CSA and Benefits in kind

Stoopid

Apologies if the information is already on here somewhere - I have spent hours trawling without success - everyone has different cases :cool:

In an nutshell, my ex receives benefits in kind - Company car etc.
All legit, all declared to tax man, and to the courts in the divorce, but...
CSA insist that they exclude all his benefits from his INCOME for calculating maintenance payments.i.e they only take his salary, not his income.
If they included the value of the benefits ( what the Tax man say the benefits are worth) it would nearly double the maintenance payments he should be making.
But they won't include it, so he isn't, so I am struggling.

I cannot believe he is the only NRP who has a company car, private health care etc, so hopefully someone can advise me

Thanks in advance

Gloomy_Past_Bright_Future

If this is declared as benefits in kind, he will be paying for these "benefits", through his tax code, as he will have a lower tax code.

CSA look at take home income, nothing else.

Stoopid

Gloomy_Past_Bright_Future wrote: »

If this is declared as benefits in kind, he will be paying for these "benefits", through his tax code, as he will have a lower tax code.

CSA look at take home income, nothing else.

Thanks for your reply - but surely this is completely illogical
Anyone in paid employment is paying for their income (whether salary or bonus etc) through their tax code, but they still have to pay maintenance on their Income.
SCENARIO 1
A man gets promotion, and is due a £10,000 payrise, but says to boss, would you buy me a car, pay for all the car expenses, pay my mortgage, and pay for my 3 week world cruise etc instead, up to the value of the £10,000, so the tax man and the csa don't know I have been promoted.

Well, he and his employer HAVE to declare this to the Rev & Customs, and he gets taxed accordingly - as though his pay had risen by £10,000.
So, the Rev & customs dept. count this benefit as Income.
Working Tax Credit dept count this as Income,
EMA dept count this as Income
The courts count this as income
But not the csa.

If he had simply taken the £10,000 payrise the csa would count it, but because it is paid "In Kind" they chose to ignore it. It is worth exactly the same in financial terms to him and his employer - hence every other gov department include it as income.

SCENARIO 2
If instead of a £20,000 yearly bonus, a man is given shares worth £10,000 in the company, and they agree to pay his childs Private school fees of £10,000. The Rev & Customs realise it is just a back handed way of him receiving financial benefit, by virtue of his employment, and so they count it as Income. He pays tax on that Income, just like everyone else ( inc me) pays tax on their income.

Just because tax is paid on something does not mean it shouldn't be included in his income. If it did, then every NRP who pays Income tax would not have to pay child maintenance.

Why are the CSA the ONLY gov body ( I can find so far) who chose to ignore it ?

Cozworth806

Buy paying more tax though he will pay less CSM, whereas a person who receives a payment in lieu of a company car would pay proportionally more as the additional payment would also be taken into account.

The CSA3 system should sort this out but as for now there is little you can do but complain to your MP.

jacklink

csa 1 never worked - csa 2 never worked - csa 3, sorry cmec, well who knows but it seems to be another waste of money

Stoopid

Cozworth806 wrote: »

Buy paying more tax though he will pay less CSM, whereas a person who receives a payment in lieu of a company car would pay proportionally more as the additional payment would also be taken into account.

The CSA3 system should sort this out but as for now there is little you can do but complain to your MP.

Exactly Cozworth806. :T
I'm glad you understand the maths, because the CSA don't.
They argue that because he has declared it to the Tax dept, they cannot count it twice.
But they exclude the extra tax he pays because of it, so I receive less maintenance than if he didn't get all the benefits. Sheer madness !!
He is laughing all the way to the bank, while I'm left cutting out coupons.

Is there anybody who has ever confessed to thinking up the way the csa works (or rather doesn't) and for how it calculates anything ? Presumably they got a hefty Golden Handshake and an obscene pension courtesy of the tax-payers - inc me !!

I think everyone I have ever spoken to at the CSA have never progressed past Key Stage 1 maths. There must be someone there who actually knows what they are doing. Am I just unlucky that I have never found them ? or are the powers that be so embarrassed to have someone competent on the payroll, that they have set them on doing the filing for all eternity ?

kelloggs36

it isn't a matter of being bad at maths but it forms part of the rules. you can always appeal.

Stoopid

kelloggs36 wrote: »

it isn't a matter of being bad at maths but it forms part of the rules. you can always appeal.

So is this definitely in the Rules ????

To date the CSA say they don't include benefits, but all the stuff on their website says they use the NRP Income - NOT just salary. Gloomy Past Bright Future said in their reply (post2) "CSA look at take home income"

Benefits in kind are income - hence they are taxed as part of the Income Tax rules - or Rev & Customs now.
CSA have yet to show me where their rules specifically say to exclude it. They have simply said they do not count it because it is declared to the tax man, therefore they cannot count it twice. This is where I came in with my point about bad maths - they never have included it at all, so how can they double count it ??

If it is in the rules, is that it then ? He wins, enjoys all the perks and suns himself on another foreign holiday and watches his bank balance grow ?
Presumably if they have written down somewhere in their rules that they exclude the Mercedes, the company expense account, private health insurance, the clothing allowance, the use of the company penthouse in New York and the Villa in the Bahamas and the Gold Sovereigns he got at Christmas, then that is it. From everything I read on here you guys have enough of a fight on your hands getting the CSA to abide by their own rules. So if their rules actually say he can get away with all this - that is me done for. I will have to sell the house. Simple as that.

This also ties in with my comment about whoever thought up the way the CSA work and calculate maintenance.
EVERY other gov body I can find so far specifically include benefits as income. They even tell you to look on your P11D etc, which box to look at for finding your INCOME figure if you do have benefits in kind.
e.g this is from the Tax Credit website

"By ’household income’ we mean money you (and your partner if you have one) have coming in each year including:

• your wages and benefits from employment"

Sharree

Does he spend much time with the kids? surely if you are finding it hard, and he has the system "sewn up" maybe suggest shared custody. Im not really in a position to take sides as we have problems with the ex using the system to her advantage, lying and getting away with i,t because of the systems failings and just generally being one sided, but there must be a way around your problem. Surly if he has all these "perks" it would benefit your children to be a part of them.

Hawkmoon69

I may add that for assessment the CSA did count all my previous 12months overtime and bonuses and came up with a terribly high figure for CSM the following year I had no overtime whatsoever and bonuses were the worst in 7yrs but this didn't matter to them as they were getting their pound of flesh from me. I didn't have a TV that year so when the kids came round they couldnt understand. When the ice cream van was in the street my daughter just looked at me pleadingly, i never had anything to spend. That was really hard. I will never forgive their mother for sticking it to like that as she could easily have stopped the claim and dealt with me....she had done it before and even wiped out the arrears but not this time.

Good luck

kelloggs36

Try finding some commissioners' decisions on the issue on www1osscsc.gov.uk click on decisions and put in child support and it is a matter of searching - I know there is a quite recent one about benefits in kind regarding vehicles.