Husband wants me to pay back half of child benefit

[Bakersdelight]

I’d like to get some impartial perspective on a situation with my husband. We receive Child Benefit for our two children. This gets paid into our joint expenses account. My husband changed jobs 5 years ago and his salary went over the earnings threshold. I’ve been telling him for the past 5 years he needs to contact HMRC and work out repayment via a tax return and then see whether to stop receiving it, or just pay it back each year. He’s finally done his tax returns (only because he realise he could claim some relief on his pension contributions). And has had to pay approx £10k back in Child Benefit. He is now saying I owe him half of this money because I have benefitted from it as it was paid into the joint expenses account.
I feel he is being unreasonable given the amount he is asking from me and the fact that I had been asking him for 5 years to sort it out. I would be interested in what others think.

@lessglittermoremud but he could have helped her fill them in, in the same way he could have financially supported her through her maternity leave, in the same way he could have listened to her when she said he had to stop claiming child benefit. I can spot a pattern even if you can’t

It makes me physically sick to hear the shit women are going through with these nasty men.

I’m not saying her situation is right or fair there may indeed be a pattern.
BUT OP could have asked anyone to help her fill them in, I’m assuming if she holds down employment that she must have basic level reading skills.
OP hasn’t said he withheld the forms from her or insisted he fill them in himself, she has said she struggles to fill in paperwork so left him to do it.
Maybe she is completely isolated from any friends or family, maybe she wasn’t able to access healthcare with a newborn so wasn’t able to ask for help from the HV etc BUT OP hasn’t said any of those things, I think it’s bonkers she continued to pay 50% of bills on maternity leave, but she did it twice..Maybe she isn’t able to access birth control or he is on that much control of OP he has beaten her down so much he controls every aspect of her life, but she hasn’t said that either.
She knew that they weren’t entitled to the full amount of child benefit as did her husband, at some point people have to take some responsibility. They have chosen to divide their finances 50/50, so based on this regardless they are both responsible, I would have told him to get lost when he said I was still responsible for 50% of bills on maternity leave, it’s a miserable situation but OP has chosen to stay and have more than one child with this man

Christ this is grim on so many levels.

If it’s useful, my DH now earns more than me. We both get salaries into our own banks. We then send all the salary minus the same X amount into our joint money which is for all and everything including savings. The X amount stays in personal spending accounts and both have exactly the same each month to spend (and/or save). Means he can’t moan about my spending and I can’t complain what he decides to spend on. Or save. If we got into debt from our personal accounts that’s our own thing to sort out. (Which did happen with me as I kept over spending on daft stuff). So we’re equal with equal freedoms. Same all the way through when I was out earning him considerably at one point. But your set up isn’t okay. It’s not equal in any sense.

This ISN'T right.

You should only be paying bills/mortgage proportionally to what the earnings are, so if he earns 3 x you, then he pays 3 x more.

As for you having to pay 50% whilst you were on maternity leave, holy shit, men that insist on this are utter fucking cunts.

You do NOT owe him a penny for this Child Benefit fuck up of his, HE OWES YOU probably thousands of pounds for not covering living expenses whilst you birthed and nourished his children for the first year of their lives.

STOP thinking you owe this cretin anything. The only thing he is owed from you is an invoice for the money he made you pay during your maternity, and divorce papers.

I'm really beginning to think this man is financially abusing you, it's just not right at all. If he cannot stop this awful mindset he has, then really, I don't think you should stay in this marriage. This is NOT normal.

@Bakersdelight take this as an example. In respectful marriages, bills are usually paid proportionally according to earnings.

So you earn £20K, he earns 60K

Your mortgage is £500, your other living expenses are £1500 = £2000 per month.

You contribute £500, he contributes £1500, monthly.

It's absolutely not normal or fair in decent marriages for one person to be financially struggling, whilst the other is accumulating a nice savings pot in their sole name. This is a red flag for financial abuse.

Your DH has an extremely unfair mindset as it leaves you in hardship. He's building wealth, whilst you're financially insecure.

If your DH cannot immediately adjust his mindset (it may just be that he lacks understanding or is immature), then once he's adjusted his mindset, your marriage can hopefully improve. However, if he does not care that this is unfair, and insists that this is how it is to be, then this really does cross the threshold of financial abuse because it is creating an unequal, coercive dynamic.

Op have you had chance to have a conversation with him about finances going forwards, do your maths on your income and tell him how it's going yo work now, your loosing out each month by not addressing this op your money remember, it's a hard conversation to have but he needs to know, yes he won't be happy but hay how long have you been paying 50% for and taking that on the chin, so let him now,
please do not ask, you need to tell him , remember its your money and he's had a lot of it,
So ' hay bob, just transferred my % in joint account it's this amount from now on due to you earning 3x more than me, oh and as for the cb take if out of the mat leave as I used my saving to enable me to stay home with our child so yep take if out of that ( paid in full) as I still topped up my 50% in joint account, could of gone straight back to work and you would of needed to pay full time nursery costs 5 days aweek, at maybe £ 80 pounds a day x 5,
walk away don't wait for a reaction as he should be gobsmacked honestly, put kettle on and go in another room, let him stew op,

1. every penny you took from your savings. When women use their savings to pay for maternity leave, men get a family for free- they don’t take time off work, you’d think a baby and a wife at home would cost money, but they don’t pay extra. Women in this situation on the other hand pay with their time, their career, their savings, and their body, while he gets to think of himself as a family man.
2. every national insurance contribution that the child benefit would have counted towards
3. every penny of tax relief he got from the child benefit
4. half of the housework and childcare for every day since you’ve had children.

i hope you’re finding your anger. I’ve even left out the fact you shouldn’t be paying 50/50. I’d campaign to support a 7 day divorce process for every man that thinks they should get babies and a family for free while their ‘partner’ exhausts themselves financially and physically to care for a baby.

Sorry what? you are not in their household, you cannot put it this way, there is a reason their 50/50 split has been working, it does not make him less of a man.

One thing people forget is that marriage has a financial attachment and at times, you have to ensure you look out for yourself as well as things do not always work out, same way she would if she was the higher earner, the kid is 50/50

Just to note on your first point, I trust she surely did not pay 50/50 to their savings during maternity, if so then I guess your point would be valid.

"men get a family for free"? how if he still puts in 50%? that is surely not free last I checked

Of course they're getting a family for free. They're getting children and experiencing no drop in their own income or in their partner's contribution to the family finances.

You have had 60 opportunities to sort this out, yet you still spent the money.

It's on both of you to pay it back.

They don’t pay EXTRA. When it’s just two of them pre baby, they both have jobs and they paid 50 % of costs. The woman grows a baby, gives birth and stays home to look after this tiny newborn while trying to recover. If she uses her savings to cover her 50% share so it’s financially barely different for the man than when there was no baby, then he’s expecting to get a family for free- a wife who pays like she works, and cares for the baby around the clock like she doesn’t.

such men should be publicly shamed and shunned by all women.

i did not see where she complained about their set up so not sure why you are speaking for all women.

I will take that to read ‘ I get what you mean now but that makes me mad so I will throw out an attack.’

does a woman have to complain for something to be unfair and shouldn’t be permitted? Doesn't that make you a lot like all the men and judges who’ve agreed ‘she didn’t object, she wanted it.’?

Are you actually legally married? In the UK? No prenup? If so, all your assets- house, savings, pensions etc. - are joint. If you got divorced any reasonable settlement would account for your loss of earnings whilst having children. He needs to recognise this.

To that end, who cares who pays for the £10k. It’s all joint money.

Paying back Child Benefit is responsibility of higher earner. They do it by filing tax return.
Child benefit should be in the name of lower earner and main care giver as it helps with pension credits etc.

Marriage is a partnership, it often can't be 50/50 financially when other person does more childcare or earns less.

We always paid it back out of joint family money if overpaid. No drama. It was spent jointly on family. You would have had an idea you were getting overpaid so should have held some back to repay any arrears. Child benefits usually get credited to the mother anyway so father's tend to be a bit ignorant about them.

" Doesn't that make you a lot like all the men "

Your agenda is clear, generalisation with a claim that is not factual shows an agenda based off ignorance!

Can something only be unfair to a woman if she objects to it?

Good day!

Well for a start, what goes around comes around. He owes you 50% childcare costs for the two 12m maternity periods where you presumably looked after his children for free - knock the CB amount off and present him with the net figure he owes you. Apologise for ignoring it for several years but you are sure he will understand…
Also, he presumably does 50% childcare, school runs, cooking, cleaning… after all he must share his half of the load right? To be fair? If not suggest if he doesn’t want to, he needs to organise paid help for whatever he doesn’t feel like doing. Only 50% is your job. This should free up time for you to improve your earning potential as he has no doubt done at your expense.

Earnings/ tax thresholds can make it make sense to have separate and joint accounts, it’s all the same ‘pot’ anyway. The bit I don’t get is beefing about who pays how much for what when you’re married and you’re surely a team anyway. We look at which account (separate or joint) is most suitable to pay for whatever it is and it’s a joint decision. Whose name is on the account never comes into it. Have to agree with you though that his attitude is worrying, if he’s like this he could later become more financially abusive, feeling that he has more say in things because he earns more or dictating financially to OP as the norm.