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Hello, I am looking for help to understand my partners situation so I can empathise with him better.
He is a loving and committed father to a 7 year old. At age 1 he became the stay at home dad while the mother pursued her career. The mother left when the child was 3, he took on part time work and continued to do the majority of childcare (child sleeps at each home 50/50 but he does after school care and virtually all additional duties - healthcare appointments/homework/parents evening etc.... He has been the resident parent since the break up, and therefore has been in receipt of benefits - half of which was paid to the mother.
After 2 years of dating I have now moved in with dad and child. Our combined income/assets mean he is no longer eligible for any means tested benefits and his payment to the mother has reduced. She has responded angrily and has now requested that the child be listed as living at her address in order that she can claim a small amount of benefits (less than £50 per month).
My partner feels that the main priority is not upsetting the mother so much that she causes disruption in his child's life, so it seems he would prefer either to change the address or pay the mother what she would get in benefits to prevent things becoming overly acrimonious.
While the sums of money are low I am supporting his decision to pay off the mother what she would receive in benefits. However, we are struggling to agree what would happen should her circumstances change and her benefit claim rise to larger sums of money.
My concern is that offering her status as resident parent could later cause difficulties should she wish to move to another city or change childcare arrangements to suit her needs over and above what might be in their child's best interest.
To what extent should my partner protect his status as the resident parent?
Any suggestions, information or relevant experiences would be much appreciated 🙂
Hi There,
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I agree with you that it wouldn't be a very good move to change the residential status of the child involved, this would have lots of implications, not just finacial or if the mother wanted to move,
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The biggest that springs to mind would be travel abroad, if the mother becomes resident parent, you would then need her permisions to travel abroad, at the moment with residency if you want to travel abroad for a holiday you would be able to without permision from the mother.
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If it were me I wouldn't want to change the residency.
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I would also question if things were the other way around would the mother look to make these changes to help your partnner out?
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GTTS
Does your partner have a court order that states that the child lives with him? Which address is the child registered at with school/GPs?
If this is an informal arrangement, without a court order, the mother could reduce the number of overnights and claim the Chld Benefit and also maintenance on top of that.
If the child is registered with school and doctors at your address, to consolidate his position, he would be advised to apply for a Chld Arrangements Order to say that the child lives with him ... but the mother could contest this and there are no guarantees the court would find in his favour.
If court is something he wants to pursue, he would have to attempt mediation first to try and resolve this, if mediation fails, the mediator would sign the form to enable court action.
If at any point he fears that the mother is intending to move away, he could apply for an urgent Prohibited Steps Order to try and prevent it, in that instance mediation wouldn't be a requirement.
The least painful way for you all, if the situation is bearable, would be to reach agreement with the mother in my opinion. If money is her motivation and she realises she just has to apply to get the child benefit and child maintenance, you may find the time the child stays would be reduced.
Thank you for your comments, it's good to hear from people with insight into these complex situations.
My personal opinion is that he should not offer resident parent status to the mother, as I see how hard fathers have had to fight to even get contact should mothers choose to act in obstructive ways, and unfortunately I do not trust the mothers motives as we have seen plenty of evidence of self-interested behaviour previously. But I have to do the emotional hard work of facing the fact despite loving the child dearly I'm not the child's parent, she has a mother and a father so what they agree about parenting is between them. Currently all agreements are informal and verbal, and for my partner child arrangements and and court action are the absolute last resort. Unfortunately, despite being initially supportive of his relationship with me relations have deteriorated since we've moved in together and if something isn't done to bring things back to more rational interaction I can see things spiralling into legal action in the end.
I did however find a link to information about Parenting Plans on another thread which really helped me find a resolution I can have more peace with. I have asked my partner to write a parenting plan with his ex so their expectations can be put down in black and white and she can reconfirm her verbal commitment to keep the child in the same city unless both parents agree to a move. Moving is our greatest concern as she spends most of her work and social life in other cities. I'm not too concerned about trips abroad, I don't think she'd have a problem with that, and if she did we'd make the most of what the UK has to offer!
He's happy as I've reaffirmed my trust in him by suggesting the parenting plan but trusting them to sort it out together and I'm happy as we now have a benchmark by which any unreasonable behaviour on her part can immediately be identified and mediation started - and a record can be built for (hopefully unnecessary) any future court action.
Thanks to Dad.info for the useful info 🙂
Things mat be Ok at the moment, but if the ex gets a partner who makes life difficult, then the status quo can change in an instant. If her motive is the benefits, then theres could be trouble ahead, and in all probability, a child maintenance claim on your partner.
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