Ex refusing to pay Child Maintenance - HELP!

Robin-o'-the-Hood

Money_maker wrote: »

Perhaps the OP may like to skip over to the debtfree wannabe board where the peeps there can help her with a soa, reduce her outgoings (funny how so many peeps see a massive sky contract & £70 mobile bills as 'essential') and help her create some savings.

Making quite a big assumption here...how do you know if she has any satellite TV, or how much she spends on her mobile? She may. She may not.

Robin-o'-the-Hood

Guest101 wrote: »

PWC also get to claim taxpayer funding to support themselves.


So you have your income, a % of your ex's income and supplement. - yep that's a tough life

Really? I get the grand sum of nothing from either the taxpayer (I'm on the mean average wage) or my youngest's mother. So your assertion that all single parents have their own income/%age of father's income/tax credits is a gross generalisation. The PWC gets a %age of NRPs income to help raise kids that are his responsibility. Where's the problem with that? He'd be paying to raise the children if he and the mother had stayed together would he not? As I have said, I pay maintenance for my eldest. I have no problem with it. Why would I?
I'm getting the impression that a lot of NRPs seem to believe that Johnny Taxpayer should pay for their kids. Why else are you/they getting so het up about it?

As far as your reply goes about NRPs being NRPs because the courts are biased against them, I was awarded residency of my child, not his mother. I know of another gent who was also granted residency of his twins. So your argument is simply not true
The fact is that most men don't fight hard enough, or at all, for residency is because they don't want it. But they don't want to pay maintenance either.

Rejast

The reason that I would make comments with regards to a pwc tightening her belt is simple. Child Maintenence is not and never can be guaranteed. There are multiple things that can happen which would leave a pwc in a situation where the maintenence could legitimately vastly reduce or even cease.
The OP asked for advice and that is exactly what she has got, I personally would work on how to balance the books if the worst was a reality.
Asking what the nrps mortgage etc is is irrelevant as if this was the other way round and it was the nrp raising that he was at risk of losing his house etc and the pwc had a high paying job etc they would get told to live within their means. The op needs to do exactly the same.
With regards to pwcs getting their own wages, some of nrp's, and tax credits. The whole system is more in favour of the pwc. Child maintenence to my understanding is disregarded for alot of things.
Just look at tax credits for example.
PWC would receive tax credits for her children and keep it all. however an NRP who receives tax credits for children who live with him would get it included in his income figure and therefore a portion of that would be claimed for the pwcs children. Fair?
I agree that the NRP would be raising the child financially if they still lived with the PWC but to a much less financially crippling degree.

Robin-o'-the-Hood

I don't dispute that maintenance can reduce or cease. I do dispute that (in most cases) it makes a life changing difference to a PWCs lifestyle. That it makes the difference between having, say, a Vauxhall or a Mercedes.
The OP was indeed asking for advice: if, as you suggest, she had a much higher paying job than the NRP then him having his income reduced isn't going to make much difference to anything probably and she wouldn't have any real concerns. Though the principle remains that he should still contribute to children that are still HIS responsibility. Why do you have such a problem with that?
I dispute that the system is skewed to the PWC. Certainly not my experience. I get no credits (fair enough...my problems are not those of the taxpayer) or maintenance from someone who is not pursued for it in any way, even though she could pay. How is that to my advantage? Tell me. (Seriously, tell me)
In regard to an NRP getting tax credits for children living with him (eh? what children??) ...what's the issue here?? The NRP is getting taxpayer's money for nothing. Lucky him. If he loses some of it for whatever reason bloody grow a pair, thank your lucky stars you get anything at all and suck it up. And yes I think its perfectly fair that the NRP has any tax credits income taken into account in regard to his FINANCIAL RESPONSIBILITY towards the children who don't live with him. Its still income, and unearned at that.
What on earth do you mean by 'crippling'?? Get a bloody grip. If the NRP is relying so much on tax credits for (...what exactly??) that giving only SOME of it TO HIS OWN CHILDREN is 'crippling' then he needs to have a long hard look at his life.
To repeat, I pay maintenance for one child, I get no maintenance for another and no tax credits either but don't have a high income yet I survive, just like many many other PWCs...the NRPs here just love their Pity Party.

Rejast

I think what i have said has been misunderstood or I've misunderstood some of the previous posts.. I have no problem with NRPs paying for their children what so ever.
I at no point said this NRP would get tax credits I was giving an example. If an NRP is is awarded Tax Credits are awarded for the children in their household not for the children living with the PWC but she would get a portion of them.
Maybe cripplimg was the wrong word what I mean is that NRP's can be left considerably worse off than a PWC (I also know the reverse is true)
With regards to your situation I have utmost respect for it. I have myself been a single parent with no maintenence, I am now a partner of a NRP. I can assure you if me and my partner split up and therefore lived apart, I would be alot better of than with him living with me, he on the other hand would be worse off.
Surely your comment with regards to NRP and their pity parties is also appropriate for PWCs?