Redundancy and Child Maintenance

[TazSyd]

DP is currently furloughed and found out last week that he is at risk of redundancy. He has been expecting this and thinks that there is a high chance that he will be made redundant. He’s been there less than 2 years, so will only be paid 1 month notice and accrued holiday pay. As he lives with me he will only be entitled to £75 a week contributions based benefits.

We have a DD together and he also has another daughter who lives with her mum but stays with us 2 nights a week (in normal times). One weeknight and also on a Friday night and Saturday day - we pick her up from school on Friday and drop her back at her mum’s after dinner on a Saturday. As DP has been furloughed, we (well he, as I have been working from home so haven’t done much childcare during the day for either DD or DSD) have been having her more often - more like a 50/50 split. Despite his drop in income and the increase in childcare, he hasn’t reduced the maintenance he pays to his ex.

I’ve spoken to a couple of recruiter friends and they’ve said that the employment market has picked up a bit but realistically they aren’t expecting it to pick up properly until September. So DP could well be unemployed for a few months.

DP will pay £7 per week out of his JSA to his ex but this is a lot less than he currently pays (£300 per month). I know I have no legal responsibility for DSD but should I top up the maintenance to DPs ex?

OP, ignore the step mother haters. They're irrational and nothing you can do to make them see reason. The bitterness is strong.

You don't need to pay her anything. Not a penny.

@Juliet2014

I’m not married Divorced

I didn't mean you as in you, a general you

50/50 time does not always mean 50/50 spend

Let’s be honest, it is the mother that generally buys birthday party presents, has the child’s friends over for play dates, teacher presents, sanitary items when they start their periods... etc etc

But it's not always that clear cut, is it? For example my DH has a majority of these costs as his ex provides nothing, so we pay for anything they may need with us including clothes etc. Likewsie birthdays, christmas, due to his exes animosity towards us, the children have their own birthday parties and christmas day with us separate to their mothers, so we also have the cost of birthday parties, party presents, play dates, etc. This includes sanitary products which there mother will buy anyway, whereas due to the contraceptive I take I actually dont buy sanitary products so that's a additional cost which we unlike for their mother we wouldnt be spending if not for my DSC. But we just get on with it as that's part and parcel of it.

So even if mum ends up buying sanitary towels, I bet dad ends up buying the new bikes?

This includes sanitary products which there mother will buy anyway, whereas due to the contraceptive I take I actually dont buy sanitary products so that's a additional cost which we unlike for their mother we wouldnt be spending if not for my DSC. But we just get on with it as that's part and parcel of it

You know mother and daughter don't use the same sanitary products, right? You sound like you're looking for some kind of praise for having some pads in to manage your step daughter's menstrual needs.

You know mother and daughter don't use the same sanitary products, right?

I've always used the same sanitary products as my mother.

Not looking for praise. Just pointing out that its absolutely incorrect to assume that BM carry all the burden of cost, and not that both parents meet it.

You sound like you're looking for some kind of praise for having some pads in to manage your step daughter's menstrual needs

Hmmm but mums on here seem to expect a medal when they make those lists of what they provide for the their children. “clothes on their back, food in the cupboards, gas on the meter, a roof over their heads” etc...
It’s nothing amazing really is it?

My partner's ex only pays for anything for the kids if it benefits her (like dragging them to her expensive hobby, but then not providing correct safety equipment etc) buys bare minimum clothes and food and that's it. We pay for all extras, swimming lessons, music lessons, trips out, nice clothes that we obviously never see again...

I'm not in anyway claiming that MOST separated fathers are in that position, but many very much are and you claimed that the majority it's the other way round- that's simply not true! I dread to think the situation my partners dd will be in for sanitary goods at her mothers, I expect it's another thing that we'll have to provide as well as just at our house.

I also see the other side, my ex doesn't see the kids unless he has to, sends minimum maintenance at best (and that's rare, he's got huge arrears!) and gives them token costumes and birthday gifts whilst telling them I demand all his money...

Neither is clearly the majority and I would never claim otherwise. We just continue doing our best to provide for all our kids, in spite of what the other parents do.

It’s strange
All these amazing fathers contributing so much and the mothers refusing to buy things their children need because they want the father to pay for it.

And yet.... the very very heavily used CMS is groaning under the weight of dealing with non paying parents and let’s not beat around the bush.... the overwhelming vast majority works be - fathers. I wonder how the wives of these non paying fathers present the situation...

Do you have stats on how many are not paying the CMS amounts or just assuming it?

There hasn’t been much of a conclusion yet.

DPs ex has spoken to her work. She can drop the Saturday and just do Wed/Thurs. This will reduce her income. She can also go on the bank (to cover holidays and sickness) on a Mon/Tues/Fri but she will need a source of reliable childcare that she can call on last minute, if she does this.

It’s moot at the moment anyway, she spoke to some childminders on Friday and none have any space for DSD.

She said she had been looking to increase her hours from September anyway - now she’s on UC and not penalised for working more. However this was pre covid and she would have been reliant on schools being open to do this.

@GiantPinesAhem

My assumption is
A) the very overwhelming majority of non payers in the CMS are men.

Would you dispute this?

What’s the reason she wants to reduce her hours Taz?

[quote Juliet2014]@GiantPinesAhem

My assumption is
A) the very overwhelming majority of non payers in the CMS are men.

Would you dispute this?[/quote]
Well yes because the vast majority of nrps are men.

You could equally say well the overwhelming majority of people who alienate the children from their other parent are women.

* You could equally say well the overwhelming majority of people who alienate the children from their other parent are women.*

Indeed you could
Although - if alienating then the father isn’t going to be buying new schools is he?!

@Juliet2014 exactly what @TrustTheGeneGenie said...

The majority of nrp's are men, but that did not mean at all that the majority of men are non payers!!!

It's like suggesting that because all murderers are human that all humans just be murderers... It just doesn't work!

However, thanks for confirming it was an assumption and not backed by stats

@GiantPinesAhem

If asked - you would say that you don’t think there are more men in the CMS that are failing to pay there legal requirement than women?

Their

I would say I have no idea as the CMS don't report what sex the paying parent and receiving parent are on their stats.

Here's an actual statistic for you though, in the quarter ending June 2019, £249.1m child maintenance was due to be paid. £230.7 was paid through collect & pay or due to be paid through direct pay and not reported as failed... That makes 92.6% not defaulted. So the majority seem to be paying.

If you want to look at the collect asked pay only to rule out the people who failed to report that their ex didn't pay, then that stands at 11% unpaid between 2012 and 2019- and they're the group most likely to be non payers which is why they're on collect!

There is no way it's fair to say that the majority of either sex don't pay.

And that's coming from someone with an ex in thousands of pounds of arrears. Just because we have to shout about the odd idiot that won't pay, that doesn't make them the majority.

Sorry that the thread's derailed a little op, I can't stand it when people take this stance of assuming that every man will do anything they can to avoid paying. Your dp is clearly not in that position and you should be applauded for trying to make things work as well as you can

I don’t think that
I receive £2250 a month from my ex for two children (high earner)
He’s never once defaulted
We have a very positive relationship

However I think it’s utterly daft to say that you can’t safely assume that more non-payers are men than women.

@funinthesun19

One of the suggestions was that DP get a temp job. If he does this then the recruiters he has spoken to have said that, if he wants to do full time hours (to maximise the amount of maintenance he pays to ex), then he will have to the anti social shifts such as weekends. In this situation his ex DP will get the CMS recommended amount but will no longer have reliable childcare on a Saturday (as DP will be working).

It will boil down to whether she values the extra time DP is spending with DSD (I will call it free childcare, as DP has been able to care for DSD on extra days, due to furlough, without reducing the maintenance / creating extra costs for ex - as if he hadn’t been furloughed she would have had to reduce her hours or find a childminder on a Thursday, from April, as that is her day). Or whether she wants maintenance (about half of the rate he currently pays, due to his drop in income), but without as much childcare.

If we reverted back to our two nights a week (for example) the maintenance will still be a lot less and she will be responsible for finding childcare for DSD on one day. If she wants to maximise the maintenance (still a lot less than she was previously getting) by having DSD full time but paying a child minder, then she’s still going to be worse off as she’ll be paying a child minder and reducing her hours.

We’ve offered her the full spectrum - from DP working full time but providing no childcare, due to anti social shifts, and paying her £150 per month. To us reverting back to 2 nights per week, in which case the child maintenance will drop to about £115 per month. To us having DSD anything up to full time but only paying £28 per month maintenance.

What’s best for your household OP? You are giving the ex a lot of autonomy over your household.

@DogBowlSpaghetti

We’re giving her the chance to plan and see what works for her. We will take her views into consideration but the solution will have to be something that works for us all.

I’m in between 2 ideas.

1 - DP is effectively a SAHP for a couple of months and does as much childcare for both DD and DSD as both myself and DPs ex need.

2 - he gets a temp job and brings more money in. With 2 I’d have to look after DD from home and he wouldn’t see DSD as much, this would have to be taken into consideration too.