How do parents manage financially during maternity leave on statutory pay

[Namesnamesnames13]

I’m in a good job, well paid ish, better than average, and I’m on maternity leave and now in statutory pay. I have savings, but if I didn’t have that (not that I wanted to spend that) how does everyone survive! I got £985 this month and my mortgage split in 2 is £1650 plus bills, car, a toddler, nursery fees, and now a baby too. How do you all cope?!

Shared finances. Saved. Bank account switching offers got me an extra £1k. Mortgage holiday due to overpayments. Good maternity pay from job.

The answer for most people is savings but where is your partner / the child’s dad in all this? It shouldn’t just be on you.

We used to get 6 weeks on 90% pay, then another 12 weeks on around £50 pw if my memory is correct. Mat leave was 6 months. I saved & went back to work when DD was 4 1/2 months old, not for financial reasons, but it was great to be financially independent again.

Just checked. It rose from £62.20 to £75 for 12 weeks whilst I was on ML.

Family savings and husband’s salary. Don’t get me wrong, it’s hard to feel dependent on your husband, especially if you’re used to financial independence, BUT if you’re legally married you have to stop seeing it as your money and his money. It’s the family’s money, and the law agrees.

Yeah, this should be the trigger for a reassessment of finances. 50/50 or anything outside one shared pot gets more complicated post kids. Doable but needs proper discussion, I don't think you can just drift into a fair split.

Why is it split in 2? The one who earns more pays more or all. All money earned by both parents is the family's now.

Does your DP think he can get free childcare?? 🤣

Either your husbands pays it all or you go back when full pay entitlement ends or your savings run out? I took 12+ months with all of mine as it was a prerequisite to us having children that my husband would pay the bills when I was off.

The problem with this in real life though is that “the law” is only interested at the point of divorce. There is no law that says a man, or woman, has to give all of their income to their spouse or take over XYZ.

You can get your mortgage switched to interest only for 6 months under the mortgage charter without any questions asked, so we did that for our second child because we didn’t have enough savings to cover it all. Then in the last month or so we have put a lot on credit cards which we’ll pay off now we’re back at work. It’s not ideal but we wanted the time as you can’t get it back!

Savings or credit card! We were idiots when we had DS and carried on living like we were before, all on a 0% credit card. He’ll be 5 in January and it should just about be paid off by then. Would not recommend it, don’t get me wrong we had no other option however I wish we hadn’t splashed the cash the way we did.

Save up in advance

Couldn't afford it so went back when mine were 7 months old.

Shared finances. I had 8 years out of working

I guess everyone has different methods, but the families who manage, are the families where both parents understand they’re equal contributors to a team. One tends to contribute more finances, and one more childcare - but an equal team. If your husband hasn’t understood/offered/thought it blindingly obvious that he needs to up his financial contribution whilst you’re on mat leave; then you’ve got fairly big problems.

We don’t have children yet but I earn significantly more than DH so I have a maternity leave savings pot ready.

Are you continuing to contribute 50% because your DH’s monthly wages couldn’t cover the bills? If not, re-evaluate finances.

I have been really lucky that DH earns enough to cover my loss in wages. I did go back for spells between pregnancies (my children are 6, 4 and 9m) but only ever PT and I’ve always taken longer than a year. We have used minimal childcare until school age. I have now decided I’m not going back after my 3rd for an undetermined amount of time so I can just focus on the kids (this is what I want). I feel very lucky that financially we are able to make this happen. If it hadn’t been possible we’d have saved and made sure we had what I would lose in earnings in savings for each maternity leave (and maybe we’d have stopped at 2?).

Savings. We also adopted and I was lucky enough to get good occupational pay but while we were adopting DC1, DH was finishing a Masters. So we were glad we had the savings.

Joint finances, husband took up the slack, cut spending.

No that’s a conversation for the couple… but at the end of the day if they can’t agree on finances then it’s a divorce and it then is a legal matter. Money is a leading cause of divorce after all.

I got full pay for five months and my holiday paid out - split across the year it was equivalent to me being part-time for the full year. My DH had a full time wage and with both salaries we could cover everything without dipping into savings. I planned this all out before getting pregnant!

Honestly? DH has always been more ambitious than me so my drop in earnings didn't feel that big. We saved a bit and DH got promoted before maternity pay ran out. All money is family money that is paid straight into a joint account, so it was never a case of me needing to find money to pay my share of bills/asking for money for personal expenses.

I think it's incredibly tricky for families where both parents bring in a similar amount though (unless they have a lot of family help). And for people who keep separate finances.

Savings & my husband did a shit load of overtime. We lost almost £3000 a month when I went to statutory so it was real rough

I will add, that before kids we paid proportionally to our incomes towards bills etc but as soon as we had kids all money became family money. We’ve not seen it as his and mine for years now. I can’t imagine being unable to take my child for a cake (because I would be totally skint if we didn’t think this way) but my DH swimming in money for various recreation and hobbies. If I want somethibg for myself, I make a judgement on whether we can afford it but I don’t have to ask permission. Obviously if ie as about to spend hundreds on something I would discuss it however, but I’d expect him to do the same also!

never had joint finances with dh but when on mat leave he paid all the bills except food and baby day to day costs. I had an ok mat pay package (local gov) and used a few k of my savings to top it up.