Child Support & the CSA

RustyBucket_2

Hi,
I'm new to MSE and would like some advice regarding child support & the CSA.

I've been seperated for over a year and am a full time parent with sole care of our 13 yo son. Due to health reasons I'm currently in receipt of Income Support and up until now, my estranged wife and I had a voluntary agreement regarding child support.

She has now informed me that she no longer intends paying any child support at all is it's "not convienent". When I mentioned involving the CSA she turned nasty and now refuses to even talk about paying anything.

My question is should I get the CSA involved and if so would it have any affect on my situation regarding benefits etc. I can't risk any further drop in income right now as things are very, very tight so any advice would be very welcome. Many thanks
Rusty

"One day my ship will come in....if it doesn't sink first"

Pee

How is she off financially?

I think most of the money would just go to repay the government your benefits, so probably not worthwhile unless she is doing well financially.

I'm sure someone will give you a better answer.

tigstheterror

Currently you have to still inform the Job centre plus of the fact you are in reciept of maintenance.
"From October 27 October 2008, you can keep up to £20 a week of any child maintenance paid before it affects the amount of benefit you may receive"
taken from the CSA site.
This is set to rise again to £40 by 2010 ,it is also disregarded now if you claim housing/council tax benefit,previously it had to be declared now it doesn't, so the PWC is better off to a small extent, before i am berated for saying that!! and of course when the CSA bother to pay up!
Tigs x

NAT.B_2

as other have said , you get to keep the first £20 MA the rest with go to SOS. Depending on her wages

Lil2002

If you go to the CSA, you will be treated as a private client, and all the maintenance collected will be paid to you. It will be up to you to declare the money to the Job Centre, and they will disregard £20 of any money paid to you.

There were changes in October 2008 - on a new case, no money would be kept from you.

Soubrette

RustyBucket wrote: »

Hi,
I'm new to MSE and would like some advice regarding child support & the CSA.

I've been seperated for over a year and am a full time parent with sole care of our 13 yo son. Due to health reasons I'm currently in receipt of Income Support and up until now, my estranged wife and I had a voluntary agreement regarding child support.

She has now informed me that she no longer intends paying any child support at all is it's "not convienent". When I mentioned involving the CSA she turned nasty and now refuses to even talk about paying anything.

My question is should I get the CSA involved and if so would it have any affect on my situation regarding benefits etc. I can't risk any further drop in income right now as things are very, very tight so any advice would be very welcome. Many thanks
Rusty

"One day my ship will come in....if it doesn't sink first"

Some NRPs want all the bloody benefits and none of the disadvantages :mad:

To your problem though Rusty, I personally would go through the CSA in this instance. It is my opinion that if you are a client on benefits then the CSA are much more diligant in ensuring that the NRP pays the amount recommended by the government eg on CSA2 15% of net income for one child. Although a proportion of your maintenance may be swallowed up by benefits now, it may be that in the future you come off benefits but the NRP will have been thoroughly investigated anyway.

The other option is to negotiate - if she will not pay you directly then will she buy things for the child directly? However, this way means that you have to trust her - I'm not sure I would trust anyone who stopped paying maintenance because its 'not convenient'.

Good luck

Sou