Please help understand Petitioner's Prayer

Mojisola

PaulAA wrote: »

Any advice or useful reading material that you can recommend please?

Mattygroves2 wrote: »

Have a look at the Wikivorce website or go and see a solicitor of your own.

Have you looked at Wikivorce yet?

thorsoak

I would suggest that you consult Wikivorce - seems to me to be a useful tool if you do not want to use a solicitor.

Pollycat

PaulAA wrote: »

A few replies on the other thread suggested that it's not the right time to be concerned with the legal/financial matters.

You have voiced the opposite opinion (thank you for this). My wife has told me she'd only want a half not more. The draft petition reads differently.

Should I be concerned that I could lose more than a half? Any advice or useful reading material that you can recommend please?

I think you misunderstood some (or all) of the replies you refer to.

Some posters - based on the information about your relationship in your posts - suggested you walk away as it seemed that your wife was pretty adamant about the way forward for her.

My own comments were that you seemed to be trying to come up with ways to 'woo' her - such as candle dinners or a stay at a posh hotel - but at the same time were considering gearing up your own 'lawyer'.

I said this sounded contradictory (and I still think that).
As someone who has been told in the past that a relationship was over, all my efforts went into trying to save that relationship. At no time did I ever think about consulting a solicitor.

Pollycat wrote: »

What's your strategy here?
No point in people giving you advice about trying to save your marriage if you're going to do tit-for-tat and instruct solicitors.

Pollycat wrote: »

You seem to be split between fighting for your marriage and 'defending' yourself/instructing your own solicitors.

I said the comment below sounded like hedging your bets.

PaulAA wrote: »

Yes, I do keep both the relationship and the lawyers in my sights.

In fairness to posters who replied on your other thread, you were asking for advice:
"Wife wants out, but I want to keep the family together. Advice needed"

I'm not sure about other posters but I was confused about your priorities.

PaulAA_2

Thank you for the analysis, but understanding the legal aspect is more of a necessity for me rather than a tool for hedging my bets as I have a letter from my wife's lawyers asking for a response. Hope this makes my position clearer.

Pollycat

PaulAA wrote: »

Thank you for the analysis, but understanding the legal aspect is more of a necessity for me rather than a tool for hedging my bets as I have a letter from my wife's lawyers asking for a response. Hope this makes my position clearer.

My point is that understanding the legal aspect wasn't a necessity when you started your first thread so any advice to you about legal/financial matters wasn't received critically by other posters.

At that point you were asking for advice on keeping your family together.

I wish you luck, I think you may need it.

Heffi1

Ask a qualified solicitor, anyone answering here on a forum is at best guessing what might happen, do you want to leave it to the luck of a bunch of strangers, or do you want qualified legal advice on a very important matter which will live with you for a very long time.

Your choice.

CP26

I was the petitioner and did my divorce DIY. However based on a free half hour with a solicitor and advice from Wikivorce I was advised to tick all the financial order boxes IN CASE I wanted to apply for one when the time came.

Essentially I was told that if I didn't tick any, if I chose to then apply there would be extra steps in the process later and I might have to amend my application. It's a formality rather than a definite 'I'm going to apply for all these when the time comes'.

I never used them and instead the ex and I did our own consent / clean break order where we picked the terms. We were a childless couple and our only asset was a house.

They remained purely tick boxes on the initial petition as I had to fill out a separate application for our consent / clean break order whereby I ticked the appropriate box for that particular type of order and left the others unticked.

My ex, the respondent, had the opportunity when we did the financial application to tick if he wanted to apply for any other types of order as until then, the petitioner does all the ticking as they're the one leading the divorce. He just ticked consent order and our application went through as that. He could, of course, have opted to go for a different type of order at that point but it was unnecessary as we had no assets to really actually do anything with.

Hope that makes some sense.

I would still 100% advise double checking this with your own solicitor or at least speaking to Wikivorce. They are good with the basic advice on the divorce process.

CP26

As for the awarding of assets, the basic starting point for a marriage of a decent length is 50/50.

If you're amicable about it all you can do a consent order where you both set out your own agreement. However you will still need to apply to the judge and provide some financial information - the judge could decide the agreement is inherently unfair on one party and make you amend it. You can do this type of order without too much solicitor involvement (although they will need to draft the order at least).

If you dont agree get proper legal advice ASAP. Although it's still advisable to get some solicitor advice anyway regardless of how amicable it might seem right now.