What age does maintenance stop legally?

[hulahoopsilove]

If no agreement was set out in the separation/divorce documents what is the legal requirement DH has to pay for DD who is 18 in April and is about to take A'levels next May/June.

What happens if she goes to Uni is this classes as further education and not a requirement?

If nothing specified then it would be 18 - could possibly try to argue to get it as long as child benefit received but there's no obligation to pay once DD at uni.

I was going to link to the thread in stepparents, but it's yours

when would child benefit and tax credits stop Rock?

yes it is!!! I cant get a straight answer and Admin suggest I tried this thread/area

First week of September unless there's a court order which states otherwise

thanks

18 if they were in full time education, but there have been cases where the child has gone to the family court for maintenance for when they are in university. The child is the one who has to sue for maintenance though, the mother is out of the picture as they are an adult. A high earning wealthy father is the only one likely to have to pay for his adult child in this way. See a family solicitor.

It doesn't have to be the child Jolly - the resident parent can make a court application for maintenance to continue beyond eighteen as described below, but the application must be made before the child turns eighteen.
www.fishermeredith.co.uk/legal-advice/3674

Yes but after 18 it has to be the child (which is what I said). Always worth looking into.

Jolly is right. It's a weird quirk of Englihs law. If parents stay together and choose not to pay a penny towards university they are allowed to. If the parents are apart the child can apply! I have never understood that.

Scottish law is different again as I think parents have a duty to support children to age 25 or something.

Our divorce court order says I pay all university costs whoever the children live with. Lucky me.

Daughter's went to '18 or the end of full time education' in the agreement because we expected her to need support through university. From 18 it was paid to her, and that was fine, as her birthday is in June so she was through with school and getting ready to start uni at that time. Might have been a bit uncomfortable if she'd had a September birthday, as I used maintenance to pay school fees and not having it would have left me in difficulty.