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I am currently separated and currently pay the Mortgage and some of the household bills in Lou on Maintenance. This equates to over half my salary and I still have to pay my own rent and bills. There is no formal agreement between my ex wife and I since I moved out. But I work away for approx 2 x 2 month out of the country. When I am in the UK I work away Mon - Fri, but I average approx 50days annual leave when the children come and live with me. I also have them at least 3 weekends a month Fri night to Sun evening which they look forward to. My ex is now suggesting that we do split parenting where she has them 4 days and I have them the other 3. This I can't sign up to because of work and if I was to give my job up and have the kids which i would happily do she would loose the house. So now she is threatening to stop access if I don't meet her demands.
How do I formalise my maintenance payment firstly?
What process must she go through to implement split parenting?
Thank you in anticipation of you advice.
You could formalise your maintenance payments through the CMS which is the new name for CSA. If you check out the sticky at the top of the child maintenance section called " how does the CSA calculate payments". It might help if you were to google the CSA calculator and input your details, it will give you an estimate of what you might expect to pay. It will probably be quite a bit less than you currently pay but if you want to negotiate the access situation it might give you some leverage.
I think it might be helpful to attend mediation, it will enable you both to discuss the situation with regard to shared parenting and with the guidance of a trained mediator, hopefully come to an equitable agreement. Here's a link to the mediation service website, it would be a good idea to select a venue close to where the mother lives to avoid her using distance as a reason not to attend.
www.nfm.org.uk
Beyond mediation, if she prevents contact, then you go to a court for a contact order. This will state the days on which your ex must make the children available for you to have contact, but does not, and cannot, force you to actually have the contact. In addition, the court will not expect you to give up your job (especially for your ex's convenience). The whole effect of this is that you should not be considering giving up your job because of your ex's demands, and if she is threatening to stop contact, then you have recourse to the courts to get contact resumed.
- Samaritans – call 116 123
- Shout – text the word ‘Shout’ to 85258
