Ex has left job and now has ‘nil’ CMS to pay?

badmemory

tightauldgit said:

badmemory said:

I'm guessing he very rarely sees his daughter & birthday & christmas presents rarely exist.  I am afraid that this is what "they" do.  Well some that really don't have any sense of responsibility.  Some do actually pay over the odds & are even involved in their childrens life.  But some of them seem to be able to turn off their children like turning off a tap.  Sorry you have got stuck with one like that.  I hope you will come to realise like me that actually you are better off not being in any way dependent on him.  It worked wonders for me (once I hammered down expenses).

That's a pretty big leap from 'my ex only pays what he is legally obligated to pay in child maintenance' to 'i bet he doesn't care about his kids at all' - I spend three days a week with my daughter, buy her birthday and christmas gifts, take her on regular holidays, and buy things she needs for school or whatever. But I don't pay more than I am obligated to pay by CMS and when I had no income during COVID I paid £0 because that's what I was required to pay. 

I am pleased to hear you take your responsibilities seriously.  But when you have an ex that goes to considerable lengths (& some do) to not "officially" work & as part of that not to continue to be a parent it is very hard on the children.  I have a friend who not only paid full maintenance but used to collect his daughter from home every morning & get her to school so his ex could get to work but also collected her after school & look after her until she could collect her after work.  I do not tar all men with the same brush, but there are signs, after all would you let your child go to stay, even with a parent, when you had no idea where they were going to be.

Twixty3

There was a recent parliamentary committee on whether lone parents should also pay child maintenance ( even I was surprised)  yet of course, all the replies to that were negative from lone parents. 

Yet a precedent has been set that people on benefits can pay it.  

Anyway. Everyone has their own opinion and that’s fair enough but there is a growing awareness that it does need looking at and there is a strong possibility the bottom rate, at least, will be increased and it is also a strong possibility that the government will consider paying the lone parent the £7.  

The you get another committee where one conclusion was -

We live in a country that helps parents, foster carers adoptive parents etc etc meet  their obligations when they are out of work.  A non resident parent does not get help therefore we  place unrealistic obligations on  them  often cause harm (aka no equality) when it is an established fact that £77 is not enough for a parent. 

Why do you think many countries are moving to 50/50 shared care where possible ? To level up!  Many states in the US have moved to what they call EPT ,equal  parenting time: Canada recently announced that they too would move to 50/50 share scare.  It’s only a matter of time before the UK does it.  

Change is happening all around us.  There is growing concern about men, boys, fathers and fatherlessness worldwide. 

MEM62

tightauldgit said:

jjj1980 said:

Is there any chance he is being financially supported by a partner or relative?

CMS will be making checks with DWP/HMRC for benefit claims but it can take time for the records to show the claim being “in payment”

My ex did the same thing for a while; was supposedly being supported by relatives so didn’t make a JSA claim.  He knew from the years previous that payments would be deducted direct from his benefit so did all he could to avoid claiming. 

The way the assessment for CMS works is all based on the PP’s earnings so if they aren’t earnings an income and have no relevant benefit in-payment, there is. Irving to base an assessment on.  Meaning no child support payment due.

It would be pretty stupid not to claim benefits to avoid paying child maintenance since the child maintenance amount is fairly trivial when you're on benefits. If that's what he did, all he did was cost himself money.

It is called being vindictive and there are many that would cut their nose off in order to do so.