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I have just found that my ex partner is now claiming low rate DLA for our daughter, she has always claimed child benefit despite us having 50/50 custody.
I find it unfair that she receives both DLA and child benefit despite us having 50/50, she will not be amicable and send me anything monthly, my next option is to go too mediation then court to see if a judge will award me either the DLA or child benefit, in the hopes that they see it as being equal to have one payment benefitted to each parent since they are both of a similar amount.
I can't find any information of people doing this previously.. Has anyone here had any joy or insight to a similar situation?
@Kettleman Unfortunately, disability living allowance (DLA) cannot be split, unless the receiving party decides to split it (voluntarily). As mad as it seems, having 50/50 care of a child doesn't necessarily mean that child maintenance payments stop; invariably, it will just mean that you, as the payer, will simply receive the highest discount.
If, e.g., you have your child 175 nights or more, you will receive 50% discount (plus an extra £7 per week reduction). If you have your child between 156 to 174 nights, you'll receive 42.86% discount. The only time the Child Maintenance Service (CMS) will consider 'equal shared care' is based on when the child's school is, who is the principal contact (or payer) with the school, the location of the child's registered doctors' surgery and dentist and sports clubs.
For added context, if your partner lives in the same town that your son or daughter attends school, even if you regularly take your son or daughter to their medical and sporting appointments, but you live 10-15 miles away, the CMS will almost certainly come down on the side of the applicant (parent receiving payments), which is often the mother.
There are many things that are unfair and unwieldy about the CMS. They will refute that there is a bias towards one parent; however, once one parent makes an application (even if 50/50 contact is in place), it's very difficult to get the CMS to change things, even with evidence. Furthermore, there is seemingly no comeuppance for those parents that blatantly lie to the CMS to maintain the level of payments that they receive.
I will caveat the above with, all parents should want to pay to support their children; however, it should be proportional, which is where a lot of people take umbrage regarding how the CMS administers a large number of case files.