Can CSA ask employer for employee's earnings?

bob_dob

Hi,
Apologies for the naive question as i know nothing about this subject but id like to know the following-
A friend at work pays roughly £310 for his three children.
The last 6 months he has been working up to 70 hours per month overtime so his take home pay has increased greatly.

He is up in arms today because he has received a copy of a letter that the CSA has sent his employer asking them if there has been any 'significant change' in his hours or wages.
He claims that this is in breach of the data protection act as they have to ask his permission first? And that his employer is under no obligation to tell them?

Please could someone clear this up for me/him?

DUTR

He would have recieved an MEF form, at which point the last 2 months or 5 weeks payslips would be required, if the NRP in the above has not suplied this then the CSA can apply for a DEO and the employer is supposed to comply by furnishing pay details. The PWC can't ask for those.

bob_dob

Apologies but what is NRP and PWC?

gingergee

non respondent parent and parent with care (i think!!) and they do this to see what, if any overtime has been earned x

kimnhol

I believe Csa do random checks every now and again but it is normally due to the parent with custody getting wind of a change to the non parents circumstances and informing the csa.

Blob

Hi

PWC; Parent With Care
NRP; Non Resident Parent [ a new bred of villain]

Yes the CSA can and do ask for information from an employer, and under Section 32 of the relevant Statutory Instrument they can be find up to £1,000 if they fail to supply this. All said and done some employers are now taking that stand point that they will not get involved and refuse to help!

PreludeForTimeFeelers

bob_dob wrote: »

Hi,
Apologies for the naive question as i know nothing about this subject but id like to know the following-
A friend at work pays roughly £310 for his three children.
The last 6 months he has been working up to 70 hours per month overtime so his take home pay has increased greatly.

He is up in arms today because he has received a copy of a letter that the CSA has sent his employer asking them if there has been any 'significant change' in his hours or wages.
He claims that this is in breach of the data protection act as they have to ask his permission first? And that his employer is under no obligation to tell them?

Please could someone clear this up for me/him?

They would usually try to phone him or send him a letter to ask him for up-to-date wage details, perhaps the parent with care had informed the CSA that she had reason to believe he was earning more.

His employer is legally obligated to co-operate with the CSA.

adamantine

yes they can if the NRP doesnt provide the requested information. in the case of my NRP he totally ignores anything to do with the CSA or the solicitors re the divorce or contact so the CSA needs to go via his employers to get his wage slips every year following his pay increase.

its not really against data protection when its legally required information the CSA have the right to IMO

gointhru

yes they can and will deduct at source an example of this is nrp working 12 hrs per day 5 days and 6 hrs sat, every week they take the whole lot in to thier calcuations meaning the payment every month was £891 leaving 1600 take home for doing all the overtime !!!, i would say stick to the min working hours,

Fission

Going back to the original question, no, it isn't a breach of anything for the CSA to ask an employer about your friend's earnings and they don't need his permssion. They are entitled to the information and it is an obvious necessary measure to make it practical to update assessments in the face of reluctance to provide information.

Your friend's best bet might be to argue for a year to date approach (averaging the increase out since the start of the tax year).

bob_dob

Thank you all, they are very informative answers and i appreciate them.

It would appear my friend now has a 'plan'(don't be harsh about this to me as it is NOT my idea, it's his and i take no responsibility for it!)
Ok, his plan is to start a private pension, put 99% of his take home pay into it, provide his monthly payslip to the CSA but also provide them with the 'proof' of him putting 99% of his take home pay into this pension.....then stopping the pension. Then doing the same again, if the CSA ask for his payslip again. And so on.
His belief is that 'the CSA can't touch what you put into a pension'.

Now is this an amateurish attempt at defrauding the CSA that is bound to fail.....or is he a genius who has found the loophole to end all loopholes?
Answers please.....