Csa

[Baby-g]

Is it worth it? My son is 9 weeks old and dad hasent contributed atall...he has gave me £20 past 2 weeks as ive had to ask for milk...he is a high earner but refuses to pay. Im on low matty allowance but everything goes on my son. I cant carry on asking every friday. He pays for his other kids with other women through csa...should i call them tom?? He dosent see my son more than a few hrs a week and hasent offered anything else...

[Hidden]

Yes if the current situation isn’t working then definitely

[Hidden]

It’s always worth an inquiry. Just be aware that if you’re in receipt of benefits you’re unlikely to receive much if any via csa because the money comes out of the same government pot, so to speak.

[Baby-g]

Thankyou. Yes my matty is with uc till jan when i start bk on temp. Ill look into it.x

[Hidden]

Poorlyflumpet not true it comes off his wages nothing to do with what she’s earns. And because he doesn’t have baby stay with him any nights a week she entitled to the higher percentage but It will also reflect on how many kids he’s paying for.

[Baby-g in reply to Hidden]

He pays for 2 ( after 6+ yrs of no payments) but im daft...i believed this baby would be looked after! I use to believe the other kids mum was a cow but now i see...should never doubt a mum ive learned.x

[Hidden in reply to Baby-g]

Yeah usually the case, I split from my kids dad as he had & still has alcohol issues I couldn’t live with anymore he started getting aggressive but he tells people I had an affair which is untrue & calls me all sorts but whatever 🙄 Im a grown up couldn’t care.

There’s 2 types of payments direct pay the Csa send a schedule of what they think he needs to pay then he has to arrange a standing order only thing he can stop it and u have to chase the Csa to chase him. Or the one it gets took direct from his work if the other mother does that I would too as they’ve already got his details prob be better.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

That’s how the old system used to work, but if things have changed then good because it seemed very unfair to me.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Are you not thinking child tax credits? This is the Csa maintenance unless he has kids half the week she’ll be entitled to a percentage of his wages.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

No, definitely referring to CSA. It used to be the case that, if you were on benefits, when you applied via CSA to pursue financial support from the other parent the CSA would make the assessment and then effectively keep the money. This was because the amount you were entitled to receive often wasn’t different from what you might already have been receiving via income support and tax credits. The way the government viewed it was they were effectively getting back from (in most cases) the father the money the CSA was paying to the mother....otherwise it was considered the mother was being paid twice.

It was a crazy system because it just meant self employed parents wouldn’t declare all of their income (i.e dividends) and so could claim they were only receiving £25K a month (the amount the CSA would assess them on) when in reality they could have a lot more coming in but it was hard to prove it. Cue a mother scrapping by whilst the dad lives the life of Riley and only has responsibility for the child one day a week. Of course there are plenty of dads that don’t handle things that way and it was different if both parents had a standard income through employment. But the example above was why CSA came in for so much criticism, it just didn’t work and they regularly messed up.

I used to work for the a ombudsman office helping to deal with complaints about the CSA, of which there were MANY!

Hopefully the system has improved, but I’m cynical when it comes to government systems 😂

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Must have been quite a while back I’ve been claiming” for the last 6 years so much have changed before I started, but it’s not really great there’s loop holes and I chased Csa for nearly a year to try to get money straight from wages in the end had to change back to direct pay just so I just get something then only lasted 6 mths as he quit his job so getting nothing at the min. Must be nice to know someone else is fully paying and taking care of your children and have not a care in the world.

[Hidden in reply to Hidden]

Yeah, couple of years ago. Sounds like things haven’t improved much, which is ridiculous.

Unfortunately I don’t think the the ones that have to be chased give it that much thought; they just know the money isn’t coming out of their pocket.

[Hidden]

i would ring them... there no harm in making enquiries.... if he can pay for his other 2 then he should pay for your lb aswell.... hope you get something sorted xx

[Baby-g]

Thankyou x

[JNDuce12-13]

It’s very worth it! If he doesn’t help physically he should help financially. It’ll go off his wage and it’ll take into account any other children he has in his household. You might be best explaining to him that he can calculate the amount you are owed himself on the gov website and pay it directly to you. Because if you have to get it off him through the child maintenance service it’ll cost him more as he’ll have to pay a fee with each payment. You’ll pay an initial fee to set it all up but he’ll pay one each time. So it’ll be in his interest to grow up and do what’s fair off his own back.

Good luck! X

[Baby-g]

Yes between the 3 kids they said he gets 19% taken off his gross income. So id get about £40 a week. I have to make hrmc aware of this and just hope they dont deduct it from my uc.x

[lou121087]

I would. My partner unfortunately has to pay through cms as his ex is horrible and refused to give him her bank details to do it privately she thinks she won't get enough privately than going through cms. But if he won't agree to pay you regularly and if you have his company name they will send his company a letter to put him on a DOE (Deduction of earnings) so it'll come straight out of his wages and they will take 40% of what he earns. If he pays his other 2 children through cms then it'll be split 3 ways if not you'll get the 40%. It's complicated lol. But if he's not willing to pay for a child he's happy to see even for a few hours then I'd definitely try and get money from him which ever way. Good luck.

[Baby-g]

Not heard from him now since saturday hes not turned up or called i had a message from his friend calling me a halfwit and an idiot! So god only knows what hea saying im doing. I had to contact wellfare yest as my electei is under £1 and i think they will help me today. I have to keep all the evidence as the dad dosent belive me.