child earning

My partner has a 17 year old son who is currently in college but is also earning £70 per week. Would the CSA take this into consideration when making an assessment of my partners contributions?

He has always paid voluntary maintenance for the past 7 years but his ex has now decided to involve the CSA. She has shot herself in the foot really as she was getting more from him voluntarily than she will get now throught the CSA although my partner will pay the difference directly to his son.

Is a child's income taken into consideration?

Nessie

Does anyone know the answer to this?

Thanks,

Ness

I don't know the answer to your question but to be quite honest I wouldn't worry too much about it. Whatever the amount that your partner is assessed as having to pay, it's not going to be for long. If he is going to pay the same amount but only the CSA amount to his ex, while it will certainly feel better to be paying a proportion directly to his son, financially it's not going to make any difference.

In my experience, seventeen year olds part-time jobs tend to come and go in any case, so he might be earning £70 a week now but won't necessarily do so in a couple of months. So even if it is taken into consideration, it might not be for long.

Sadie

Hi Sadie, yes we realise that it is not payable for much longer.

He has voluntarily paid £450 for the last 7 years and now she stands to only get £240. She has never applied to divorce him and he has never had the money to divorce her, until now. The FMH was sold and proceeds split 7 years ago, he took 30k of joint debt and went bankrupt for it. He has not only paid maintenance to her and his son but bought all of his sons clothes, including underwear and socks and paid for every £50 return train journey for him to see him. The only reason she has popped her head up is because my partner had now left the armed forces and so she is after his pension and gratuity. We always knew this would happen as she is very much money driven, it was just a case of time.

He has received his form E to complete and it will go from there. It will be interesting how it all pans out as her needs are reducing rather than increasing. She is 54 and has a full time job, house and car and her son could technically move out (she threatens to throw him out should he contact his Dad, so for now we haven't seen him since Christmas and he mis-calls his Dad and he phones him back in secret - so silly)

He has had a phone call from the CSA again today. They said that they will look into his son earning and also what College course he is doing next year as whilever his ex is claiming Child Benefit then CM is payable. He has got to furnish them with the usual pay slips and a copy of the forces pension he is receiving. Apparently from what we can see from the College website the only course he can do is an apprentiship which would fall under part-time and not full-time, meaning that CM would no longer be payable, although his son has said his mum has been to College and 'sorted it all out for him' and that it is a new course, but I am afraid that we don't believe her.

The CSA guy suggested that he starts a PPP as this would reduce what he has to pay to his ex. Has anyone else received advice from the CSA as to how they can decrease their liability to their exes? Seemed very strange to me that they should suggest doing something that would make a difference to payments.

The guy also said that he has advised my partners ex that she was better off when he paid her voluntarily but she said that she wants them to carry on with the claim.

Sometimes money grabbing makes you worse off than before.

Madness............

Ness

Ness,
- It doesn't matter that a child is earning - the CSA look at whether the parent with care is receiving Child Benefit
- Child Benefit should only be received if the child is doing 12 hours on a recognised course and not working more than 24 hours per week - if this is the case then benefit fraud could be taking place. You can check on the www.hmrc.gov.uk about which courses are allowable.