What is fair Child Maintenance - Single Mother's Opinion Please

[MissedTheBoatAgain]

I work outside EU so CMS can't make an assessment as I have no UK Taxable Income. I used the online calculator and it came to about 100 pounds per week for one child.

Have seen on some posts on MN that it can cost 230K to raise a child over their childhood years to 18. That's about 1,000/month. Is this correct? Seems a lot.

During the marriage Wife had credit card to pay for whatever she needed that I paid by direct debit so I would not know what was spent on child.

I can afford to pay 1,000/month, but curious to know if that is what it actually costs to raise a child?

Actually why does the CMS calculator matter at all in this situation?
If you're as wealthy as you say you are you give your child everything you can even if you go without yourself.
That's what you SHOULD WANT to do - what you actually do might be different altogether...

1Wanda1

Overseas earnings were entered into CMS calculator. It gave £100/week or £430/month. I suggested to ex to pay £1,000 as where I live has much lower taxes than UK and accommodation, food and transportation are provided by employer

If your wife doesn’t have huge living costs, no mortgage etc, I think that £500 a month to her would be fair, plus you could pay for some clubs or sport, mobile phone, etc, and also put a decent amount away each month in an account in your child’s name, for Uni, a car, a wedding, help to build their future.

I say that as someone who gets £27 a week though in CM, and £1000 would be almost as much as I earn so does seem a lot!

It depends really on the standard of living your child is used to. I don’t see how they could cost £1k a month though.

sprinkleandsauce

You have the numbers mixed up. CMS was £100/week, not £27/week. Convert £100/week to a calendar month is £430/month. I pay £1,000/month as my employment circumstances make it affordable and I can live reasonable too.

Both myself and my parents pay the maximum amount into Child's Trust Fund each year to cover for future costs such as; Uni, House Deposit

Sounds more than reasonable and £1000 a month more than my piece of s**t ex pays for his kids. He has a new excuse every week as to why he can't pay, but seems to always have money for drugs, alcohol and holidays every few months.

In answer to your original question....it really depends on the child. I have a ds with severe medical and mental health issues and he's costing $100,000 a year to raise (in part because I haven't been able to work because of caring for him). My dd costs way less, but still has needs. It also depends on where you live and what resources are available.

You pay what you can afford, for some single rps what they receive will be very little compared to others, there are also a lot of fathers who will do anything to pay very little towards their dc and that is very unfair on the dc. I receive a lot for my 3dc, it means i dont have to frantically budget every month wondering if i have enough money to replace a pair of school shoes or pay for a new coat. As dc get older everything gets more expensive, food, clothes etc, energy bills get larger, dc do not remember to turn lights off however many times you remind them! My dcs do not have the same lifestyle they had when their dad and i were married but they do not go without either, if you know that the money gets spent on ensuring that your child is fed, housed, warm, clothed and doesnt want for anything within reason and that they are happy then you pay the maximum that you can afford, why wouldnt you.

OP, it sounds as though you are quite wealthy. If I were in your position, I would do as follows:

Take my weekly gross earnings.

Work out what the weekly market rate cost of the accommodation being paid for by my employer is and add that notional 'cost' to my weekly earnings.

Add in the 'cost' of any daily transport costs paid for by my employer (not business travel such as flights for business trips which would be paid by employer anyway, just daily travel to work).

Add in the 'cost' of anything else I was getting for free, which otherwise I would have to pay for from my earnings.

Then I would take that new figure as my 'real' compensation from my work and use that number as the starting point for the CMS calculator. Alternatively I would pay an English family lawyer to tell me what is fair in these circumstances. There are plenty of cases with wealthy fathers working abroad. It is simply wrong to say that because the CMS can't do an assessment, you are left having to decide for yourself what is "fair".

£1k a month may be "fair"in a legal sense, it may not. In child maintenance terms it is "a lot' to most people, in the same way that earning the equivalent of £300k a year is "a lot". But if you are in fact earning several hundred thousand (or millions) every year, £1k a month child maintenance is never going to be "fair".

If you can afford it and love your child pay it

1Wanda1

In addition to £1,000 a month I pay for school hobbies, birthday, Christmas and annual holiday.

Ex wife works part time on minimum wage. What she earns plus benefits I estimate will be maximum £1,250 per month. So she has at most £2,250.

No mortgage or rent to pay, but Council Tax, Utilities, upkeep of house, food, clothes, school meals, school uniform and running a car will take a big chunk of £2,250 I would have thought even if there is only one child?

To Thisisntmeok,

Have you claimed all the possible benefits? Child benefit, child tax credits, working tax credits (if working), Council Tax reduction for being only adult in the home, childcare costs?

CMS is the Legal minimum NRP's must pay. Anything over that is considered voluntary.

My ex paid the mother of his child £1k per month 15 years ago. This was about 25% of his net earning. We were expats and had no rent etc to pay. He was happy with this and she was happy. No questions asked about what she spent it on. She was working part time on minimum wage in the UK.
For me this was fair.
I now have 2 children myself. It's hard to say what they cost per month as there are lots of shared costs and intangibles and it depends on your lifestyle.
For 2 kids we probably spend about £100 per month on sports activities and say £100 per month average on clothes, presents for other children etc. Xmas and birthdays cost about £500-800 per child per year.
There is the time and petrol to drive /walk them to clubs school etc. At 25p or 45p mile. And then there is feeding them (which probably doesn't cost that much).
If you had a mortgage a share of the mortgage.
Dd1 is now at private school so initial uniform was £500 and fees are over £1000 per month.
So all in all without the school fees personally if you are well paid I would say £1k was fair. With school fees it would need to be in excess of £1.5k (assuming a 50/50 split).
I have no idea how parents are meant to raise a child on £100 per month.

I read 1Wanda1's post. My suggestion is you estimate the real cost of the child per year including everything (council tax etc) e.g. 10k Then Add together what you and your ex earn e.g. 90k for you 10k for her = 100k.
Then divide the cost of the child by the total earnings of the parents 10/100 = 10%. Then this is the proportion that you should both pay for the child 10%. So she would pay 1k and you would pay 9k.
For me this would be fair and transparent and you can adjust it over time as the child costs more and or one or other of you earn more or less.
I hope this helps.

OP, when I got divorced I also had around £2.250 a month in total - from my earnings and child maintenance (plus child tax benefits at the time). I worked full time. I spent £600 a month on mortgage, £1,000 a month on childcare (one child at child minder), about £250 a month on utilities, phone, broadband etc. Things like house and car insurance were expensive as I had to build up no claims bonus, all insurance previously having been in ex-H's sole name. So that was about another £150 a month. So that's £2k gone just on essential costs, before I had even bought food and clothes for me and DC, or petrol to get to work. Leaving £250 a month for those things. If anything happened like the car or washing machine breaking down, I had to put it on credit card. I was constantly in debt and I had a "good" job. I could not afford to put anything towards a pension for myself or any savings for the future. Ex-H paid the minimum maintenance he could, on the basis of a CMS assessment that was always a year out of date. He had a nice lifestyle, I and the DC did not.

Things are different now as I worked my way up and by most people's standards earn a good salary now. But I have never forgotten what it was like to be unable to afford new school shoes or a school coat or whatever. It felt wrong, because it was wrong.

missedtheboat I clearly state that the CM that I receive for my child is £27 a week, I have not mixed any numbers up.

To sprinkles

Either your ex does not earn much or he has hidden what he does earn. Not self employed or working through a Limited Company by any chance?

he was previously self employed and based it on that. now employed and earning twice as much but refuses to increase it. He offered an extra £20 a month which still wasn't legal minimum (or if it was then the company he pays for aren't paying NMW which I find hard to believe!).

Only way I can change it is to go to the CMS which I started to do.

I think that you are proposing very fair payments for your own child and am glad that you are putting money away for their future, seeing as you are in a position to do so.

To Sprinkles

Have you informed CMS that your Ex is now employed? CMS have access to HMRC and should be able to see from his Self Assessment Tax Return what he earns. CMS can enforce a Deduction from Earnings whereby money can be taken direct from your ex's employer.

Good luck.

My divorce got nasty as ex made it a contest and a fortune (about £40K) was spent on Legal. As I was the only earner with assets at the time all costs came from what I had. When the Final Hearing took place there was much less in the pot than before for Judge to share out. Money I would rather have given to Ex.