Child maintenance.

[AMQ00004]

I’m looking for some guidance really, I have recently split with my partner and we share a 2 yo son. We both work full time, and in fact from Monday he will be working away for two years Monday-Friday. He will be having him for a maximum of four nights a month. The rest is up to em.
On discussing money he is only willing to contribute 300 a month. Due to us both working full time our DS nursery hill is 380 a month. So when that’s taken into consideration, that’s 27 a week after child care he is contributing to his child. To include food, g, clothes, everything. I’m finding the whole thing really stressful. Has anyone else had anything similar.
Am I being unreasonable? I just feel like all of my wages go towards ensuring my son has a roof over his head and everything he needs and he will contribute £300 out of the £2500 he earns a month.

Maybe it’s me but I find that difficult to get my head around.

Any help understanding this.

Thanks
Amy

There are calculators online. Put in his salary and how many nights he will have him. You can claim through cms if he is PAYE. If he's self employed it's much harder.

Have you done a CMS calculation? Maybe you'll be entitled to more. However if he's self employed you're at his mercy. I get £120pm for 2 dc and not a single extra for 2 dc but via cms he'd only have to pay £28 so he thinks he's extra generous.

Try the child maintenance calculator, but having a child 4 times a month (so 52-101 nights a year) at a salary of £2500 a month, he'd have to pay about £260 a month, so £300 is (frustratingly) more than generous.

I think I’m just finding it so frustrating. Because we are no longer together, because he works away and is unwilling to change his career path and because he is refusing to contribute any more despite the large childcare cost, I have to sacrifice my career, that I enjoy and I’m successful in.

Why is his career more important than mine? He gets to work full time with no childcare worries and only having to pay 300 a month towards everything for our son. I don’t think it’s right and fair.

I would never do this, but part of me would love to say, you take all the responsibility for everything, have our son for a month and I’ll give u £300. See how he gets on then.

Yes it's more than frustrating. The system is fundamentally flawed to the detriment of the resident parent (nearly always the woman). Once they are at school it gets even harder as they need run around to various clubs etc so someone has to be free to do that. I can already only work within the very limited childcare hours but to be able to facilitate their hobbies I've had to take a low paid job that allows me to finish earlier rather than continue with my passion.

It's up to CMS what he needs to pay not what he wants to pay!

I get it, OP. I have three kids under 6 (split with ExH when I was pregnant with the youngest). My childcare bill is £1100 a month.

His entire maintenance payment is £625 a month, to cover all three kids. If I count £550 as his contribution to 50% of the childcare it means he pays £75 a month to cover three kids. £6 per kid per week. It's insane.

But it is what it is. I'm happier without him than I ever was with him. And I have a wonderful job and soon my childcare bill won't be so much.

Thank you so much for all you’re replies.

I will try and focus on the fact that I’ll get through it money wise one way or the other. And it’s much better that we aren’t together xx

For comparison I get £247 in maintence for 2 DCs, one of whom is in nursery and whose childcare costs come to about £1000 a month! I don't think it's worked out om your chidcare costs? I think it's an algorithm using the salary of the non-res parent, the amount they see their child/ren and they take a proportion of the salary. As PPs have said, if self-employed it is easier for non-res parent to muddy the waters. Also can pay more into pensions etc to end up paying less.

CMS money is a joke and does not cover the cost of raising a child. Whoever devised it was utterly clueless.

Have you looked into any benefits and free hours you may be able to claim op? Also what is exs salary? £300 may be appalling or generous depending on his income

As pp check the cms calculator. Money is wages before tax and ni. But after pension deductions.

Sadly the resident parent has to cover the costs with the nrp contribution. On the plus side your child care bill will go down over the next few years.

You will make it work. Many like I have haven't seen a penny in years.

Hi OP
Are you a single parent living alone w/ your child? If so, are you not getting subsidised towards childcare? I get 85% of my son's childcare fees covered by UC. I send him for 3 of my working days, which should be £700 a month 🙃 so the help is a godsend. You will be entitled to this being a working single parent. It's worth looking in to :)
If it's any consolation - my exP is self employed so hoodwinked the system massively, he only has to pay £23 a week towards our son, even though I know for a fact he earns a heck of a lot more than that. Unfortunately there's nothing I can do to prove it to CMS 🤷🏼‍♀️

As HPmummy19 says you could be entitled to help with child care costs. I think I used "entitled to" calculator when I split with my ex and from there I made a UC claim for child care costs. I remember how I worried and stressed over my finances when we split so that made a huge difference not only to my finances but to my wellbeing as well. Good luck OP x

he doesn't get to decide - its a % calculation that can be done online. Equally though, your ACTUAL costs as the RP are not taken into account at all - its up to you make whatever decisions you see fit with regard to your work / childcare etc . It sucks (IMHO) and the % is pathetic in most cases but that's what it is. Please just go through the CMS.