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my daughter will be doing a foundation degree at the same college as she is currently doing a levels. Will my csa payments stop when this begins in September? Is this still classed as higher education even though she is staying at the same college to continue her education.
Thanks
to the best of my knowledge, a foundation degree would class as a degree, but it's worth checking this with the CSA. The fact that it's the same college offering the course is irrelevant, I think.
Hi mousha 64.
Thank you for your post. I am William the Child Maintenance Options consultant.
We are a different organisation to the Child Support Agency (CSA), but I will try and point you in the right direction.
Under child support legislation, regular child maintenance payments must be made until a child is 16 years old, or 20 if they are in full-time, non-advanced education (A-level or equivalent), or for as long as Child Benefit is being paid. Before 10 December 2012, the upper age limit was 19.
However, if your daughter was 19 after this date and in full-time non-advanced education, maintenance would be paid until the age of 20.
If your daughter were in advanced or higher education, she would no longer qualify for child maintenance. To confirm if a foundation course is classed as higher education you would need to speak to the CSA directly.
You can find contact details on any letter the CSA have sent to you, if you have a case with them. Or, you can find the right number here: https://www2.dwp.gov.uk/csa/v2/en/contact/index.asp.
If you would like to know about setting up a family-based arrangement for child maintenance and access to useful tools and forms online you can visit http://www.cmoptions.org, or if you would prefer a confidential chat you could call the Child Maintenance Options team on 0800 988 0988 (free from a landline).
We also have a sorting out separation web-app that you may find useful, it offers help and support to separated families. The link is: http://www.dad.info/divorce-and-separation/sorting-out-separation
I would add that a probably way to know if the foundation degree is advanced is to find out if she needs A levels to get on the course - if she does, then it must necessarily be more advanced than the A levels - worth knowing so you can argue your point with the CSA.
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