How to claim child maintenance

Applying for child maintenance | nidirect

To apply for child maintenance through the Child Maintenance Service (CMS), you will first need to contact Child Maintenance Choices. The team will talk you through all of the options available to you.

Child Maintenance Choices

Child Maintenance Choices is a free, impartial service. The team will talk you through all the facts, in confidence, about child maintenance, whatever your circumstances. It will provide support and advice to help you decide how to make the best child maintenance arrangement for you and your family.

Child Maintenance Choices

If after your discussions, you decide not to arrange child maintenance yourself, the Choices team will help you to apply to use the Child Maintenance Service. All new applications for maintenance with the CMS are made under the 2012 Child Maintenance Scheme and charges could apply.

Child maintenance
Collection fees and enforcement charges 2012 scheme

Information you need to give CMS

When speaking with the Choices team about applying to CMS for making or receiving payments, you will need to provide information about you and your family. This includes:

your National Insurance number
bank account details
details about the child you’re applying for - including the full names of their mother and father

A full list of what you need to provide is included in the child maintenance application checklist:

Child maintenance application checklist

How the information is used

The information you give can be used to set up and manage child maintenance payments. It can also sometimes find the paying parent.

CMS won’t give out names and addresses unless ordered to by a court, but information might be shared with other government organisations, debt collection agencies or the courts.

If CMS can’t get information it needs from either parent, it might ask other people or organisations, such as:

the paying parent’s employer
government organisations like the Social Security Agency
prison services or local councils
the paying parent’s bank or building society

General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and data protection laws controls how your information is used. Contact the Child Maintenance Service for information about how it uses and stores your information.

Child Maintenance Service

How long does it take

You will usually get a response from CMS about your application for Child Maintenance within six weeks. However, it can take up to 26 weeks if there is a problem with contacting the paying parent.

If the contact details for the paying parent aren’t known, CMS will try to find them - but if it can’t, the Child Maintenance application will stop.

The first child maintenance payment is usually made within six weeks of making payment arrangements with the paying parent.

Child maintenance payments

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What to do next

Child maintenance application checklist | nidirect

Before you begin your application for child maintenance, you might find it helpful to use the checklist below. It covers all the major details you need to tell the Child Maintenance Service (CMS). The more detail you give, the quicker your application may be processed.

Your details

You should provide CMS with:

your full name and any other names you use
your address
your telephone number (including mobiles)
your National Insurance number
if you are a member of the armed services, your BFPO number and HM Forces Service number
your bank account details (or details of an account you want your child maintenance paid into)
how often you want to receive maintenance payments (weekly, every two weeks, every four weeks or every month)

You must write your name and National Insurance number on the back of any documents you send to the Child Maintenance Service by post.

Your child or children's details

For each child you are applying for, you should provide the following to CMS:

their full name and date of birth
their gender (male or female)
their National Insurance number if they are over 16 years old
the full names of their mother and/or father
if anybody is receiving child benefit for the child
if there is already a maintenance agreement for the child
if the child stays overnight with the paying parent each week or at any other periods including school holidays, occasional stays and for how long
if the child stays overnight in the care of Social Services
if the paying parent knows you have named them as a parent of this child

Paying parent’s details

If there is more than one paying parent, you should provide details of each one separately to CMS:

their full name and any other names they use
their address and the last date you knew that they lived there
their telephone number (including mobiles)
their date of birth
their National Insurance number if known
if the paying parent knows where you live
if the paying parent is the mother or father of the children you’re applying for
if they are employed, unemployed or self-employed
their job title and employer’s name, address and phone number if known

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What to do next

4 practical tips if your marriage is on the verge of a divorce maximum amount of alimony after divorce.

Alexandra EGOROVA

Disputes over child support is one of the most painful topics during divorce, which is not easy to go through. To keep a cool head when the family is collapsing, it is possible, frankly, few. Mutual accusations, curses, and often threats are used. Discussing money matters in such a situation is very problematic. To pull ourselves together and calm down, let's try to act on the points. There are a lot of myths about alimony among the people - but here's how you really need to act.

1. Try to negotiate with your ex-spouse

Yes, it is difficult, and sometimes very difficult. But this is the first step in the list of actions that will help you get more alimony in a divorce. As you know, according to the court, the approximate amount of alimony is calculated as follows: 25% of the spouse's salary for the maintenance of one child; 33% for two and 50% goes to alimony for three or more children (by the way, this formula has remained unchanged since 1936, when it was established).

Before submitting an application, try to sit down with your ex-husband at the negotiating table - perhaps in the end you will still be able to find a common language, and the amount of payments will exceed these notorious 25 percent (at the same time, according to the court, it can be reduced in a number cases). And don't just rely on words. The ex-husband swears that he will not leave an heir - excellent, go to the notary's office and conclude an agreement in which the amount of payments will be prescribed. If suddenly your story does not have a good ending, go to court with this document.

2. Do not give in to blackmail

Unfortunately, it also happens: a husband begins to blackmail a woman in the truest sense of the word. Like, agree to what I propose, and if you swing your rights, I’ll bring a certificate from work that I work as a janitor and receive a “minimum wage”, even if they calculate your alimony from it. This is not worth leading. Firstly, when assigning alimony, it is the total income (salary, fees, additional remuneration, earnings, etc.) that is taken into account, and not the official salary for the position. True, the presence of "gray" profit from a negligent spouse will have to be proved in court. How to do it? You can, for example, try to imagine the purchases he paid for recently, which could not be purchased with the declared "beggarly" salary. Arm yourself with evidence that your ex-spouse maintains a fairly high standard of living. In addition, do not forget that you can also collect alimony from property - apartments (if this is not the only housing), cars, etc.

3. Deal with income

And if there is no talk of intentional concealment of salary, but also a fixed monthly income, from which those same 25% could be written off, does the father of the child not have? Maybe he's a creative freelancer and lives on royalties from occasional projects that come and go. Then you should think about alimony in the form of a fixed amount. It is set regardless of the level of income (which in this case cannot be precisely determined), in proportion to the subsistence minimum in the country or region. There is also a minus - alimony can be very small, because, according to the law, it is necessary that the defendant himself should not be left without a livelihood. But you can prove in court that in marriage the father spent significant amounts on the child - for example, he paid for a private school. This will give grounds to demand more significant payments, only, of course, all expenses must be documented.

4. Learn your rights

A parent's financial contribution to a child's life is not limited to alimony once a month. For example, in the Family Code (Article 86) there is such a thing as “additional expenses for the maintenance of a child” - these are funds that are paid ABOVE child support. They can be demanded in an emergency - for example, if money is needed for serious treatment or the necessary rehabilitation of a disabled child. However, sometimes even utility payments for housing, the owner or one of the owners of which is a child (the latter is important), act as "additional costs". Everything here will depend on how competently the rationale is drawn up - why the actual alimony for the "communal" is not enough and in what amount more payments are needed.

You can also increase the amount of support already determined and paid. According to the law, this is theoretically possible in the event of a sharp decrease in the income of the parent with whom the child lives after a divorce (for example, the mother was fired from work), or, conversely, a serious increase in the income of the payer. But, again, you will have to substantiate your financial claims very competently. And also, alimony assigned in a fixed amount (not as a percentage of income) is subject to indexation - if its procedure is not established by the agreement concluded by the spouses, then it is carried out in proportion to the increase in the subsistence minimum.

Another important point is that alimony can also be demanded for an adopted child (art. 137 of the Family Code). The procedure for their determination and recovery will be exactly the same as in the case of native children.

STAY INFORMED!

How to apply for child support

If you cannot reach an agreement on child support, you need to apply to the Magistrate's Court. What documents will be needed:

statement of claim;
child's birth certificate;
marriage and divorce certificate;
copy of passport;
certificate of family composition from the housing office at the place of residence of the evading parent;
photocopies of all documents, including the application.

If it is difficult to accurately determine the father's income, along with the application, you must provide an estimate of the funds that, in your opinion, will be required for the maintenance of the child and documentary justification for these expenses.

This is interesting

child support

How to get child support for a child from her ex -husband and why older parents sue their children

what to do, what to do, if the ex-husband does not pay alimony

In fact, evading the payment of alimony may well entail criminal liability (the maximum penalty is imprisonment for up to a year), if the debt is very high. As for the administration, it is possible to seize bank accounts or property of a defaulter, deprive him of his driver's license. In addition, the violator of the law may be restricted from traveling abroad. For late payments, a fine is also provided - 1/2% of the amount of debt for each day of delay.

And, by the way, such obligations do not have a statute of limitations - that is, you can demand money from the father of your child for his maintenance, even if the father appears ten years after the divorce (provided that you received a court order to collect alimony, when your common son or daughter was a minor).

But what to do if you have a court decision, but dad still refuses to pay? In this case, we go to the bailiff service with a statement about the need to start enforcement proceedings. Further, the bailiff can launch the measures mentioned above: arrest of accounts, travel restrictions, etc. It is important for the plaintiff himself not to yawn here - you need to constantly be in touch with the bailiff in charge of your case, provide additional information about the debtor's sources of income, if you have any. Nothing helps? Then it makes sense to re-apply to the court, you can demand the recovery of a penalty for alimony.

BTW

It doesn't matter whether you lived with the child's father in a formal marriage or for all the years of living together you never reached the registry office. It does not matter at all - according to the Family Code (Article 80), parents are obliged to support their minor children. The opposite situation - to apply for alimony, it is not at all necessary to be divorced. If a husband, for example, spends a significant part of his income on some "hobbies" (conditionally, he regularly loses in a casino), and the child gets a penny, you can demand payment in court.

Comments for the site Cackl e

How to collect child support

Article 80 of the RF IC states: parents are obliged to support their minor children. Parents have the right to choose the order and form of maintenance independently.

Contrary to popular belief, it is not necessary to get divorced in order to file for alimony. If you have a certificate confirming paternity, you can receive payments for the maintenance of a child, both while being married, and if there has never been a marriage stamp in the passport.

The main thing is the presence of a common child, who, according to the requirements of the Family Code, must be supported by both parents.

There are three main forms of receiving alimony:

voluntary alimony;
maintenance under a formal agreement;
alimony according to court decisions.

Voluntary maintenance are payments made on the basis of an oral agreement between the parents. To confirm the fact of participation in the maintenance of a child, it is worth transferring money through a bank, indicating the word “alimony” and the period for which the amount was paid in the purpose of the payment, since in practice there are cases when it is necessary to confirm that the transfers really took place.

Many payers complain that the recipient of alimony spends the transferred funds for other purposes, and they are interested: is it possible to replace the transfer of money with the purchase of toys, clothes and food for the child? Lawyers do not recommend doing this. In the event of a dispute, the court most likely will not consider things or products as an equivalent replacement for alimony in monetary terms.

Alimony under a formal agreement is a convenient alternative to both voluntary payments and judicial recovery. This form clearly records the obligations of the parties. The agreement is certified by a notary, which gives the document the power of a writ of execution. It determines the form of payments, the amount of alimony and the frequency of payments.

The question of the form of payment of alimony is important, because they can be paid not only in money, but also in property (or its shares), as well as in kind. This option is almost perfect: the former spouses agreed - the money is coming in regularly. However, in practice, such an agreement between former spouses is a rare occurrence. If the former spouses cannot agree on the maintenance of the child and do not sign an agreement, then alimony can be collected only through the courts.

There are two procedures for collecting child support through the courts.

The first procedure is the application for a court order. The alimony recovery process starts five days later, when the judge issues an order that is both a court decision and a writ of execution.

Then the order is transferred to the work of the former spouse or bailiffs. Withholding alimony and transferring money to the recipient's account is carried out by the accounting department of the enterprise where the payer works. Moreover, this is done no later than three days from the date of accrual of wages to the payer.

However, within five days after receiving the order, the debtor has the right to cancel it, without even explaining the reasons, and file an application with the court. In this case, the potential recipient of alimony will have to go to court already with a claim.

The second procedure is filing a claim with the court. This is no longer a statement, but an independent claim. It is necessary to have with you documents confirming the right to present claims for the recovery of alimony. Plaintiffs in this category of civil cases do not pay state duty. The claim with the collected documents is filed and registered at the place of residence of the defendant. Waiting for a writ of execution can last from one to two months.

You can collect child support at any time, until the child reaches the age of majority. The other parent is required to pay them from the month in which the application or claim was filed.

You can also claim maintenance from your ex-spouse for the previous three years, if there is evidence that there were no payments.

The final amount of alimony is determined by the court, taking into account the financial and marital status of the parties. The minimum amount of alimony for one child is a quarter of the payer's total earnings, for two children - a third of wages, for three or more children - half of the official income. If the payer remarried, in which he had a child, his spouse (or spouse) can also apply for alimony. In this case, the court has the right to establish the total amount of alimony in the amount of one third of the payer's income, and reduce the amount of alimony for the first child, respectively, to 1/6 of the former parent's salary.