Child maintenance rules

[KazK]

Hi Looking for some help.
My ex runs his own limited company.
He pays himself a small salary and then dividends.
Currently he gets 11 k wage then 40k dividend leaving roughly 50k per year in the company after corporation tax.
I understand he plans to give half his share to his new (soon to be wife), so his income declared to hmrc will drop from 50k to 25 k, so the child maintenance will be reduced.
Transferring the shares and paying her a salary is legal, but surely her income from his company should be included? Also the 50k left in the company is his to take, so why is this not included?
Thanks for reading and any help would be much appreciated
Kaz K

That's very shitty of him to do, but the rules allow him to do it. This is why Child Maintenance rules need a complete overhaul because it allows far too many loopholes for (nearly always) men to avoid paying adequately for their children (making women bear even more of the burden of the responsibility of shared children).

Why do you think her income should be included? Morally, you have a point in this case, but legally, why do you think her income should pay for someone else's children?

Thanks, yes I think he can pay less.
I agree she should not have to pay normally, but as all her income is income diverted from his income I'd hope it would count. If she also had employment from a third party I would not want that included, completely agree.
There should be special rules for close companies in my opinion.

I agree that this is one of the loopholes that should be closed. It is not right that (mostly) men can divert their earnings to someone else so that they can stop it going to their children.

This is why we need Feminism, and why we need more women in Parliament.

Agreed👍

I have a limited company with DH. Unfortunately your ex can do this and it does suck. However gifting it to her, for free, is a bit of a risk for him as he can’t just ask for it back if they split up. He’d have to pay her for the shares.
Any funds left in the company are not included until he draws down on them. If he were to wind it down, he’d have a big tax and child maintenance bill due on any money he’d saved up in there. I’m assuming he’ll wait until the children are adults and draw it down then, avoiding maintenance but not a hefty tax bill. Or he might save it for a while and buy an asset. Men like this do all sorts to avoid their responsibilities.

I'd ask him whether you or he is going to explain to his children that he's arranging his finances to avoid paying for them properly. But I imagine he doesn't really care about that.

Child maintenance rules are ridiculous.
They fail the child almost every time.

I think he will spend money on the children, it being done so he can treat them to the extras, while I can give them the basics!
He also tried to use rediculos values for his company. He found a case (H vs H 1994), which the judge said the husbands business should have no value. If you Google the case, it was given no value so it could be passed to the wife as the husband was going to jail for raping the wife. I couldn't imagine a women using such a case to claim her business had no value.
Anyway, thanks for the help, I have to just accept it.

Think he's wasted his time researching old cases.. Once they are married transfers between husband and wife are always tax free so valuation makes no difference

I knew someone who had this happen to her and she gave all her information to the her local MP who did help her to chase the shit bag up.

The valuation was when we split. He was trying to not give me a penny, in fact he want to pay him to keep the company!