Child benefit

[Immy1]

Wasn’t sure what thread to ask this on, but figure other parents may have an answer.

so my ex wants to claim child benefit for our son. He said there’s a new change that the child doesn’t have to live with you for you to be able to claim it.

he has our son overnight once a week, doesn’t pay or provide for anything extra other than the CMS at £80pm.

i receive UC so have our son on my claim, so obviously I get the extra child allowance and bedroom/housing allowance.

ex wants to claim child benefit so he can get the extra bedroom allowance, says he will give me the extra he gets in child benefit, he just wants to be able to claim housing allowance for the extra bedroom.

this all sounds wrong and fraudulent to me, and I’m not in agreement to it at all.
but wondering if there’s any truth to what he’s saying?

getting nervous he’s going to put a claim in and it’s going to screw me over, I’ve only just got squared up financially after the separation a year ago.

TIA

Why doesn't he get a job and pay his own rent/ house costs?

This is completely untrue. There's not been a requirement to claim child benefit for UC for a while. I claim CB but my ex claims UC for both our children.

Your ex could put in a competing claim for CB bit if he did yours wouldn't just stop. They'd contact you and look at various deciding factor before making the award to one of you. This would be who is the primary career, who is registered as primary career at school, which doctor and dentist are child registered at (yours or exes) etc.

CB has nothing to do with UC either unless you both put in a competing claim, then it would be used as a deciding factor.

Whoever claims CB is regarded as the primary parent meaning that they can claim maintenance from the other parent even if they are not the main carer. My ex claims UC for both our children but I am primary carer ( this is actually allowed believe it or not!) I'm not eligible for CB but i keep the claim in my name and opt out of payments to avoid him trying to claim maintenance from me when I have the children the majority of time.

In your case I definitely wouldn't let him claim and if he puts in a competing claim you need to contest it.