Help required in obtaining an advance payment of arrears from CSA

Debicj

I am owed a substantial amount of arrears that built up largely due to the CSA failing to carry out a reassessment for several years. This was slowly being paid off by the NRP as a DEO was in place but this failed when he changed jobs several months ago and at present I am not getting any payments. It is likely to be several more months until the CSA reassess and the DEO is implemented again. In any case, it will take around 3 years for the arrears to be paid in full if they are paid at the amount agreed between the NRP and the CSA.

Does anyone have any experience of getting an 'Advance payment of arrears' from the CSA? I have searched for info on this but I can't find much. Any advice would be appreciated, because if I could get all the arrears paid to me in one go, it would help our family's financial situation greatly.

I have written to the CSA requesting an advance payment, but 6 weeks later, I still haven't had a reply! :mad:

Sensemaya

They will not pay you all the arrears.

Please PM me with your email address and I will send you the criteria.

Have you started the complaints procedure?

dizzydusty

Hi,

I dont understand why the CSA are taking so long to re assess, unless of course the NRP is deliberately withholding information or not cooperating. My case is clerical, at it has taken 13 weeks for a re assessment and a further 13 weeks for it to get through quality, I am currently waiting to see if a DEO will be acted on at the end of June.

With regard to advance payment of maintenance, you will need to show that the CSA have been negligent in the handling of your case or caused undue delay. The CSA will also want 6 months regular maintenance payments to have been made by the NRP before they will consider any Financial redress for maladministration or advance payments - I know this as they have rejected my request for advanced payments of maintenance as my NRP hasnt paid anything while they were re assessing him. I am citing unnecessary delay by the CSA as they took 9 months to eventually change my case to clerical as it was stuck in the system and then do an initial assessment.

Their guidance does say however, that lesser regular payments can be considered in certain circumstances, and that they can also taken into consideration previous payments (such as your DEO payments). The guy that rejected mine is sticking to the 6 months minimum payment - but I am going to request that it is reconsidered and will be quoting the relevant paragraphs of guidance to them. They have said to me that I can put in a new request once 6 months maintenance payments have been made by the ex.

Chase up your request - I had to go to my MP to get things moving as Bolton wouldn't do anything while my case was being reassessed - apparently this is nonsense according to Falkirk!

I would also put in a claim for compensation due to the unacceptable delays on your case - you will need to list what they are of course. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Best of Luck.

Dizzy

Sensemaya

Dizzy

Have you got the Criteria in all it's glory? If not please PM me with your email address and I'll FW it on.

I've had an ongoing problem with Bolton since Jan 09 and it's still not rectified. MP been involved since Oct 09.

Good Luck.

Debicj

Thanks for your replies. I have already had compensation for the delays/errors etc. I wish I had known about the possibility of the advance payment when I sorted all that out, then I could have done it all in one go!

However, I have only recently realised that I may be entitled to an advance payment and as you will know, getting the CSA to respond to requests/complaints etc. is a long process.

DaisyChainMaker

The problem is that you are a clerical case. I am also on a clerical basis, which means they have to do everything manually (old fashioned pen and paper) and this is more time consuming than just using the computer. So every time there is a change of circumstances (my ex husband has one every few months), they take upto 20 weeks to sort out the paperwork and the assessment.

You also have to keep informing them if you don't receive a payment, and chase them for every single thing, as they do not have the computer to automatically generate alerts or do tasks, so they only do things when you prompt them to do so. Blooming annoying. And once you are a clerical case, you don't go back to going on the computer either.

I had this explained to me, this week. After I emailed my MP to try and sort them out. Within three days of emailing my MP ..I had the csa on the telephone explaining things, and also suprisingly sorting out the DEO to my ex husband again. Has taken six months to get this done, since his latest change of circumstances.

Good luck x