Question Re Maintenance

andysstuff_2

Hope someone can give me an answer on this one.

I got divorced about 15 months ago, at the time I agreed through County Court to pay £340 per month to my ex for our 2 children (£170 each), plus a further £160 to my ex-wife.

Since the agreement circumstances have changed inasmuch as the children now come and stay overnight every other weekend. I therefore want to alter the payments to my ex to compensate for this (as the CSA wouls if the agreement was through them) - works out at just under £50 per month.

Question is do I need to go back to the Court to change the amount, or do I just inform my ex that this is what I'm doing?

Thanks for any help.

Zara33

I would suspect that you would have to inform the courts.

Will your ex by happy with you just telling her or will it cause problems?

andysstuff_2

Thanks - can't see it'll be taken vary well to be honest!

lindens

According to the CSA calculator, the amount only alters once you have them (as non resident parent) more than 52 nights per year. Dont you have them 26 nights per year?

andysstuff_2

lindens wrote: »

According to the CSA calculator, the amount only alters once you have them (as non resident parent) more than 52 nights per year. Dont you have them 26 nights per year?

No, It's Friday and Saturday night, so 52+

lindens

ah right, my mistake:o

The_Daddy_2

I may be wrong, but it is my understanding that the CSA can not get involved once a maintenance order has been made via the courts.

Therefore you are bound by the court order regardless of what teh CSA calculations would comeout as. I believe that you would have to go back to court to get this adjusted due to the change in circumstances.

Also, do you have any orders in place with regards to contact with your children? If not then I would be careful with just telling your ex that you are reducing the amounts as she may well just reduce your contact to less than 52 days per annum therefore meaning that the CSA calcs are irrelevant, and impacting your time with your children.

Good luck.

andysstuff_2

Thanks , Looking at the Court Service website, there seems to be a pretty simple form to fill in to get the order amended - that's not to say getting it through the Judge will be as simple!

Can't remember exactly whether we got any Court Orders on contact - had always agreed when I would see them, they just weren't willing to both stay overnight until recently.

The_Daddy_2

Yes ok, so in summary situation is as follows;

- Maintenance agreed via the courts based on old contact
- Now you have improved contact, so logically the payments should reduce
- No contact order in place
- Ex likely to not be happy about reduced payments

The reduced payments logic is directly related to the amount of contact, so you might want to firm up your contact legally via the courts before asking for any adjustment. Otherwise you risk your ex reducing your contact in order to erradicate your arguement for a payments adjustment.

I am not an expert, but my gut feel on this is that you should
1) Get a contact order in place to protect your time with your children
2) Then use this order as a basis for asking for an adjustment to the payments

Good luck - The_Daddy

andysstuff_2

The_Daddy

Seems a sensible approach, thanks. Looks like it's back to the court website again!