Should the mother pay 50/50 towards bills when on maternity leave?

[Rachelone]

Hello,
I have discussed this with my partner and he would like me to continue to contribute half towards the mortgage and bills while on maternity leave. To do so I will need to use a redundancy pay out that I was given during the first stages of pregnancy. He earns a very high wage.

So what’s happening with the redundancy money? It sounds like you’ve been made redundant whilst on (or just before) going on mat leave so were you paid extra in your redundancy to account for that or are you on SMP? Are you technically still employed until you finish maternity?

The point of a redundancy payment is that it’s supposed to allow you time to find other work by being able to pay your bills etc for a short period - it’s not “savings” unless you’re lucky enough to get a job with no gap and IMO they should be treated as if they’re family income (with the proviso that he’s giving you equal access to anything he’s managed to stash away)

Oh god are you not married?

Serious sit down toight.

Oh dear.
This isn't sounding good.
Is he going to be a supportive, fully contributing, hands on parent?
Do you have any financial security WRT to your home?
Will he be paying 50% of the cost of child care when you go back to work?
Have you really talked this through before deciding to have a child together?

No no no ..... what a tight arse!

I thought it should be ratio based. I was lucky each time I went on mat leave the company I worked at introduced enhanced mat pay.

I ended up paying the same outgoings but we shared everything. even with separate accounts.

Be very careful.

If you take a loss in earnings after the baby is born and you go back to work, ie working four days a week to keep childcare costs down, the only way to protect yourself and the baby against your decreased earning capacity is by getting married. If you're unmarried, all you and the baby is entitled to is the CPS minimum.

Have a hard look at the relationship boards here, and think about what happens long term. Lots of women are shafted because they put their career on the back burner after having children, with no protection if the relationship breaks down unless they're married (and it's not stellar then either).

He sounds like a selfish bastard - make sure your child won't be poor because of it.

Oh dear - it sounds like he has no respect at all for pregnancy, birth and childcare.

Once you have a child together your finances need to work together somehow to ensure everyone is fed, housed and cared for. If someone is doing a bit more caring, it normally means someone else is doing a bit more earning. If someone has to physically make a baby - they normally get a bit of support from the other parent recognising that.
Good luck sorting it all out.

I have discussed this with my partner and he would like me to continue to contribute half towards the mortgage and bills while on maternity leave.

Fine. If you do that, tell him you will be charging him per hour for half of the childcare you will be doing while on maternity leave - that is every hour he goes to work or leaves the house. Then think long and hard about the kind of person you are having a baby with.

If you take a loss in earnings after the baby is born and you go back to work, ie working four days a week to keep childcare costs down, the only way to protect yourself and the baby against your decreased earning capacity is by getting married. If you're unmarried, all you and the baby is entitled to is the CPS minimum.

Have a hard look at the relationship boards here, and think about what happens long term. Lots of women are shafted because they put their career on the back burner after having children, with no protection if the relationship breaks down unless they're married (and it's not stellar then either).

He sounds like a selfish bastard - make sure your child won't be poor because of it.

I agree with every word of this.

I’m on mat leave at the moment and there’s no way I would still pay 50/50 for everything. I couldn’t be with a man that won’t support us while I’m pregnant/taking care of our children.... especially not if he’s a high erner. About the payout....maybe he feels you shouldn’t leave it all to yourself? I would use it to get all the baby stuff etc. And tell him he doesn’t have to contribute?

The Daily Mail would love a discussion like this.

What the daily fail might think is irrelevant.

This is a very real issue that affects women and children across this country.

Lots of kids struggle financially while their father who earns good money doesn’t support them.

What do you want to do OP?
I don't think it's reasonable for you to pay half, assuming you're on statutory pay and you said he's a high earner.

No. You pay in proportionate to your incomings.
Can't quite believe he is serious. And if you're not married I'd be very worried indeed. I expect he'll just swan on with his life as normal after the birth.
Doesn't bode well.

I will continue to pay 50/50. But part of the bills to consider is the nursery fees for our toddler.

I saved to cover the bills for 20 weeks when I’m on SSP (enhanced and holiday pay mean I’ll be on full pay for 30 weeks). I was able to do this as my DH paid for the majority of treats while I was saving.

I’m happy with the set up, I suppose DH is contributing, just not directly.

As it’s a work place nursery I pay out all the fees, and then top up to 50/50 into the joint account. I have made sure that the amount covers 50% of the mortgage repayment though

Just hand him an itemised bill for the cost of pushing a baby out through your vagina and ask him how he wants to pay.

If he's a high-earner, then he can suck it up. It would be different if things would be a struggle without the money and it was needed to survive, but if he can afford to cover the bills while you are looking after his child that you have carried for nine months and given birth to, then he should.

My OH and I have our own finances and each contribute a set amount to bills each month, but we are TTC and should we have a baby, he will be covering most of the bills while I take maternity leave from my business. There was no question from either of us about that.

This is why I just don’t get 50/50 finances when pregnancy / children and childcare come into the mix. it just does not work.

I just asked the same question from my DP and his answer was so much better in our native language, but I'll do my best with translating. Basically when one has (a lot of) money and therefore no problems with money, there shouldn't be no problems. And when one has nothing coming in then what contributions can we talk about.

Keep in mind that we live in a country where you have 18 months of maternity pay (full salary if you have worked the previous year and minimum wage if you haven't worked) and full time daycare when child is not younger than 18 months costs slightly less than 10% of average wage. My DP can be quite a lazy with housework (and sometimes that pisses me off) but has always been generous when it comes to money. Currently we are paying 50/50, no children, his salary is slightly bigger. Once we have children (they have to keep your job until child turns 3 but 18 months to 3 years is unpaid) and we decide to be home for longer than paid mat leave, he would have to step up with paying bills.

If you aren't married but own the house jointly you might want to consider keeping up your half of the mortgage payments to maintain your stake in the house, as that is your equity that you might want back someday. But sod the bills, your partner should be sorting those.

Please come back OP and answer our questions.

I'd tell him that's fine, and you'd LIKE him to still do 50% of all housework and admin along with child care 50% of the time (including half of all night feeds).

I did.

Every single time.

I saved, in order to ensure that I had a reasonable amount of 'income' available to me during the year I was off - once my contractual maternity payments tapered to statutory only. My independence has always been really important me tho and I accept not subscribing to the idea of family money that is so prevalent on mumsnet makes me a bit of an outlier in terms of this conversation.

Well that was your decision @NormaNameChange - funnily enough as soon as I found out I was pg I was lucky enough to be able to save as much of my salary as possible to tide me over and keep paying my share of the household bills after my SMP ran out. My decision, not my DH telling me to and definitely not if he earned a lot (which he didn’t as I earnt more than him). This is looking like it the OP’s partner is being cheeky to say the least expecting her to still pay 50:50 especially when he can afford it (and tbh should be paying a percentage of salaries than 50:50 if there’s a big difference) and it’s to his benefit too.

I also paid my half both maternity leaves.

The minute I knew I was pregnant I saved and put aside all my personal Direct Debits and the amount I'd of paid per month for my half of the bills and mortgage. OH did foot the joint credit card which was for food, baby stuff etc. I did have to go into some other saving sometimes to fund going out during the day.

I think his statement alone says a lot about him.

Yes, absolutely. Providing the working parent pays the mother for childcare. I think approximately half your partner’s salary should cover it.