Child maintenance

[Jobhunterteacher]

i just want to gage opinions on this. I earn a good wage at ups3 and pay £375 a month in child care. I have always paid and when he was in nursery I paid half the cost of the fees on top of the child maintainance payments. He is now 11. When he went on a week away with us school last year I paid half the £1000 cost as well. However, I am starting to feel annoyed as his mum has just asked me to pay half of his two term drumming fees of £300, so £150. I don't mind paying for my boy but I already pay £375 a month and the pay more to keep him entertained during my time with him. I have to buy him clothes for my house, food he likes and he has a bedroom for home sled and another set of toys at mine! My resentment comes from
the fact that she would have to spend 750 a month of my contribution and her matched money plus the £100 child allowance feom
the government and then another 100 or so to at i spend on him alone on top of that so around £950 to be paying more than me. It just feels that I'm constantly paying. Am I looking at this wrong?? As a teacher I have him every other weekend Friday to Sunday eveing and at least half of all the school holidays. Sorry for the length of the post

She is doing the majority of the caring for your child if you're only having him every other weekend and half the school holidays.

You're paying the legal amount of child maintenance, and also say you don't mind 'paying for your boy'. £375 is paying towards his housing, food, heating, electric etc etc.

You can legally decline to pay for additional costs, although I don't think his mum is being unreasonable, if that's what you want to do. Or you could go for a 50/50 arrangement if you want everything to be so 'fair'.

It's up to you. She shouldn't have signed him up to drumming lessons without asking you first. If you agreed to drumming lessons then yes you pay half.

All your points about the clothes etc are irrelevant to the drumming fees. You need to take each extra expense separately. Eg. Optional school trips to France or whatever and both decide jointly if you can afford to pay for him or even want him to go.

Firstly most responses will be from women. Do not talk about what money the mother of your child receives because it NEVER GOES DOWN WELL. Also nothing to do with you OP

To be fair you work Mon to Fri because rhe mother of your child has facilitated this by picking up the slack and looking after your Son. Whilst having to find a job also! Who did all the school runs pick ups and drop offs Iver the years?

If you get along with her speak with her.

I should also add I picked him up from school every Tuesday and cooked dinner for him. It might be irrelevant but she also earns the same amount as I do or actually considerable more if you take into consideration the maintenance. I also provide him with clothes l, housing and food l. It's not as if o rent out hir room when he's not there!

OP - you won't get much sympathy on here, as has already been highlighted.

From the threads I have read, the general consensus from the Mum side is CM is for the basics, and you should share the extras like trips etc.

Like you, I have my kids OOW Fri - Mon, plus 1 night in the week plus holidays, in total nearly 50% of the time.

They are in secondary school so are quite independent and make their own way to / from school.

My exDW works P/T plus gets U/C plus a 4 figure sum from me each month, in total she nets over £3.5k into her account.

In addtion to that, I pay 100% of her mortgage, have bought her a car and paid a decent six fgures into her pension, so she has very little in the way of costs.

She has more disposable monthly income than I do, however she still wants me to pay half for school trips etc

I normally pay up as the kids put a guilt trip on me via what their Mum has said about me being mean, but it is bloody frustrating.

She's taking them on 2 holidays this year, I can't afford to take them on one.

It's not fair in my opinion, but my advice is to suck it up and that way nobody, including your son can ever hold it against you.

When he's 18, you won't be under this financial pressure anymore - I get it, it's hard, just don't let your exDW emotionally blackmail you via him - be the bigger person.

@CoparentingDad if you DID 50/50 nobody pays CMS! What grinds my gears is that the fathers ACTUALLY do not do this and share half the school holidays..... if only. It's a bloody good job UC steps up otherwise we and the children would be starving!

That's not true as she works part time and I am the higher earner, I would still be liable for CM even with 50/50

During the divorce, I offered 50/50 and to reduce my hours (and pay) and she refused saying the kids needed a stable home location (aka she wanted more £ from me each month), my lawyer advised me if she was not willing, I would need to go to court who generally side with the Mother's especially as I worked FT.

Anyway, like I have said above, I have sucked it up and count down the days until it ends.

I hope for her sake she is making an effort to improve her salary / employment prospects as she'll be circa £2k a month worse off from their 18th birthday, and I'm sorry it does't cost £2k a month to raise 2 kids, especially when you have no car loan / mortgage / pension to pay.

Nobody sensible can tell me 100% of the money I transfer is being spent on my kids

You feel annoyed because she asked a question? You could just say no.

You can go into the finances and think it's unfair all you like, she could go into the amount of time she has him vs the amount of time you have him and think it's unfair too.

I think this is a very different situation and that @CoparentingDad is going above and beyond what is required. I understand why you do it, but to me, your ex-W is being a CF.

For OP, he isn't having the children Friday-Monday, but Friday to Sunday afternoon, and not having them one night during the week too. He hasn't offered 50/50 and been declined by ex-W (unless you just haven't mentioned that OP). For example, you mention feeding your child tea one evening a week. For every fortnight, you provide four evening meals, and your ex provides ten. You're likely not paying school dinners/providing packed lunch as you're not having them any days that's required. That's just part example of what your £375 is going towards. It's not the same.

And what has that got to do with extra curricular drum lessons?

Why don't you raise your kid 50% of the time? Then you'd have nothing to whine about, and it would be fair. The child's primary parent facilitates you only parenting every other weekend, and you want her to pay your share of other expenses?

Feeling like you are 'constantly paying' is just being a parent I'm afraid - I feel like every day at the minute there is some request for money for something from school, for an activity or for a present to attend a party etc etc etc. Keeping up with your half of these ad hoc requests just makes you a decent parent - non-resident parents who stick to their idea of a 'fixed fee' for their children are in my opinion highly unreasonable and not living in the real world