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I got divorced in 2000, i have paid maintenance since every month and never missed a payment, I have had the two boys every week end at my ex wife's insistence and with my pleasure. I have since re married and have two other lovely children who get on very well with their brothers. In april i lost my job and managed to secure another in mid August (lucky in the current environment!) i has a pro rata payment in August which covered the essentials at my own house. I communicated the situation with my ex in April that i had no money coming in and I was searching for another job. I was wished good luck and to let her know how things progressed.
I explained in June i has a job that started in mid Aug and i could restart payments rom my Sept salary payment.
I have just received a court summons for which my ex applied for for the 4 months i have not paid! out of the blue! The court summons for the amount of £1500 was dated 24th Aug which is before i had even been paid.
My question is, what can I say when i go to court? What rights do i have?
I have been back to court on two occasions with my ex, first when i wanted the amount to br reduced and my ex lied that i never saw the children, the second when she sent me a letter telling me to pick up my 16 year old or she would deliver him to social services! I did obviously and he has lived with me ever since, after years of always offering to have the boys live with me when my ex complained how hard things were.
The original court order stated to pay for the children until 17 or further education has finished, the second time we went to court was for me to request a change to the order as she has forced my eldest son from her house and i did not want to go against an existing order but change the order to reflect my one remaining child at her house. I did not ask for any contribution to me from her for the removed son as due to him being under 17 (re the existing court order)
as the wrong form was sent to me by the court the sitting was adjourned!!
My ex then sent me a letter stating she was happy to accept the money for our son at her house only moving forward, on the advice from her solicitor. I duly changed the amount to reflect this.
That has been the case up until my loss of job and finding another.
On an aside, my ex has a live in lover for 3-4 years, who hid 60K from his then current wife and put the money into my ex's house, also put a £15K ISA into her sole name. After their split he via solicitors demanded the 60K back, so my ex is having to sell her house, which she has done and bought another smaller place using the large equity she released from the sale, the £15K she paid into her sons bank account and then transferred it to another account, (why not her own account?), i know this as both my children confirmed it with me.
I am now working again and have restarted the monthly payments.
My questions are:
1) as we have agreed a separate amount are we outside of the original order?
2) the court summons was made before i was even paid, can this happen?
3) what can be done with the knowledge that y ex willingly too part in trying to hide money from another mother (her ex lover's) and yet before i have had my first payment from my new job has gained an application in court for arrears that I have no idea how i am to repay?
4)i just want a quite life, with my amazing wife and all my children who live with us or come over when they want (as in ,y 17 year old son, who is enjoying student life at college, recently changed courses) how can i ask the court to see what is going on and ask for some common sense to be applied and ask for tolerance also.
This has been going on since 2000, there has to be a time that enough is enough surely????
I would really like to hear any thoughts pertinent to my points.
Many thanks
Hi and welcome to the forum
I have edited your name out of your post so that you cannot be identified. Also, I have moved your post to the Child Maintenance section where it should get more views.
As this is a court summons regarding these matters, you will have to provide the court with a position statement detailing all these events. The court is likely to order full financial breakdowns from you both before reaching any decision. Court financial hearings are different to CSA/CMS and within the boundaries of the law it will be a decision made by a judge.
Some of our members may have experience of attending financial hearings and share their individual outcomes with you.
Good luck
You have no choice but to go to court, but it's not cut and dried that she will get what she wants, it depends on the court on the day, but I would certainly argue that under CMS rules, you only pay based on your income, so if you weren't earning (and a tax free redundancy payment doesn't count as income), then the maintenance should be reduced accordingly for that period.
Any income of your ex's boyfriend is completely irrelevant I'm afraid, so that's not worth pursuing.
however, how old are your children now, and where do each live? And does your ex have an income? The reason I ask this is because if they live with you and are still in full time education (not university) and below 20, then you can open a case with the CMS and claim maintenance off her for the children who live with you, and pay maintenance to her based on your income and how many children live with her. This will override the court order.
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