Financial Agreement in Separation

A side question on the subject, do you know if when claiming the tax credits the claimant is obliged to state the income or assistance from the my side. I have seen the claim and it just states her part time salary and the tax credit award was based on that, however at the time I was paying well over £1000 per month into the FMH by paying all DDs and adding some cash to.

Should my input have been declared or is this irrelevant to the claim?

Thanks

The only key criteria for tax credits are the wife''s salary, the number of kids and any childcare costs.....that''s pretty much it.

The husbands income and the amount of his contribution to the wife is not part of the means testing, its simply not considered.

Therefore for a wife earning approximately £1000 per month with 2 kids then its perfectly reasonable to expect a monthly tax credits payout of somewhere in the region of £600 - £900 pounds.

seems bizarre to me. That at the same time as getting the higher earning absent partner to pay as much as possible to keep the other to the standards they have been used to, the Government decides to add more to make it really comfortable for one and uncomfortable for the other. I am sure this is not the case for all so I do not want to generalise but certainly I have a situation where the disposable income available to my stbx is vastly more than when I lived in the house....

anyway, enough of that and sorry for hijacking your post, but your circumstances are similar to mine and therefore hopefully my questions were relvant also.

Thanks for contributing but I agree, to a point. It does seem strange that the contribution from the husband does not for part of the calculation in terms of what the wife then receives.

I''m also in a position where my wife has not disclosed the amount she is receiving or when the payments started.

I really want to be fair & reasonable but I don''t think that me continuing to pay a large amount without taking into account the tax credits as part of her income aligns with this.

I think that the tax credits amount should form part of her income in our family based arrangement and therefore the shortfall that I need to make up should be lower.

By the way, the amount i am referring to in real terms equates to the CSA Calculated amount for 2 children based upon my salary PLUS 50% of the monthly mortgage amount.

I think this is fair & reasonable.

I''m not an expert but have been through this financial nightmare of the divorce.
I''m not sure if this is generally the case but as I can gather you''re trying to work out what SM + CM you ought to pay or what you think is fair?
I understand that SM is only paid when there is a need by the recipient and if the payer can afford to pay CM isn''t optional.
Your stbx should add up her monthly needs takeaway the income she receives including CM and if there is a shortfall that''s what could be paid but only if you have sufficient income left over after your monthly needs. Her income is from earnings, tax credits, child benefits, and all other benefits and CM. presumably she''ll be claiming a 25% discount on her C.Tax?
so the answer to your question you should probably be paying less!
I''m presuming this is only a short term arrangement as the courts would expect her if she is able to maximise her income. What are the ages of your children?
Are you going down the full financial disclosure to sort out the finances because if so she will have to disclose all the income and benefits she receives. As will you. If it''s a voluntary arrangement as long as your paying CM you don''t have to pay more it''s voluntary!
She''s very lucky that you''re being so generous!

In most cases the aim is for both spouses to have a similar lifestyle rather than maintain the lifestyle enjoyed during the marriage. Living in two homes is more expensive than living together and unless there are millions it''s unrealistic to expect to maintain the lifestyle . Both parties need to tighten their belts.

Hi all, been out of the game for about 9 months so this might be out of date - but I will give my thoughts because I went through the exact same thing.

Firstly I think its fair and just that you made sure all the bills were paid immediately after you left because most people will take some time absorbing everything before they apply for all benefits.

However, once those benefits are in place I really think you should take a good look at what you are paying. Some of the advice has been said before so apologies for repeating but you might want to do something like the following.

Firstly you can as mentioned use various on-line calculators to determine all the benefits your ex will be receiving - and it will likely surprise you. Child benefit, working tax credits, child credits and possibly council tax benefit and even free school meals if your ex applies for them. You don''t necessarily need to ask her, you can determine this for yourself.

You can also use on line calculators to determine what your child maintenance payments should be - which is essentially X% of your monthly income with a ratio applied based on how often you have the kids overnight. Again, it might surprise you what this is - mine is about 15% of my monthly income.

It was mentioned earlier but it is imperative that you start paying this amount separately by standing order and that the standing order is clearly marked "Child Maintenance". Otherwise your ex could feasibly ask for back payments.

Current benefits do not take into account Spousal Maintenance however as I understand it Universal Credit will - Spousal maintenance will be deducted £ for £ from Universal Credit payments meaning that it is largely useless to an ex who has a large benefit income as and when they switch to UC.

OK - so with that said - I would suggest the following:
Determine her likely total income (including benefits from on line calculator) without anything from you.
Add on your Child maintenance projected payments.
Calculate all her essential bills including obviously quality of life for the kids (clothes, holidays, decent food etc). Take into account reductions in outgoings (you are no longer eating there and neither are the kids x nights a week, her council tax will reduce by at least 25% and possibly water/gas/electric)

Take total outgoings from total income including Child maintenance which you must pay anyway.

Assuming there is still a shortfall - I would suggest that if you can afford it you should cover this, but bear in mind the comment about Universal Credit. This will become Spousal Maintenance and she will eventually lose it.

Once you get past the Essentials and have all bills covered, its then a judgement call. You need to look at how much you need to live on. Whatever is left (hopefully) is then "spending money" and you have to make a call about how much each of you should have of that spending money.

Of course anything over and above the Child Maintenance will essentially be an informal agreement but if you have been fair and have really taken into account all her outgoings you hopefully wont get too much of a shock come the final settlement.

But as Fiona said, the goal of the court is NOT to preserve the same lifestyle of the parent with Care at the expense of the non resident parent. The goal is to make sure the kids are OK and then to be fair to both parties - and that does not mean the parent with the lower income is automatically entitled to parity with the higher earner.

My advice is to be fair - to both of you, and not to be driven by guilt and overcompensate, as I did for a while. It will do you no favours in the long run.

And again - be wary of that Spousal Maintenance/Universal Credit gotcha. Your politics may make you feel this is right and just but eventually anything you pay above child maintenance will likely be lost. This may mean that she cannot afford to live in the FMH if her total income + child maintenance + benefits do not cover her outgoings. But I would seek advice on this, don''t take my word for it.

Hope this helps - as I said been out of things for a while so some of this might be out of date. Please seek advice on the points I''ve raised as I am not an expert.