Support payments paid in cash to ex, now CSA wants money

Blimey

Thanks for the great responses, I really appreciate them.

I am meeting with my friend tonight and I should be able to find out a bit more information. Regarding the CSA payments I think its a backlog that has just caught up with them.

Sadly at the moment it seems that they're pretty much screwed and will have to repay the money.


Thanks again.

roothie

If they must make direct payments use a cheque, photocopy it and have pwc print, sign and date the photocopy. This should be an adequate record if things got sticky.

dalenpayton

Don't know if this will help but in my circumstances, when me and my ex split, i paid 100 a month (her request) and for the purpose of tracking, i paid it via standing order from my bank account. this went on for approx 3 and a half years until she decided that she wanted more but was being awkward regarding contact (another story, 3 Cafcass visits, multiple court dates that cost me over £1500 in solicitor fees! just to see my kid more often) so i refused as I felt I didnt see enough of my daughter.

She then contacted the CSA approx june 06 and they caught up to me in July 06. Asked me to fill in details and post it back. I recieved their information pack on the wednesday and on the thursday I recieved a letter from them telling me that they had been in contact with my payroll department and i needed to pay £X amount. I immediatly cancelled my Standing order (August 06) as I assumed that they would be deducting the money direct from my wages. They didnt.

They came back to me in January 07 to ask why I hadnt made payments, i explained that I thought they were going to deduct from salary seeing as they omitted me from the information gathering process that they would do their own thing and collect it direct. The said that they would now do that but because I hadnt paid in Sept and Oct as well as Nov that I now owed backpay too. They tried to include August but I told them I had proof of my last payment to my Ex for that month. They took firdt payment from my wages in March 07! so another 4 months backpay to add to it. I will be finished with backpay in November 08 thankfully.

I appreciate that this is very long (and probably long winded too) but the one thing that bemused me was that they wernt looking to claim back pay for the years we had been apart, only from the time that she contacted the CSA.

But if you havent got documented proof that you have been paying it and even weekly regular withdrawls arent proof enough for the CSA then your friend is up the proverbial without the paddle.

HTH

floss2

Has your friend got any correspondence from the CSA to explain what they are wanting? i.e. what the payments are supposed to cover?

As others have said, and from personal experience, they do not generally pay out until they get it (and they even hang onto it for a couple of days in between receiving & paying out too). The most likely circumstance is that it is an arrears or reassessment after new information issue, but they should have written to explain what is going on.

Maybe your friend's partner should contact the CSA & ask what is going on - as an absent parent, he has the right to do this, and he will then find out rather than be guided by his ex-partner's version.

nicola1982_2

This sounds like the ex hasn't declared it on her benefits and now the CSA are claiming on behalf of the benefits office. I would ring the CSA and say that the maintenance was paid and if it wasn't declared this is an issue between his ex and benefits office.