CSA - Notification of new child through child benefit???

[Thyeternalsummer]

Hope someone can help with this..

We've had a few problems with CSA recently. Payments are way more than we can afford, and if they don't get sorted out for August will cause real financial hardship. Number of errors in calculations including assessment based on gross income, lower number of resident nights despite new court order detailing interim contact during residence dispute etc etc.

DP has a Deduction from earnings order (despite never having missed payments, had to go to court FTC), so any errors in their calculation - not at lot we can do until they recalculate.

Anyway - new baby due at the end of the month, and will need to notify CSA of change of circumstances for recalculation based on 1 resident child BUT told today that their systems will only recognise a child registered from child benefit system. Now, as we won't be claiming CB (would have to pay it all back via tax assessment) - this seems ludicrous. Means we could wait up to 12 weeks post birth for their systems to update. So another 3 months of paying 15% more, on top of the existing miscalculations.

They really don't seem to care though.

Anyone with a similar experience?

You can "claim" child benefit but elect not to receive any payments from it I think. That means your DC will be logged on the system as the DC you have child benefit for, even though you don't receive any money for it. That's what people who aren't working and want to make sure they preserve their national insurance stamps were being advised to do, I think.

The other option is to receive child benefit and then pay it back, which won't leave you any worse off - and might even help with your cash flow if you are likely to end up overpaying CSA payments whilst they process that you now have a DC.

There's relatively few ways of proving a child lives with you - so child benefit is used quite a bit for this purpose. Not claiming it at all can leave you a bit stuck sometimes.

Purpleroses is right, you can claim child benefit but elect not to receive it. We no longer receive CB due to DH's earnings but were we to have a third DC I'd still claim just to get them in the system. Besides, you never know when you might be in a position to need it and I can only imagine the faff of trying to register an older child when you really need the money.