CSA refused to revise

Hi,

I think if you want to avoid issues like this then maybe to stop doing over-time. could wait another 3 months, then when you have 3 payslips showing no overtime, can contact them and tell them your income dropped by 25% or more and income is likely to stay like this long-term, and they should adjust your payments.

@bill337 

i'd do it if it was there, i'm happy to pay whats fair for my child but i dont have the choice any longer as overtime has gone completley unfortunatly.

I just dont see how they have seen my latest 2 payslips showing no overtime & the fact i've told them that it was only temporarily available due to covid that they are saying i need to pay based on 34 income when its 10k less than this now.

I have another payslip due on 18th November so can send the 3rd one i guess(i get a month to challenge this) 

They surely cant force me to get into debt to pay maintainence, i havent dealt with them before so going in blind. 

Thanks @bill377 - appreciate the time.

hi,

yes you could wait for the 3rd pay slip next week and contact them. if your wage is 25% less then they should recalculate. if they reject again, you can put in a complaint. I hear an effective way is to email a senior manager there: arlene.sugden@dwp.gov.uk and also copy in your local MP. you can remind them of their processes, which can be found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/how-we-work-out-child-maintenance/how-we-work-out-child-maintenance

i have been in this position and the back log the previous default calculation is still lingering in the balance to yet be written off.

I had to provide my accountant profit and loss balance sheets to the CMS every 3 months, the point of this is to keep doing this until they have at least one year hmrc records. Then the payments should level off over time, any differences during the year on year will be balanced off during the yearly review.

@bkm 

Thanks for that, would your advice be to by hook or by crook make the payments they have asked me too - i can possibly lend this from family. 

Are you saying that if they find that i've overpaid in my initial year that they will take that into account in year two for example and reduce it accordingly?

or do you just have to take the hit in year one & then have the payments adjusted to the correct amount when they review this in October 2022??

@bill337 thanks so much 

I've emailed Arlene & also my MP 

Ive recieved an acknowledgement from both today, the CMS said they will pass it for review again & would get back to me within 3 weeks and the MP is writing to my address.

Fingers crossed common sense prevails but i'm not confident based on my interactions so far with them. 

@happygolucky16 

im speaking from experience going from normal salaried job to self employed for the first time, i have learned alot from it for the first year.

Here is how it went for me and it may help you?

oct 2020 i left my old job via p60 and went self employed in november 1, i went on income support during the period of november to april due to income was so low, i was running in debt. The cms dont see this, they do the annual review at december and did a calculation on the basis i was still working on my old job and gave me a big monthly figure.

they literally wont listen to you unless a chartered accountant can verify your income if your self employed, this is because HMRC dont have records of your first years income, so you have to be stuck with paying default calculation. I got an accountant and provided the profit and loss sheets from november to april. This then reduced maintence to 0, as expected as the income was below minimum as i was running a business from scratch and i was not in profit yet.

Then every 3 months, i have been providing updates to the profit and loss, this has again adjusting and payments increase realistically on actual income data.

rule of thumb is, if you receive a schedule and you have to make a payment if you agree with it or not, you must make a payment regardless, the balance will always be adjusted as long as its been labelled correctly for child support etc. in my case, i made a payment but not the amount they were asking, as any payment is marked as a payment and is welcomed. As the figures were wrong, so your allowed to make a payment that you can afford. this is perfectly acceptable given the circumstances.

do not under any circumstances make payments outside of the schedule, example your assessment. (you have no schedule as we are working out what you should pay). any payments will be gifts/over payments.

My current situation is now i am earning, the calculation is up to date and everything is ok, the transition from salary to self employed is very stressful for the first year for everyone, and everyone suffers.

the accountant fees were around £250 for these reports.