Looks like it's time to get the CSA involved...

[peppapigpants]

DP just had this from exH by email (in response to DP's ex telling my ex that we now live together, although he knew that already):

"My payments were and continue to be made based on information supplied by PPP which shows her income only. In addition, PPP has instructed my children to conceal information from me concerning your move. My children have told me this is the case. I see that as part of an activity to deceive me about your living arrangements. This has implications for my monthly payments to PPP. There is also the matter of how long this arrangement has been in place.

From information I have I believe you have effectively been cohabiting since last year, and there has been an effort to deceive me by asking my children not to tell me salient information. My future payments to PPP will take account of this period. There is also the question of the truthfulness of details shared in the run-up to the financial settlement as part of our divorce.

I would like to meet with you to discuss several points. I want to review your bank statements, credit card statements and storecard/petrol card statements for the past 2 years, as well as documentation for all accommodation. This sounds intrusive, but I think it is important for us all to be clear about what has been going on between you and PPP in financial terms. I believe from the facts stated above she has lied to me, and has engaged in concealment. If you don?t want to meet with me or share the requested information, I shall draw my own conclusions and make calculations for future payments, and review of existing settlements, in the light of the information I now have."

The only correct bit is that I asked the children not to mention the impending move until it was certain...I part exchanged my house with the developer (new build) and there was less than a week between them confirming that they were willing to proceed and completion on the new house. It is only since completion (2.5 weeks ago) that DP and I began living together, and he did not support me or the children financially at all until then. Since I earn a good wage, he didn't need to anyway.

The DDs don't say much about DP when they are at their dad's because he makes it clear that he is not interested and doesn't want to hear about it. He is in a new relationship himself, but is bitter and angry even though our split was four years ago.

Our divorce settlement was in April because I waited a year for him to exchange Form Es through our solicitors and he didn't so I filed at court for a financial hearing. They then awarded an additional sum over and above what he had already given me and the judge actually commended me for not being greedy! The only questions are 'do you cohabit' and 'do you intend to cohabit within the next six months' and my answers were correct at the time the Form E was sworn (Dec last year) and at both court hearings (Jan and April this year).

Since exH clearly doesn't get that his payments for child support do not depend on DPs income or our living arrangements, the CSA seems the only route to go.

I will ask my solicitor to write to him

Is what he pays in a court order? I believe if it is, then the CSA will not get involved until the court order is over 1 year old.

If it is, he cannot just adjust the payments without getting them recalculated and agreed in court. If he lowers the payments, he will owe arrears.

If it is just an agreement between the two of you, why not ask him what he is going to propose to pay first and then see if it is worth going to the CSA. He may be proposing more than the CSA would take.

All the rest is irrelevant. You know he cannot demand to see your partner's financial information so ignore it.

Oh and don't ask the kids to keep stuff from their Dad, the first thing a child will do when told not to tell someone something is tell them they aren't allowed to tell them something.

I agree.

Csa wont get involved until court order runs out, usually 1 year.
He cannot demand to see bank/credit card statements or anything else so tell him to get fucked on that score. What a knob!

He cannot just reduce payments so keep a record of everything.
Go to csa once court order finishes and let them sort it with him.

Good luck

There is no court order for child support, just a private agreement that has been in place since the children and I moved out of the marital home. There was only a court order in respect of the final settlement (in respect of equity in the marital home), which included a clean break.

I would never normally ask the children to keep things from their dad, but on this occasion it was necessary, although undesirable. They are teenagers, and understood that there was no point in mentioning it until it was certain (by which point they were away on holiday with him and I moved in without them being here) and I explained why he might be angry.

It is extremely likely that the CSA will increase payments. He has them 1/3 of the time and pays £460 a month on a base salary of over £85,000. He also gets quarterly bonus payments and his total income has exceeded £100k in the past.

Go to Csa.....let them deal with him

Why did you agree to less than the CSA amount? Perhaps just a reminder that he is already paying less than the CSA would make him and explain that your living situation makes no difference to how much he pays will make him see sense? If you want to receive the CSA amount though, then yes apply to them.

You obviously regret asking the kids to keep it from their dad, it's just not a nice position to put the kids in. What actual difference would it have made him being told anyway? You keeping it from him makes it look like you may have been doing so for sinister reasons. Hopefully once he realises you weren't doing that he'll lay off.

I want to review your bank statements, credit card statements and storecard/petrol card statements for the past 2 years, as well as documentation for all accommodation

He sounds lovely.

You can use this calculator to give you an idea of what he should pay.

The amount he pays now is based upon his income according to him and his base salary only, less school fees for DD1 (which stop next May) and adjusted for the 1/3, 2/3 split of their time. I believe the CSA would look at net income, including bonuses, although they will still take the school fees into account. He will be £13k a year better off in 9 months time and was unlikely to review payments then, so I had thought about involving the CSA anyway.

The amount he pays has increased by £20 a month since it was set up 3 years ago; I'm a public sector worker on a 3 year pay freeze and lost the £10/wk tax credit I was getting, as a result of the recent shake up. It's not about the money anyway, we can manage, but his responsibility to support his children is not cancelled out because there is another person living with us.