In short, no. Although child support reflects the legal obligation of parents to provide financially for their children, many people make informal arrangements. It is, in fact, quite common for parents to be able to come to a decision about financial arrangements for their children without needing to involve the courts or other agencies. However, these agreements can be broken and relations between the parents can sour, which then leads to the involvement of other agencies.
In other instances parents are made to pay by court order, or the Child Support Agency calculates the amount of the payments that parents should make. These are not mutually exclusive solutions, and it may be that a parent pays maintenance using more than one of these ways.
Could you Avoid CSA Involvement?
Not all couples will be able to come to an amicable private settlement but it can be beneficial to all sides, including the children, to try to reach an agreement without involving the CSA. Some of the benefits to private arrangements are; the lack of interference of third parties, which gives you more control and flexibility over the particular terms of your agreement and the ability to adapt to your own specific circumstances, rather than be trapped within the rigidity of CSA policies. However, there are several questions that you will need to ask yourself about your particular circumstances.
- Could you and your child’s parent work together in the interests of your child/children?
- Can you be honest with one another about money issues?
- If either of your circumstances changed, would you be able to work together to be able to make changes to the agreement as necessary?
- Is your relationship with your child’s parent such that you can agree to commit to making a private settlement work?
- Have you tried to agree payments before, but it hasn’t worked? If so, it will be harder to make it work the second time around.
- Will it matter that your private settlement is not legally binding? If the non-resident parent stops paying, you will have no recourse to collect or force payments against a non-paying parent.
- What would happen if your agreement stops working? Could you talk to one another about it?
Answer a few questions about your situation and get a clear summary of your child maintenance rights and options.
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If you have arranged to settle the matter of child maintenance privately, you will need to discuss the agreement together to work out the fundamental aspects. Once you have been able to agree these elements, it is helpful to reduce it to writing and for both parents to sign it. Be aware, however, that this type of arrangement is not legally binding. The basic issues to agree are as follows:
- The cost of maintaining the child, including school, day to day living, clothing and sustenance
- How and when to make payments
- How much the payments will be
- Include a date in the future on which to review the terms of the agreement, to discuss whether or not the agreement is working
Your situation may be slightly different. ask a question below ↓ and our editorial team will reply with our advice.
Can you Stop the CSA Being Involved?
If the CSA is already involved, and the care parent does not provide the CSA with the information they need to make the calculation for maintenance payments, the case can be closed and there will be no maintenance paid. It should also be noted that giving false information to the CSA, or not providing information to the CSA when it is requested is a criminal offence for which a person can be fined any sum up to £1000.
However, if a non-resident parent is not cooperating with the CSA in disclosing his or her income to them, the CSA can impose a ‘default maintenance decision.’ This is an automatic rate based on the number of children for which maintenance is being sought. The rates are currently £30 per week for one child, £40 for two children and £50 for three or more children.
I have never missed a payment it’s been now 5 years. Can she still demand an annual review or can she go back to child Maintence at any point?
I had a disagreement over 50% childcare arrangements over school holidays as I don’t have shared custody.
My sons mum has now reported me to the CSA.
Can this be done if the issue isn’t really financial.
I have moved in with a new partner with 3 children and as this affects the payments, she is threatening to go to the CSA so I have to pay an additional 20%.
Can she do This?
In advance thanks
I'm a dad currently going through a bit of a rough patch with my sons mum, when my son was born, for the first few months i was giving her £200 but then we re evaluated and came to an agreement of £150 pounds, he was born last February only recently in the upcoming months i've increased how much i gave my son's mum by £30 pounds so in total i was giving her £180. She currently say's it's not enough and has threatened to go through CSA - bearing in mind she has got two other children from a previous relationship and their dads aren't around so i'm assuming she's struggling due to them not paying child maintenance. Will CSA take in to consideration my travel cost and also present i get my little one as well at christmas and birthday's? i normally transfer his mum the cash via bank transfer so i've got recorded history of money going from my account to hers.
I have tried to be reasonable with her but it's like talking to a brick wall, if she goes through CSA what is the process and how much more or less will i need to pay? am i right in reading at the top that The rates are currently £30 per week for one child, £40 for two children and £50 for three or more children?
Previously i've read they take a percentage out of your wage depending on how much you earn, If someone could advise, that would be great.
Cheers
says that her three children will be counted in any calculation for
maintenance for our son. Is this correct?
If so, will his girlfriend's income be taken into account as well? Both of them earn more than me and she gets maintenance from her ex for her children.
He hasn't paid any child maintenance since my son was born, he is 7 years.
Every time I have applied for child maintenance, the agency close the case as most of the time he is aboard.
He hasn't seen my son for the last 4 years, he call my son only once a year.. replied his emails every 3 months and never get involve financially or emotionally in anything in his live, but I have to ask permission to him every time I travel with my son, it's ridiculous, if English law can not force him to visit his son, to get involve with him, and help to cover the financial needs of his son and do his duties as a father, then I don't understand why I have to ask him permission to take my son aboard..
In my country a man who don't pay child maintenance and can't be found as they are aboard, the law sheare his details in the airport, so once the arrive the get sent to jail until the put to up to date with the child maintenance.
I would like to know if I can recover retroactive payments of a informal arrangement, email and other trying to contact the father without reply? Except for one harsh and bully reply to us. I am now, since one year and half with CMS but there are years of unpaid child support for unmet need of an 11 years old child.
I look forward to hearing from you,
Many thank,
A
So why CSA are you interfering?
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