Divorce advice

[Panicatthegarden]

Hello I'm wondering if anyone has been through a divorce and can offer me any advice on what the next stops should be, I've read quite a bit online but I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed by it all.

For background me and my husband have now been separated for over two years. It was me that wanted to split up rather than him so I am worried that he may stall things/ not actually want to get a divorce. We were married for less than a year before we split, no children, we have no joint investments together (we lived together in a flat rented solely in my name at the time of marriage and he has since moved out) and neither of us have much in the way of savings. We do have some joint debt but foolishly I took it out only in my name (he didn't have a good credit history) so I realise I'm going to have to pay that myself.

I would ideally like us to split the costs of divorce if possible but I will pay the costs myself in order to get it over and done with if it comes to it. My worry with this is if I pay and send off the papers have I just lost £550 for nothing? He has verbally agreed that we should get a divorce but was always quite disorganised so even if not malicious he might just forget to do anything with the papers.

I also know I need to get a financial consent order. Is there anything obvious I'm missing or any steps I've not considered?

Tia

When he receives the papers, he has something like 8 days to respond. He can't just ignore them and it'll go away, it doesn't work like that. If you can't prove he's received them, then you can get them served legally. Which may be an extra cost, but not huge.

The £550 is for the court fees start to finish, and you may possibly get costs awarded. But either way, money well spent .

It doesn't sound like you have a massive amount to sort out financially so it should be fairly open and shut. Possibly worth a session with a solicitor to draw up a "clean break" financially to make sure. (You might find a solicitor who does a free half hour initial consultation who'd be able to clarify).

Okay thank you that's a relief. I had visions of me constantly sending him paperwork and him ignoring it and me having to start the process all over again!

It's absolutely worth the money.

I paid the£550 to do it online and he was ordered to pay the costs when it was granted but my xh didn't pay. I just saw it as money well spent but it is annoying and was yet another thing he seemed to get away with

Look at the wikivorce website, it's very helpful.