Child maintenance or informal agreement?

[Iain4444]

Hi all,

Story so far is very similar to a lot of people on here. Never thought there could possibly be any disagreements co-parenting, everything slowly disintegrated and then went pear shaped. Currently awaiting second court date in Jan to try and get 50/50 care but facing a string of false allegations (honestly can’t believe another human being could actually lie to the extent my ex has and about really serious things - surreal).

Anyway, trying to keep head above water when on top of everything ex wants to change the informal financial agreement we had to increase my payments to her.

Am at a point where i just dont want to have to deal with her any more than i have to, so my question is: is it better just speak to CMS and arrange formal payments rather than constantly being pulled around and agreements changed or are CMS to be avoided at all cost? (have heard mixed opinions)

For context, i earn 4300 before tax which i pay to myself as a dividend. I pay my ex £340 pcm + spend £100 on items my son needs which we sometimes discuss. She is now asking for an additional £300 pcm so £640 in total.

I have my son every Tuesday from 8am until 7.45am on Wednesday morning and every other weekend from Saturday at 10am until Sunday at 6pm. Trying to increase this to Tuesday and Wednesday night + Saturday and Sunday night and then more gradually.

 

[bakedapple]

Hold fire until after your court date. If you get 50:50, then your liability drops to £0. In the meantime, you could offer slightly more on a receipted as-needs basis. What does the CMS calculator say you should pay?

For the amount of additional maintenance payments over a few months, it may not be worth a fight before you have a child arrangement order in place; after that, you've got a lot more room to manoeuvre.

 

[Hackedoff_dad]

a friend of mine was abused over 19 years with an informal agreement, if you do get the 50/50 then once you get that sealed order upload it to the CMS they go with what the courts say, NB: do not say anything to incriminate yourself even if your ex does not stick to 50/50 that court doc will carry weight with the CMS, its lawful, I recently did this with a spend time with order, where the ex Narc kept stopping contact, then contacting CMS to say there were no more overnight stays, as you have to agree this (Both Parties) all I did was state that I have a spend time with order and here was the proof, that was the end of it it was declined and even though I did not have any overnights she still got no further financially, just don't say too much, just the order and reject her claims is pretty much enough

 

[Iain4444]

Hold fire until after your court date. If you get 50:50, then your liability drops to £0. In the meantime, you could offer slightly more on a receipted as-needs basis. What does the CMS calculator say you should pay?

For the amount of additional maintenance payments over a few months, it may not be worth a fight before you have a child arrangement order in place; after that, you've got a lot more room to manoeuvre.

Thanks bakedapple, how does a receipted as needs basis work? Is there some kind of agreement that formalises this approach?

The government calculator is saying that i should pay £436pcm.

I dont think we will get to 50/50 straight away, rather it will be stepped building up to this over a period of time.

If we get to 50/50 care do you know who would pay for nursery fees? Prior to my ex asking for an increase we were just splitting this half each but how would it work with CMS?

 

[bakedapple]

I was meaning that rather than increasing the amount significantly, if there are specific large items you agree to split these.
Personally, at this stage, I'd land at a number very slightly higher than the calculator, to remove any incentive for her to go CMS at this point in time.

Who needs to put the child into nursery? Is it your ex so she can work? In which case, this is a choice that she is making not you. If she wants to withhold the children from you, then this is the cost to her of doing so.