[Solved] help child maintenance

Contact and maintenance are two separate issues, the CSA don't have any thing to do with any contact issues that arise

Has your ex contacted the CSA? ....if you can't open another account and don't have any contact, there's not much you can do with the money then.

I don't know if my ex has contacted the csa yet but I have been putting the amount the calcutor says so that I have it ready for when they contact me

There shouldn't be a problem if you open another account as you are entitled to have £6000 in savings before your ESA is affected.

Hi lillysdadmark13

Thanks for your post, I am William the Child Maintenance Options consultant. Contact and child maintenance are not linked in law and difficulties over one should not disrupt arrangements for the other. You may wish to seek legal advice regarding your access rights to your daughter, the following link will provide you with contact details for organisations in your area that offer legal advice.

All parents have a responsibility to provide regular and reliable financial support for their children, which you are wanting to do. We are here to help people choose the best way to do this.

Many parents choose to sort out child maintenance between themselves. It can be the quickest and easiest way of arranging child maintenance, and we call it a family-based arrangement. These arrangements are made without involving the Child Maintenance Service or needing to disclose personal information to a third party.

I understand your daughter’s mum’s family do not want you to have any contact with your daughter and her mum. However, do you have any family or friends that could possibly speak to them on your behalf and arrange something that way? Alternatively, could you send her a cheque each week through the post?

There are no strict rules or formulas that you have to stick to when agreeing a payment amount. It can include money and other kinds of support, for example you putting money into a bank account for when your daughter gets older could be your family-based arrangement. You will need to speak directly to the Jobcentre plus, in regards to if you are able to open a separate bank account without it affecting your Employment Support Allowance (ESA).

Family-based arrangements are not legally binding. However, they give you the flexibility to change your arrangement as your daughter gets older and her needs change, or if either you or her mum has a change in circumstances.

To help put a family-based arrangement in place we have some tools and guides available to download from our website at http://www.cmoptions.org/en/toolbox/index.asp along with our maintenance calculator, which you have already used. You may find our Child Maintenance Decisions guide for paying parents Information for parents living apart from their child and our Discussions Guide useful. These can help you understand your child maintenance choices and help you plan your conversation with your daughter’s mum. We also have a family-based arrangement form. You can complete this with your daughter’s mum and sign your names to show your commitment to your arrangement. Although this is not a legally enforceable document, it puts the agreement on a more formal basis.

If you feel a family-based arrangement will not work for you, you still have the option of using the statutory service, through the Child Maintenance Service. They have two schemes Direct Pay and Collect and Pay, either parent can make an application at any time.

Direct Pay is when the Child Maintenance Service calculates maintenance and then leave you and your daughter’s mum to decide together how your payments will be made. They will not contact you again unless either of you report a change in circumstances or if they are told that payments have missed or stopped.

Collect and Pay is when the Child Maintenance Service calculate and collect payments on your behalf, as some parents prefer the security and help of a third party managing their child maintenance. If an application is made with the Child Maintenance Service, your responsibility to pay will start from around the time that they contact you or you contact them depending on who makes the application.

The Government plans to introduce charges for using the Child Maintenance Service in spring 2014. There will be three types of charges:

- Application fees
- Fees for collecting and paying out child maintenance
- Enforcement charges for paying parents who do not pay

The exact amount for these charges are still to be approved by parliament, however, the Child maintenance Service will write to you at least a month before they are introduced.

The best way to avoid charges is to set up a family-based arrangement and not use the Child Maintenance Service at all. However, if you and your daughter’s mum cannot agree an arrangement between yourselves, there will be no collection fees for parents who pay and receive child maintenance using Direct Pay, only application fees. For parents using the Collect and Pay scheme the government plans to charge collection fees to both the paying and receiving parent, this is for collecting and passing on child maintenance payments.

Under the government’s plans the paying parent would have to pay 20% in addition to the weekly maintenance payment and the receiving parent would have 4% taken away from the weekly maintenance payment. For further information you may wish to speak to the Child Maintenance Service directly.

If you decide to make an application to the Child Maintenance Service, you will need to contact us first either by telephone or email, for your unique reference number. This number is personal to you. It is unique and shows that you have spoken to Child Maintenance Options before applying for a statutory child maintenance arrangement.

If you would like more information about the Child Maintenance Service you can find this on their website at www.gov.uk/child-maintenance.

If you feel that none of the above options will work for you, you could consider a Consent Order/Minute of Agreement, which is an official ruling made by a court. To arrange a Consent Order/Minute of Agreement, you and your daughter’s mum need to agree how much child maintenance will be paid and how often, before going to court. You can agree this either privately between yourselves, through a solicitor or a mediator. This usually happens when parents are going to court for other reasons, such as arranging a divorce or dividing their property or other assets. Arranging a Consent Order/Minute of Agreement can be costly as fees for solicitors, mediators and court costs may apply.

We have a sorting out separation web-app that you may find useful. It offers help and support to separating and separated families. The link is: www.dad.info/divorce-and-separation/sorting-out-separation.

To find out more about all the options available for maintenance and how Child Maintenance Options can help you visit http://www.cmoptions.org or call us free on 0800 988 0988 between 8am and 8pm Monday to Friday or 9am and 4pm on Saturday.

Thanks
William