Am i being unreasonable to let the CSA take XP to court?

[MyLittleElfAndMe]

XP has not paid any maintenance in the last 12 months, whenever i ask him can he give us some money he comes up with some excuse, he is self employed and waiting for his business to pick up etc etc...

I contacted the CSA about 6 months back to ask them why i had not recieved any payments? origionally they told me i was entitled to £5 a week, i never saw a penny of this so contacted then to ask why? they said they would investigate.

Today xp rang to say the CSA(finally they have got off their bums) have told him he has to pay £550 by the 9th feb, if not they would start court proceedings.

XP has asked me to tell the CSA that we have sorted out an arrangement between ourselves so he can avoid court and have more time to pay (i am not even sure whether they would accept this anyway) but i told him no, we have no arrangement, i am not going to lie to them, it has taken me 12 moths to actually get the CSA to do something about it and my pleas to XP to cough up some money have always fallen on deaf ears

I said if they take him to court he only has himself to blame, was i right to do this?

I do feel quite bad about it but what else could i do?

YANBU. £5 a week is not exactly much. He should take responsibility.

yanbu at all, don't lie for him as you will be letting him off the hook and he still won't pay.

I am guessing they have back dated what he owes to when i first made a claim (about 2 yrs ago) so it does work out at about £5 a week (£550 / 104 weeks)

So i dont feel so bad now, if he had been paying this too start with he could have avoided it mounting up

Oh and he mentioned that they might take his driving licence away if he doesnt pay

I think £5 per week is a joke, I dont know your financial situation but I'm pretty sure that you spend more than £5 per week on your dc.

YANBU he made this child the same as you did so he should pay towards keeping your dc. He should have come to an agreement before now. How does he expect your dc to eat? oh yea dont worry your the mum you deal with it.

Do not feel bad he should want to pay to look after your dc. Does he have much contact? Does he ever buy anything for dc? and how old is your dc?

He sees ds once a week overnight, ds is 2.6

£5 a week is not a lot, and considering i pay £100 a week in nursery fees, so i can go to work so ds can eat, it is pittance

He has his priorities all worng, he keeps telling me when business picks up he will give us some money, thats been his excuse for the last 2 yrs, so in the meantime, yes he expects that i will feed, clothe and provide a home for our child alone

He doesnt seem to grasp that he should provide for a dc he helped to produce

that is crazy that he see ds and does not pay anything for him. And you go to work to pay for his child and pay nursery fees.

I cannot understand why csa said he should pay £5 per week, I would ask them to look at that again.

TBH people pay more than that a week to pay for their dogs or other pets.

So basically csa are thinking hey mum will pay for this child as well as ex thinking this.

have you had any legal advice on this?

my exp is not paying maintence at the moment but he is also not seeing dd due to violence so ifhe takes me to court re access I will then bring up the maintence issue. So I do not know anyting about how these things work, but I do know that seems unfair.

I have seen a thread on here before that helps you caculate how much maintence you should recieve, maybe you should google it?

Sorry to keep going on about the amount but that seems so little to me......

and you are defintly not being unreasonable, I think you have been understanding for much longer than most would. And don't let him convince you otherwise.

YANBU - if you lie for him then you are as you are telling ever single parent out there that it is ok to put an adult before the welfare of your own dc.

Of course he is going to try to lay a guilt trip on you. Has he contacted the CSA to try to sort out some sort of payment plan? has he contacted the CSA to try to sort out the mess he has now put himself in? I dont think he has or has any intention o trying to put right the mess he has made or stand by him ds and pay a very small contribution toward his upkeep.

Yet you pay tax which goes towards paying for dc that have nrp that don't pay maintenence.

I think he is lucky that the CSA dont name photograph and shame him for not paying for two years.

newsinglemummy i think the reason the CSA worked out he should pay £5 a week was because when i made the origional claim he was claiming income support and £5 is the standard amount they make all absent parents pay if they are claiming IS, and the reason this amount hasnt gone up yet is because he is self employed and hasnt provided them with the neccessary details of his earnings for the past year

He told me yesterday that he has now given them all the details so they may review it and decide he owes even more

No matter what he has earned over the last 2 years he should still have been paying £5 a week to his son and he hasnt, he tells me he cannot afford that, yet he can afford to buy cigarettes, petrol, top up for his mobile, a pint with his mates at the weekend... etc etc, all of these things come first before his son

Oh and he has been living with his mother rent free, he hasnt been paying her anything towards his keep, and she has been paying for all the things ds needs (nappies, wipes, food...) when he stays one night every weekend

Oh and the reason i am so understanding is because i actually care very little (if at all) for this man and getting angry at him is a huge waste of my precious energy, i gave up with the CSA about 6 months ago because they are useless feckers, but if they have got off their backsides now then that is great! £550 would be a godsend to us right now...

As for xp, i have more concern for my neighbours dog

Good for you. Don't feel bad about it.

Hopefully he has told them what he is earing now but if I was you I would also tell them he has his own business and has had for the last year. Just to make sure he is paying what he should.

I was going to ask if he drinks. But for him to smoke which is £5 per packet, that would be the money he pays for his son if he would just smoke one less packet a week.

Is he really young? He sounds it living with his mum, not paying her any money and making her pay for his ds when at her house. He sounds like a joke. His mum is probably the one who looks after your ds when he is there.

Well done to you for not getting too upset about it all as if it was me I would be fuming and stressing myself out over it. You sound very muture compared to him, I can see why you broke up.

I have told the CSA about his business (he designs websites) even told them he was DJing in a club last year (am i sure it was cash in hand) and gave them the name of the club

He is a very immature 34 yr old

I didnt realsie how immature he was until we had a dc together

I am a slightly older than he is, it is a joke isnt it! if it wasnt such a sad and pathetic state of affairs it would be laughable

DOn't lie for him. It's about time he got a good twatting from the CSA. He's been lying to you for 2 years and it's payback time.

omg cannot believe he is 34, I am in my early 20's and feel that even if he was my age he would still be immature.

Good that you told them, dont let him away with anything.

It is always the way that you finally see how crap some one is after dc's are born.

He is like one of those comdey, stereo type, waste of a space, absent fathers

He should apply for a part in Shameless