How far does your child maintenance go?

TotallyBroke

The maintenance I get (when I get it) is £100 pm so £23 pw.
Childcare element of WTC is £96 pw.
Child benefit is £20 pw.
So in total for my ds I get £139 pw

It costs me £150 pw for a childminder so I can work.
So £150-96-20 = £34 minus my half = £17
So Ex's maintenamce pays this and then I have £6 pw for all other costs.
So already I am down before I start with any other costs.

loobyloo0302

See, techniclly, this is quite a complicated issue.. see, I live with the father of my kids, however, his financial contribution towards them is £0.. I buy the nappies, milk, food wipes, clothes, shoes etc.. his answer to that is that he pays the rent.. which keeps a roof over his OWN head also... oh and I pay the bills. I'd go as far as saying that his ex wife probably gets more of a financial contribution towards their two kids than I get towards mine.. so how is that fair? As we both work, (although I only work 24 hours per week) there are no benefits other than CTC and CB, which obviously with CTC his ex will get at a higher rate as she is a lone parent, and whatever else she recieves.. sometimes I'd say its not the PWC that gets the raw end

Blonde_Bint

I'm coming to that conclusion to sometimes. Whos better off, the nrpp or the pwc? its not always the nrpp who gets the advantages.

I had 2 friends who were sick to the back teeth of ther dh's pwc, so they left couldnt take it anymore, so divorces it was, both said financially they were much better off plus added bonus the nrp now helps with the child by looking after child for them when necessary, both said they felt more like a single parent when they were with their nrps:D

and I have to say when/if our pwc starts again I wont be taking it because I dont have to, if I cant stop her actions at least if I leave I can get away from her.

nadine273

Ivrytwr3 wrote: »

Mine gets me 5 - 6 pints a week in the local and few packs of 20 cigs; used to get me a lot more

:T

Shocking!!! :eek:
You should be getting enough to buy at least 10 pints/week and 20 cigs everyday.
I shall start a campaign on your behalf!

Soubrette

shell_542 wrote: »

If both PWC and NRP are willing and able, wouldn't it be sensible financially to have 50/50 residence. Then both parents would be contributing a fair amount to the household costs. And just share the other expenses 50/50.

If an NRP has become an NRP by the PWC deciding they wanted to end a relationship should they be expected to run another household 52 weeks of the year with enough room for the child to stay in and then have to contribute to the other house the child is living in too, when they have the room for the child to stay there more often.

When I say able in the first paragraph, I'm obviously talking about parents who still live near eachother, close to schools, can practically have 50/50 residence. So obviously it wouldnt work for those NRP's who walk out and want nothing moree to do with the children, cannot see them so much due to work etc etc.

I'm not looking to be jumped on and called an idiot for proposing this if others think its a stupid idea, just thinking out loud about possibilities to over come the squabbles with CS.

I think it is a great idea - one of the big opportunity costs for a PWC is the time spent with the children, being the one that has to come home if they are ill, often being the one that works part time with the low wages and poor prospects associated with this. It would also give the NRP a wake up call when out on a date as many people aren't interested in parents as potential partners, yes they can put up with the kids visiting a few weekends a month but not more full on.

If all time and money could somehow be evened out between the two families then each parent would still be a parent ie a child would have two homes rather than a home and the one they visited every other weekend.

The only problem I can see is that you would have to have much more severe guidelines on what would be expected from a parent for example if you had a workaholic parent, it would be wrong for a 7 year old child to have to let themselves in from school and be alone until their parent arrives home at 8, or be expected to be alone all day when ill at that young an age because the parent has already used up their holidays and work frowns on unpaid leave.

Of course there are other practicalities when they are small such as breastfeeding etc but if there is a will then there would be a way.

In theory brilliant idea - in practice I don't believe people have the will to make it work plus it takes both parents to do it but only one for the whole thing to come crashing down. I'd like to see a move towards this though from society in general.

Sou

nadine273

loobyloo0302 wrote: »

See, techniclly, this is quite a complicated issue.. see, I live with the father of my kids, however, his financial contribution towards them is £0.. I buy the nappies, milk, food wipes, clothes, shoes etc.. his answer to that is that he pays the rent.. which keeps a roof over his OWN head also... oh and I pay the bills. I'd go as far as saying that his ex wife probably gets more of a financial contribution towards their two kids than I get towards mine.. so how is that fair? As we both work, (although I only work 24 hours per week) there are no benefits other than CTC and CB, which obviously with CTC his ex will get at a higher rate as she is a lone parent, and whatever else she recieves.. sometimes I'd say its not the PWC that gets the raw end

Your story is sooooooooo scary because it is as if you are me.
I paid for everything too when I was with my ex.
I felt I was a single mum despite not -technically- being one.
Because of that -and other reasons too- I left him!

Soubrette

loobyloo0302 wrote: »

See, techniclly, this is quite a complicated issue.. see, I live with the father of my kids, however, his financial contribution towards them is £0.. I buy the nappies, milk, food wipes, clothes, shoes etc.. his answer to that is that he pays the rent.. which keeps a roof over his OWN head also... oh and I pay the bills. I'd go as far as saying that his ex wife probably gets more of a financial contribution towards their two kids than I get towards mine.. so how is that fair? As we both work, (although I only work 24 hours per week) there are no benefits other than CTC and CB, which obviously with CTC his ex will get at a higher rate as she is a lone parent, and whatever else she recieves.. sometimes I'd say its not the PWC that gets the raw end

I assume he doesn't pay for her rent though :eek:

More seriously, although I use my own family as an example and my own salary and how much the girls have cost me - in reality they are part of our little family with any money that my husband and I earning being put in a shared pot.

You may choose to divide up the money into rent/bills/cost of children etc but in reality it is both your money being used for the benefit of both of you, for example say rent costs £200 and bills cost £200 - you may say that one pays the rent and one pays the bills but the reality of the situation is that £400 of money is being paid for these things whether from single accounts or whatever, and each of you are benefitting from the others contribution.

I do think half the problem is that people are very rigid about what money is spent where so if for example a PWC smokes a pack a day and spends £35 a week on it and the NRP pays £35 a week child maintenance, the assumption is that the child maintenance money is spent on cigarettes. Of course other money is spent on the child but this is all discounted in the fags and beer argument as in 'all my maintenance is spent on fags and beer and none of it on my child'.

On a more personal note - I would not be happy with a person with such a defined view of what was his and mine moneywise but if it works for you then good luck with it

Sou

Dancing_Shoes

I won't deny that we have a much larger income than our pwc. That said we do make large contributions in other ways on top of our csa payments. In our case our payments would cover (estimated of course) as much as the children cost the pwc (and maybe a bit more) but that is because my husband earns a very good salary. For someone who's partner is on benefits etc and they only have to pay £5 (not sure if thats right:o) then obviously it is all down to the pwc/state to raise their child financially (no shame in claiming benefits though). It is one of the reasons that I think it would be great if a 3rd party looked at income and expenditure for both parents and judged a 50/50 split of the childcare costs and for those nrp's who can contribute more on top of this then they should be allowed to put the remaining into savings etc for their children. Obviously I wouldn't be for splitting our salaries 50/50 as we also have children to support and having walked away with nothing from his divorce my husband had to start from scratch and our pwc did not so in many ways the money has evened itself out to a certain degree. I don't think that many pwc's "live it up" on their child maintenance money in fact I actually think the opposite I think many barely get by on what they get so I don't think the csa is doing a great job for either side. (no offence to Kelloggs as she is fantastic:D)
Maybe if both parties were made to attend some sort of mediation when they seperated/divorced to try and work through their issues for the sake of the children then this would help as I think the majority of people that maintenance goes wrong for are the people who aren't on any sort of speaking terms.

Dancing_Shoes

Blonde_Bint wrote: »

I'm coming to that conclusion to sometimes. Whos better off, the nrpp or the pwc? its not always the nrpp who gets the advantages.

I had 2 friends who were sick to the back teeth of ther dh's pwc, so they left couldnt take it anymore, so divorces it was, both said financially they were much better off plus added bonus the nrp now helps with the child by looking after child for them when necessary, both said they felt more like a single parent when they were with their nrps:D

and I have to say when/if our pwc starts again I wont be taking it because I dont have to, if I cant stop her actions at least if I leave I can get away from her.

NO BLONDIE!!:eek:
You must not let your pwc break up a 2nd family:mad:
If she starts her tirade again pm me as we have had to go down the formal route due to things deteriorating so badly that we worried for the safety of our children:mad: I can send you any details of what you need to do but rest assured there are legal ways to deal with what you have been through:T
Really sad thing is that i'm sure the children of the 2nd family aren't seen as much as victims as the children from the 1st when it comes to marriage break-ups:(
Does your pwc know that if you break-up and you set up a csa case 9or court order) she will be paid alot less

chriszzz

:)

Dancing_Shoes wrote: »

NO BLONDIE!!:eek:
You must not let your pwc break up a 2nd family:mad:
If she starts her tirade again pm me as we have had to go down the formal route due to things deteriorating so badly that we worried for the safety of our children:mad: I can send you any details of what you need to do but rest assured there are legal ways to deal with what you have been through:T
Really sad thing is that i'm sure the children of the 2nd family aren't seen as much as victims as the children from the 1st when it comes to marriage break-ups:(
Does your pwc know that if you break-up and you set up a csa case 9or court order) she will be paid alot less

I agree with Dancing Shoes!! Dont let the pwc care get to you, this is what some of them want.
Our pwc is the most manipulative, evil, selfish mother that I have ever come across and there have been times when I have thought Its just to hard, but take her out of the equation and me and my OH get on great, so now we try not raise to the bait and if she wants to mess her kids head up, let it be on her own selfish cruel head
Dont do it Binty!!! ((HUGS AND KISSES)) we know what it can be like, so cmon chin up missus