CSA threatening liability order - help!!

Kath_999

Hi there, my husband has just received a letter threatening a liability order against him for unpaid maintenance, and wondered if anyone can help with some questions....

The kids are now grown up and self sufficient, so the arrears are historic - 200 - 2003. Basically like many others on here he paid maintenance money to the children to give to their mother as he and his ex wife are on very bad terms (since she left him with a mountain of debt and took off with the kids to live with her boyfriend!). So there is no proof of payment, the amount of payment was agreed between him and his ex-wife and he never had a letter from CSA stating how much he should be paying, he just got a letter a couple of years later out of the blue saying he owed money. As he'd already paid his wife directly (it was agreed between them to give the money to the kids) he didn't pay and the CSA were impossible to get any sense out of, the letters of arrears came every now and then and were ignored (he's a head in the sand kind of chap). For many years the kids lived with my husband and not their mother anyway!!

I'll stop rambling, my questions are:

Can we query the amount they are asking for (they want £21k within 7 days for a 3 year period when he was earning approx £10k per year self employed), and if so how do we go about this?

If we manage to settle this will that be the end of it? Can they come back in a few years and say he owes more money for other years??!!

About 2 years ago one of the letters offered a settlement figure of £6,000 as his ex wife had agreed she'd had the rest. So how can this now be £21k, as no arrears have accumulated since as they are both over 20 years old now.

I don't want to loose our home so I'm tempted to beg steal and borrow to riase the money and pay up, but if anyone can offer an words if wisdom I'd be really grateful!

Thanks, Kath

kelloggs36

No money which is paid to the children can be classed as maintenance. You need to ask for a breakdown of the arrears and how they accumulated plus a copy of the assessment that it was based on.

Kath_999

Thanks for that, I'll contact them and ask for that. What about the 7 days "pay or else", I don't imagine I'll get that info from them in 7 days, so what happens then?? Does it get "frozen" pending such enquiries?

kelloggs36

If he is self employed, they must seek a liability order in order to be able to take legal action to recover the debt - that will take a couple of months - courts are notoriously slow!

It may be based on an interim assessment which means that they were unable to calculate an actual liability based on income figures and housing costs etc because they didn't have them. If the 21k is based on 3 years worth of maintenance, then this is highly likely to be the case.

He can request that it be converted to a proper assessment by submitting all the information needed to do this, ie tax returns, housing costs and evidence of your income etc. You need to establish the effective date and relevant week to be able to do this. They should be able to tell him that over the phone - and if it is an IMA A assessment (interim maintenance assessment category A). If they convert it it, it may reduce considerably - especially if he has low earnings

Kath_999

Thanks that's really helpful, we'll contact them tomorrow and will keep you posted!

NACSA_CHAIR

i agree with Kelloggs...sounds like an IMA is involved, so you need to check with the caseworker. If they confirm IMAs are involved ask them to confirm what info they need to get that IMA converted. If necessary, this can be sufficient grounds to ask the courts to postpone any LO application...

Kath_999

If it is an IMA do they have to convert it if we can supply all the necessary info, or can they refuse? Do we ask the CSA directly to postpone the LO if indeed IMA's are involved? Thanks for your help at this very difficult time, Kath.

blimey40

I would like to know why it took the CSA 12 years to write a letter?, then expect payment within 7 days which has happened in my case. I was in similar position as never heard from them and ressurected a relationship with my daughter from about 1998 and paid happily till about 2005. She is now 23.

I am sure the liability order cannot be issued without you knowing previously. More of a concern is the baliff's knocking if you do nothing. They normally pass the arrears onto a company called Marsdens, who will be knocking within about 4 weeks of the liability order being served.

I have no fixed abode, so they can take a run and a jump for the money. CSA do not even know about my personal circumstances and just trying to fill the governement coffers.

one question that does not seem to be answered is this

In regards to arrears I am sure they cannot back before July 2000, so why do the CSA pursue with adding the figure in?

pd001

blimey40 wrote: »

I am sure the liability order cannot be issued without you knowing previously. More of a concern is the baliff's knocking if you do nothing. They normally pass the arrears onto a company called Marsdens, who will be knocking within about 4 weeks of the liability order being served.

I have no fixed abode, so they can take a run and a jump for the money. CSA do not even know about my personal circumstances and just trying to fill the governement coffers.

I am in a similar situation.....no fixed abode..

I was renting a room in a house, but the csa then decided to take 65% of my net take home pay using a deo. I am a low paid worker.
This meant that I got behind with rent.

In the meantime the csa decide to get bailiffs on my case. The bailiffs wrote to the address where I was living, asking for payment of my arrears, and of course I had to tell the house owner what was going on.

I was then asked to leave due to the rent arrears.The impending visit of the bailiffs didn't help matters either, and I had to live in my vehicle for a while.....nightmare!

The upshot is that although the csa have a confident address to use for correspondance, as do the dvla, I don't actually live there. (This confident address is required by law)

I am officially homeless and not entitled to any state benefit at all.

The csa are not now taking 65% of my net take home wage, they are now taking the correct amount of 40%. It has taken 7 months to get them to take the correct amount by deo. I am in arrears with all sorts of stuff now and at this rate I will never be able to afford to rent a room again

Kath_999

Update... just spoke to the CSA and you're right, it was an interim assessment. They have said it can be converted to a proper assessment if we send in tax returns from the start of the claim - that was 1993. However the liability order is only from 2000, so it looks like there are more arrears prior to 2000 that they are after, we have been told the total bill is in excess of £40k! I just hope we can get the info we need from HMRC and get this amount reduced, this must be the most stressful thing 've ever been through, and they're not even my kids!! They are my husbands kids, all grown up and earning more than we do!!

blimey40

I think this becoming more commonplace. These children are now young adults. My argument is the ineffieciency of the CSA.

Why has it taken it this long to track or contact PWC's, bearing in mind the've had the same information on them going back years and it could have all been sorted amicablly. All these stories you hear provides the presumption that no-one has actually moved on and were perfectly traceable over the last 10-15 years, otherwise they would not be receiving demands now.