Shared Care and Children's Expenses

mumtoboys wrote:

how would it work out financially if you kept the child benefit for one and paid him 15% of your earnings, as per CSA calculations? would that even things up or still tip the balance a bit too much in his favour?

I think I'd lose out quite a bit as I'd get £80 in CB, but have to pay about £200 in maintenance. Then there are my childcare expenses, which he doesn't contribute to. And finally there are their other expenses: because the children spend more of their time with me, I tend to do all of their shopping, etc. so it wouldn't really make sense to me to be paying him child maintenance, especially if he weren't contributing to those expenses.

jaymdee wrote:

Have you tried mediation? Bit cheaper than solicitors and definitely better than court.

At mediation you get a chance to put across many issues at once rather than each issue in isolation.

As to the cynical aspect when I was going through a divorce it made me very cynical. 15 years on I realised that we were both as bad as one and another and if we had just talked it would have be sorted much quicker and saved a lot of money!!!

Yep, I suggested mediation at the very start of this. He went once and unilaterally canceled the next meeting and wouldn't return. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when the arrangement we agreed on for the children, two months and several solicitor letters later, was the one I proposed in mediation.

I think the best option yet is going back to a 50/50 split on expenses and letting him keep CB/WTC. I realise this leaves me open to problems, however, even if I had CB for one child I would stand to lose it in 2013 anyway. I wonder if the government have given any thought to how this will play out in situations where a potential PWC is also a higher earner...

I have also wondered who would be considered PWC if the child benefit is removed!!

from the CSA's perspective it would be the holder of the child benefit.

I assume that it wouldn't make a jot of difference to education and health services as parental responsibility gives both parents the same rights on these issues. However, the children will be registered at one address only and surely either parent can change that? I can't imagine if dad walks into school and says the children now live at X address, they are going to question whether that is true or not. And that's the problem if the OP has to eventually contest who needs to pay what to whom?

But the from next April 'higher tax earners' wont be entitled to child benefit so how will they decide then who the PWC is?

LOL! Good point! No idea!

The Child Support Act 1991 defines a “person with care” as the person with whom the child has his home and who usually provides day to day care for the child (whether exclusively or in conjunction with any other person). Child Benefit is only used as evidence of that . If higher earners aren't in receipt of CB other evidence can be used- the number of nights a child spends with a parent, what address is registered with the doctors and school etc.