Cms direct/collect and pay

[marbless]

My husband and his ex have gone through CMS for their son to sort out maintenance. He has paid religiously their agreed amount for 8 years but she has requested collect and pay so he has to pay more (she's admitted this, very petty). He's obviously going to come back with a request to pay direct as he cannot afford an additional 20%.

Will this be rejected/ Does she get the final say? He can provide years of bank statements to prove his payments over the years. He would never dream of not paying. The claim has come from breakdown in co parenting. I think she will end up with an additional £9 a month or something as he's always used the calculator to check. which is obviously no big deal, but an extra 20% would make it unaffordable.

Thanks!

She can't request Collect and Pay without evidence of missed payments, even then it's pretty impossible to get! So I'm not sure why you think it will automatically go to this. The default is Direct Pay.

No she can't, if he's been voluntarily paying and can prove this (they may well ask for evidence) then no they won't use Collect and Pay.

Oh okay good to hear. The paperwork that's come through says '[ex's name] has opted for you to pay through our collect and pay service' or something along those lines, so he wasn't sure what grounds he had to contest it. Like I said he has reams of bank statements so should be ok if this is the case. Thank you!

This is from the .gov site:
"Both parents are given a choice. If either parent chooses Direct Pay, the payment method will be Direct Pay. If the paying parent misses or is late with payments, the Child Maintenance Service can change the payment method to Collect and Pay."
So you just request Direct Pay and as long as payments are made on time you should be fine.

Been trying for years to get in to Collect and Pay as there has been many missed payments, at different times. All logged, arrears logged, but they have never changed to Collect and Pay on my request. Good news for you but shit news for parents that get dicked around.

We have the opposite experience to PP. My husband’s ex wife refuses to hand over any bank details to my husband, which is how he ended up on long term C&P. The CMS cannot force a person to hand over her account number and sort code, so that’s that.

Hey op, I used to work in a bank and quite a few occasions had dads coming to ask for their bank statements to prove they'd been paying. People requesting this isn't always because the man or woman hasn't been paying. Some people genuinely do lie. Make sure its always labelled child maintenance and not 'for kids' etc. That being said cms isn't fit for purpose

I got collect and pay straight away but that’s because my ex refused to acknowledge cms and ignored every single letter, if he is cooperative and willing to pay then it should be direct pay.

I’m not sure how she would get an extra £9 a month if he’s already paying the amount set out by CMS. It’s my understanding that if you go on to collect and pay then they take an extra 20% off the paying parent and then they take 4% off the receiving parent to cover the costs of using that service so she would actually end up getting less money. I could be wrong as I’ve only recently started using CMS but this is how it was explained to me.

Thanks everyone, all sorted and on direct pay. He's never ever not paid so was happy to go through CMS anyway. The only reason she gets an extra £9 is because husband did a bit of overtime last year which brought up his pay a tiny bit. So nothings really changed, obviously if he didn't pay he'd be out on collect and pay but that would never happen so all good. Thank you 😊

Agree with this. Paying parents getting away with not paying and CMS do nothing even though apparently they have the powers to force Collect and Pay. They rely on the NRP being a responsible parent, like the OP's husband, and paying what's due. Cases of paying parent owing arrears but saying they can't afford it, then CMS won't enforce it. It's a complete disgrace and not fit for purpose.

I really do feel for everyone in that situation. It seems the system is very flawed! I don't understand why you wouldn't just pay but understand not everyone has the same morals. I guess I could say the same for my DH's ex trying to spite him to pay an extra 20% on collect and pay for no reason. So odd how people can't just be civil and get on with it!