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My partner has an adorable 6 year old with his Ex Wife. They remained in the family home and he moved out and agreed to pay over £2000 a month in child maintenance as Ex only worked P/T and on lower income. Her family are super wealthy and also give her money and she lives in one of most expensive counties in UK and enjoys holidays, botox and plastic surgery and new car/high end treadmill etc (the material purchases are not necessarily relevant to my Q but just painting the picture!)
My partner and I live together. House is in my name and he pays towards bills. Not deliberately done like that but we weren't able to get the mortgage we needed with his name also on it as the payments were much higher.
His self employment business has taken a dip and whilst he is working hard to increase client base, and income, he is having sleepless nights about if he cannot improve situation quickly as his savings are running low and he only has 5-6 months of Child Maintenance set aside.
He has obviously over committed from the start, by agreeing to pay over £2k a month but he felt guilt at ending the marriage and leaving his daughter behind so its understandable why a Dad would do this - (iHer wealthy family paid off the mortgage on the marital home for her to help reduce her outgoings. My partner agreed for his Ex to keep the house and everything in it and he left with just his clothes.) but he is daunted by the fact he is likely to have to reduce the amount he pays for his daughter due to income dropping - GOV website seems to indicate he would legally have to pay to circa £750 a month... so clearly his Ex's standard of living is going to be significantly impacted by any reduction. Which worries us both as obviously he doesn't want his daughters home to have to be sold to release equity. But essentially she is living beyond her economic means from money given to her by my partner and her family each month - she cannot sustain that lifestyle on her own income.
Its obviously hard for my partner to strike the right balance with him being allowed to have his own quality of life and paying the right amount to ensure his daughter lives well.
And I expect once he notifies his Ex of an intention to reduce the monthly payments - she will go to CMA.
Can anyone share tips on what to expect?
He has only just recently gone self employed so not got a long history of provable income - prior to that he was paying her using savings.
The last 2 months I have paid for everything including the mortgage and bills, and we do not yet have a joint bank account but we were about to set one up - although I read here somewhere that CMA can then take money from it even if the money is solely mine???
My partners daughter stays with us alternate weekends and we finance the petrol back and forth on the 250 mile round trip each time too.
his Ex keeps asking for more money or extra contributions for school shoes or swimming club.. but my Partner is clear that his payments should already cover that.
Any tips welcome! Seems its a minefield out there!
Hi
At some point, he is going to have to bite the bullet and tell his ex he has to reduce his maintenance, so he should really do this now, rather than running his savings out completely. He can either wait for her to go to CMS, or he can open a case himself (costs £20 one-off fee to do so, and I would recommend he does it before his ex does, as that means the case is in his name, not hers). She can't ask for any more than they calculate, so she won't get beyond this figure, and he isn't then legally obliged to pay anything beyond that (he can, of course, voluntarily pay for extras). CMS base their calculation solely on his earnings, not on yours. However, why are you looking to open a joint account? If it's for bills, by all means do this, but each of you pay in just enough to cover those, and keep your own separate accounts as well, just makes life much easier.
Hopefully, others can give you more information on the self-employed side of things.
hi,
you mention that your partners ex is well-off. A lot of people out there are struggling due to the cost of living crisis. I think it's better if he sticks to the Gov CMS calculator amount. If his ex applies to CMS or he applies, he will be pretty much paying the amount that the calculator works out. He then would be entitled to claim expenses such as the fuel for the 250 mile trips, as well as reductions for child spending alternate weekend overnights with dad.
once CMS case is opened, they will check HMRC records for most recent tax year. whatever figure they see there, they will base his maintenance payments off of that. If he is yet to submit a self-assessment tax return, CMS will go by most recent tax year income. Then they review his income every year and create 12 month payment plan, known as annual review.
thank you everyone! really helpful! I will pass this all on
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