Finances - unmarried couple with 6 month old baby

[Sunshinegirl18]

Hi there guys,

I'm interested in hearing how others split finances.

A bit of background, I've been with my partner for 2 and a half years and we now have a 6 month year old lo. My partner earns a very good wage, double what I used to earn before maternity. I was on maternity allowance due to my work contracts meaning £140 per week for 39 weeks. However, as my partner wanted longer off with us when our baby was born he took 4 weeks of my leave (he was paid by his work his normal pay), meaning I lost £560 of my mat allowance.

He pays for council tax, electric, water, half the rent, food (90%),

I pay half the rent, internet, food (10%)

We pay half each for everything for our little one, except I get the child support of £80 a month so buy additional things we need for lo with this.

My partner is not from the country and therefore each year we have to travel to his country. This year I have paid for my flights (over £500) and he will pay for most other things. I will off course take some spending money for things I'd like to buy (e.g. presents for my family from us, any clothes for myself I'd like to bring back).

So my initial question is, how fait do you think this financial split is?

Next year i hope to go back to work 2 days. This will hopefully enable me to gain some extra money for things like my car insurance, petrol, car tax, clothes, MOT etc.

Likelihood is I won't be paid particularly well unfortunately and we will have to put lo in childcare. This will cost approx £90 which we will be splitting the cost between us.

I'll then be staying home the next 3 days to look after our lo, so earning nothing, while my partner is at work. This is a joint decision as my partner also doesn't want my lo in full time childcare either...

So my final question is, do you think this is fair?

Recently I've spoken to someone who thinks this situation is unfair.

I've been feeling quite financially stiffled, whereas I used to be completely independent and felt able to carefully budget but also have access to my own money.

Thanks in advance

Apologies for typos!!

The only thing that is fair, IMO, is for you each to have equal spending money.

A joint account, to which you both have access, pays for rent and bills and food and groceries and everything to do with the baby. You both have access, you both agree how much it needs, you both only buy things from that money that you have agreed should be bought from it, but you don't need to ask every time you go to the supermarket.

Joint savings if you can afford it - you both agree how much goes in. You don't take money out of this without explicitly agreeing.

The remainder is split between you. You have individual accounts with your spending money. The other person cannot criticise what you do with it. It's yours to do with as you please.

Pool it all and split equally for spending.

You've had a child together!

Anyone who is planning on having a baby and has not yet discussed post-baby finances with their partner, and has not got a good reason to believe their partner will treat them fairly, should look at your situation with fear, and treat it as a warning.

No, it's not fair - why are you taking the hit for providing childcare part-time instead of working, when it's both your child? I would not recommend anyone to drop their earnings capacity to do childcare without being married - you have no protection in case you split up.

Why do you pay half each for your child when he earns a lot more? That doesn't seem fair either. What do you think he would say if you brought it up?

No, it's not fair. When you blend lives and have children you become a family.

You should have equal access to money, equal say on what you spend it on and equal spending money.

It's that simple as far as I'm concerned. When DH and I had our son I went down to SMP - prior to that we'd earned near identical salaries. Once my mat leave started we moved from 50/50 to equal spends. All money is pooled, we pay all bills and put away all savings. What's left is split equally.

I'm back at work but I'm PT and earn just over half his salary and we still do the same. The only costs I bear alone are my beauty products (expensive habit), clothes, socialising etc. Everything else is joint.

Get back to work properly unless you are married. Otherwise you are screwing yourself.

No it's not fair. How are you paying out such a lot of money when not working? Where's the money coming from.

Yes the situation is extremely unfair.

Even before having a child, splitting things 50-50 is not fair when one partner earns significantly more than the other. The higher earner should pay a higher proportion IMO.

When you have a child together, everything changes because you are a family and need to pool resources whether that's finances or parental leave or unpaid time to look after the child and home. If you are on maternity leave or working part time or being a SAHP, you are making a major contribution by doing childcare, and the other partner should contribute more financially.

You have a few options:

• Get married; strongly recommended as this gives you financial and legal protection
• Set up joint finances i.e. a joint bank account that you both pay into and both have equal control over spending (even though he will pay in more)
• Keep finances separate but rent and bills (including everything for your child) are split proportionately based on your income, so if he earns twice as much, he pays twice as much
• You go back to work which means you retain your earning power and financial independence. If he doesn't like the thought of putting his child in childcare, perhaps he could go part-time.

Another option is to LTB of course. Which you may have to if he doesn't agree to split finances in a more reasonable fashion.

if he earns twice as much, he pays twice as much

This is still not fair. He'd also have twice as much spending money. Why should he?

Trills
It's true that it's not completely fair but it's certainly more fair than the current situation.
Before DH and I got married, when we were living together, that's how we managed our finances - we split rent and bills proportionately. So he did have more spending money I suppose but he saved it and it's shared money now anyway, because we got married.
This is one of the reasons I would never have children with someone without getting married first. But even people who don't care about getting married before having children (which I think is naive personally given the protection it gives you) have joint finances or other arrangements which are much fairer than this.