Can a father sue child for return of maintenance money?

zzzLazyDaisy

I am not really interested in the 'moral' ins and outs (I'm a lawyer, take from that what you will).

However for what it is worth, in my view, and on the information given, legally your sister is not under any obligation to pay the money back.

Why? Firstly because the court order concerned your father and your mother. Your sister was not a party to the order. The fact that, within the family, it was agreed that the money would be paid directly to her is irrelevant.

Secondly, under a court order, the maintenance continues to be due and payable until either the last date for payment is reached and the order expires, or some intervening event happens (such as the child ceasing full time education) and the paying party asks the court to revoke the order. The fact that he continued to pay and took no action to have the court order revoked, even though he knew that she was no longer in F/T education, is down to him. If he does wish to reclaim the money, he would have to make an application to the court that made the original order, but even then the case would concern himself and your mother - your sister would not be involved.

Hope this helps

NAR

Surely the court order would have run out when the mother no longer received Child Benefit for the girl?

daska

NAR wrote: »

Surely the court order would have run out when the mother no longer received Child Benefit for the girl?

If it were maintenance arranged via the CSA then yes, but not under a Court Order, that's a separate agreement. Orders for maintenance can include lifetime awards if that's what's agreed. One party has to apply to the Court to change the terms - and if the Court doesn't agree the Order stands.

System

If my Father was as bad as the OPs Father was i wouldnt have wanted a penny off him. To receive it i would have felt hypocritical.

globetraveller

People seem to have taken the allegation of abuse and bullying by another family member as gospel. The OP didn't say she or her sister waere abused or bullied as a child. Also going by the mothers coersion to keep taking the money, perhaps she has clouded their view of their dad as they were both young when he left. Also she has NOT said he has threatened court. She is assuming that he will be doing that. Lets face it, he has given £700 a month for years without any problems( or we would have heard about them). OP thinks he is a s*** but it doesn't sound too bad to me.
The only thing we do know is that younger sister has continued as an adult to take his money, but wont have any other contact with him( a bit hypocritical) so perhaps he has just got fed up with being treated as an ATM only.
And no _ I don't think he will take them to court. I don't think legallly he would win, not sure about morally though

ValHaller

Leakrgn wrote: »

My father always was and still continues to be a bit of a s**t but we did our best to persevere.

You are all chips off the same block, to mix our metaphors. But I think he is smarter than the rest of you.

As zzzLD points out, any case to recover the money will be against your mother. Not only was it hypocritical of your sister to continue to accept the money, while remaining estranged - it was also rather foolish.

As you say, your father knew full well your sister was no longer studying. But now he has potential grounds to sue your mother and regain a lot of influence over your lives because he probably knows that between you, you will not be able to pay him off. Thus he can get his payback in other ways.

southoftheriver

It is extremely frustrating when people say "he can't have been that bad if he's giving you all of this money" and words to that effect. People can and do do bad things despite having and giving away money. Of course we only have your side of the story but thats no reason to believe what you are saying. Money doesn't dictate character.

On the other hand, people are right when they say that your sister should have stopped receiving the money once she stopped university. I know that is easier said than done though.

Good luck whatever happens and well done for sticking by your sister.

Leakrgn

Right, well this will be the last time I come on this forum and these boards, I feel I have taken enough of an emotional beating for a while.

Just for the record I came on here with this issue mainly because I had been told that this was a good place to come if you wanted advice on such matters. To find out where you stand from a financial/legal etc stand point. I did not realise I had to give very single event from my childhoold to justify the decisions that we have made along the way.

I know all you are looking at is a computer screen but I am still a young woman who has had a very difficult time. I did not come on here to go into great detail about my past, I came on to try and find some legal reassurance for my sister incase he resorts to his usual tactics of threatening us with legal proceedings.

For the record my father always has been and always will be a bully in the worst sense of the word. He has done things that I hope most people would never even dream of doing to their own children/family. My mother fought very hard to make sure that he could not just make us homeless and walk away from his financial responsibilities, even if he found it easy to walk away from his emotional ones. So forgive me if I encouraged my sister to hang on to the one thing my mother managed to get from him. If we have offended you with our choices then I can only apologise.

To those who have remained impartial or given advice despite your own personal views on the situation, thank you very much. I appreciate it.

Wishing you all well.

zzzLazyDaisy

ValHaller wrote: »

As you say, your father knew full well your sister was no longer studying. But now he has potential grounds to sue your mother and regain a lot of influence over your lives because he probably knows that between you, you will not be able to pay him off. Thus he can get his payback in other ways.

Just to be clear - he doesn't have grounds to sue for the return of the money (that would involve going to the small claims court or the county court, and suing on the alleged debt, but as the case concerns an alleged over payment of maintenance, the normal CC does not have jurisdiction).

He does have grounds for going back to the original family court that made the order, and asking for the order to be rescinded and the 'overpayment' to be refunded. But since the onus is on him to make an application to the court for the order to be rescinded, the fact that he carried on making the payments after he knew she was no longer at university and took no steps to have the order brought to an end, he is unlikely to get very far (in my view).

Treevo

zzzLazyDaisy wrote: »

Just to be clear - he doesn't have grounds to sue for the return of the money (that would involve going to the small claims court or the county court, and suing on the alleged debt, but as the case concerns an alleged over payment of maintenance, the normal CC does not have jurisdiction).

He does have grounds for going back to the original family court that made the order, and asking for the order to be rescinded and the 'overpayment' to be refunded. But since the onus is on him to make an application to the court for the order to be rescinded, the fact that he carried on making the payments after he knew she was no longer at university and took no steps to have the order brought to an end, he is unlikely to get very far (in my view).

You seem to be ignoring the fact that he did stop the maintenance when his daughter quit university as per the order.

He then started giving her money again because she told him that she needed it (though the OP admits that this was a lie) on the condition that she return to university. She didn't return and then she cut off all contact with him, while still taking his money. It's only now that he's trying to discover if he's been conned by his own daughter that the family are worried.

It's clear that they (the mother and daughters) knew they were stealing as they give repeated justifications as to why they fraudulently took this money.