CSA arrears

baz9192

Can anybody please give me some advice. I have a 14 year old daughter from a previous relationship. I have paid maintenance through the CSA all of my life. Back in 2007, i was told to pay £82.90 a month, and i never heard anything since, until last week. I was told they were going to re-asses my payments, so i provided details of my payslips.

They told me that my new payments would be £176 a month. Fine i thought. Then they asked about the £5200 that i owe them, of which i knew nothing about. Apparently, there has been a system error, through no fault of my own and they want this money, either in a lump sum (which i dont have), or in 12 monthly payments (£433 per month). That would make my payments over £600 per month.

I am currently the main earner, as my wife is off on maternity leave (we have a 4 month old daughter). This would financially ruin us as our mortgage is nearly £900, so with other bills we would not have anything remaining.

As it is their fault, am i within my rights to say i cant pay and its your problem. I have been told that if i dont pay the full sum, they can instruct the bank to take the first monthly arrears payment on the 5th October. Can they do this?

Can anybody recommend anything, i cant stop worrying.

Thank you

PreludeForTimeFeelers

baz9192 wrote: »

Can anybody please give me some advice. I have a 14 year old daughter from a previous relationship. I have paid maintenance through the CSA all of my life. Back in 2007, i was told to pay £82.90 a month, and i never heard anything since, until last week. I was told they were going to re-asses my payments, so i provided details of my payslips.

They told me that my new payments would be £176 a month. Fine i thought. Then they asked about the £5200 that i owe them, of which i knew nothing about. Apparently, there has been a system error, through no fault of my own and they want this money, either in a lump sum (which i dont have), or in 12 monthly payments (£433 per month). That would make my payments over £600 per month.

I am currently the main earner, as my wife is off on maternity leave (we have a 4 month old daughter). This would financially ruin us as our mortgage is nearly £900, so with other bills we would not have anything remaining.

As it is their fault, am i within my rights to say i cant pay and its your problem. I have been told that if i dont pay the full sum, they can instruct the bank to take the first monthly arrears payment on the 5th October. Can they do this?

Can anybody recommend anything, i cant stop worrying.

Thank you

As its their fault, they may accept arrears spread out over a longer period, however a standard caseworker can't authorise this, it would be at team leader level, possibly higher. You need to call them up and ask for a supervisor callback. When you get this callback then it's a question of showing willing - explain that you're willing to pay but need to spread out the payments for the welfare of the child in your household. It's important to use those words.
You mentioned you now have a 4-month old child - do the CSA know this? You get a reduction in your maintenance amount to pay based on this child in your household, however the CSA can only account for this child from the time they're made aware.
Do a rough calculation yourself, put your income details into the calculator on the CMOptions site, does the amount they've calculated tally up with your own figures?

PreludeForTimeFeelers

Drat, actually this might be an 'old rules' case, in which case that calculator wouldn't work. When did the case open?

baz9192

The CSA do know about my new born, they have taken her into account. This case has been open for 12 years now. What it the chances of them wiping the debt clean since in a way it is their fault it had built up this much

Sensemaya

baz9192 wrote: »

The CSA do know about my new born, they have taken her into account. This case has been open for 12 years now. What it the chances of them wiping the debt clean since in a way it is their fault it had built up this much

I would advise you to contact your MP. Through your MP ask the CSA to provide you with an account breakdown from Day 1and whilst this is being done...which I suspect will take them quite awhile...ask them to suspend collection of arrears.

I stress this is best via your MP as there will be a paper trail and the CSA will have to do this as they will try to fob you off and will go ahead instructing your bank otherwise.

The next step is to see if the new account breakdown is different...it will be :cool:... and then you proceed to ask how and why the system error arose. Then you start on the maladminstration route...

kevin137

I believe that they cannot touch money from a joint account. So if the only details they have are an account purely in your name, then have your partner/wife added to it, it cannot be attached as they have no way of knowing who's money it is in the account in question, and the bank have an obligation to BOTH parties on the account so should not pay any request from them.

Failing that, they can only go after an account they know about, so if you have made payments form that account, close it and open another, or keep it open and open another and have wages etc paid into the new account and just transfer the correct amount for the actual payment into it every month.

PreludeForTimeFeelers

baz9192 wrote: »

What it the chances of them wiping the debt clean since in a way it is their fault it had built up this much

Non-existent. They haven't even got legislation to wipe out arrears when the PWC says they doesn't want the money, nevermind arrears that have came about as a result of an error.

You may have been shocked to get the arrears notice, but think of things from the PWC's point of view - she's been underpaid this amount for the last x amount of years.

The best you can hope for is that they spread out your repayments.

Kevin - they can do credit searches which show all open accounts for an NRP.

kevin137

PreludeForTimeFeelers wrote: »

Kevin - they can do credit searches which show all open accounts for an NRP.

I know they can do credit searches, but it could be leaving the CSA liable to charges of theft if taking money from a shared account, as they cannot prove who's money is who's...! That is what i was told by a solicitor and a judge as a actually queried it when i took my injunction and asked the CSA of there powers to take money from my account.

The judges answer was, is your account joint, which it is, and as it is a different surname for the other account holder, she advised the CSA that if they did this, i would, or the other account holder would have a case for pressing for charges of theft.

Not sure what the legislation says, but that is the advise i was given while teh CSA barrister was there...

Sensemaya

PreludeForTimeFeelers wrote: »

Non-existent. They haven't even got legislation to wipe out arrears when the PWC says they doesn't want the money, nevermind arrears that have came about as a result of an error. That depends...and how far up the complaints procedure you go. Perhaps the OP would like to contact the PWC and inform her of what's happening.

You may have been shocked to get the arrears notice, but think of things from the PWC's point of view - she's been underpaid this amount for the last x amount of years.True.But what if they have made a boo-boo? It's not unheard off.

The best you can hope for is that they spread out your repayments.The best? I disagree.

Kevin - they can do credit searches which show all open accounts for an NRP.

OP - As Prelude advised in her earlier post show willing. Keep paying the actual maintenance and offer a minimum amount in arrears ( there have probably been arrears accruing when the reassessment was carried out) until it is concluded through your MP.

One more thing. You say a reassessment of the "payments" has been carried out. Does this mean you have been reassessed on your income or that they have just decided to change the amount you pay each month?

PreludeForTimeFeelers

kevin137 wrote: »

I know they can do credit searches, but it could be leaving the CSA liable to charges of theft if taking money from a shared account, as they cannot prove who's money is who's...! That is what i was told by a solicitor and a judge as a actually queried it when i took my injunction and asked the CSA of there powers to take money from my account.

The judges answer was, is your account joint, which it is, and as it is a different surname for the other account holder, she advised the CSA that if they did this, i would, or the other account holder would have a case for pressing for charges of theft.

Not sure what the legislation says, but that is the advise i was given while teh CSA barrister was there...

I was talking about the other bit of your post, where you mentioned that they could only take money from accounts they know about - setting up a new account isn't really a viable action in my view.

baz9192

They have reassessed me because my ex has moved, so when she rang up to change details, they asked her if I should be reassessed on my income. How happy is she going to be when she finds out my payments will be doubled and I somehow need to give her 5200 pound.

I am going to see citizens advice today, then I may go down the mp route. We are also going to receive some free legal advice because my wife is part of unison.

When I receive my next phonecall (tomorrow), should I tell them? Should I ask for a breakdown of why the arrears have come to this much (i know it is their system error) and I want ut in writing. Would all of this stop at least the first payment coming out next month?