receives CB it is very important you get it sorted.

When you say 60% of the time, do you mean overnights because that is what they look at.

can I ask (sorry to disrupt thread here) how long it takes for CB to come through? we applied for it a month ago, two months after DSS left his mother's house and came to live with his dad and me. We've heard nothing yet... is that "normal"?

given past behaviour, we dont expect the mother to be cooperative in any investigation - how do they investigate to find out where he actually is living?

Well when I went through mine, it took 6-8 weeks (Can't remember now) but that was without the ex disputing it.

If she does then it can take longer. As with most govt departments, the answer is often "How long is a piece of string".

What I did was call them up regularly, ask them where they were up to, what the next step is and how long that would take. Then call them after the next step to confirm its been done. Rinse & repeat.

Hope that helps

thank you! yes, will try that approach!

I just got my child benefit back today, after a 9 month struggle. All backdated to the time I (re)claimed, though, so worth it in the end.