Child maintenance query

[Moneyquestions22]

I am pregnant with my ex who already has two kids 50 % of the time . He has a stable paye job and earns 40 k. He has told me already be begrudges / would begrudge giving me money as it will be spent on me he feels . He dotes on the kids he has and they do a lot of activities etc. I know he doesn’t manage his money well and will claim he can’t afford the recommend child maintenance . Can he dispute the amount / not pay?

If he is employed/salaried then no, as far as I am aware as it goes on information sent to HMRC. if he is self employed then yes he could fiddle his figures to pay very little.
Bare in mind Child Maintenance is not generous. It is basic in my opinion and it will take into account he has his other children 50 percent of the time so this too will knock your child's amount down.
If you can come to some sort of mutual agreement and leave them out of it I would try. The CMS are useless. I have a DOE order which inconsistently gets paid and apparently they can do nothing about it as something is being paid. They will take a fee for collecting the money too

He can dispute the amount, both parties have thst right once assessed (mandatory reconsideration) however he would need to provide evidence that his income is incorrect and more than 25% different or something else is wrong with the calculation. You have the same right if you do not agree.

The issue for you will be how the other children are treated, as that will affect the amount of maintenance paid. They can either be Children in. Family based arrangement (so treated the same as your child) or children in his household. To be children in his household child benefit would need to be in payment to him/his partner at his address. To be children in a family based arrangement, he would need to be paying maintenance to their mother. On a 50/50 he may not be doing this.