Hi,
Does anybody claim maintenance from a non resident parent who resides in the UK?

We are going to living in Ontario and want to claim off the birth mother who resides in the UK....

Who do you contact? Rang the CSA, who put me on to the Ministry of Justice who do not answer the phone!

Thanks
Charlie

i was told from the csa that all assessments would stop when i left the country, if it was on a temp work permit they would start up again on my return to the UK but if it was permanent then sorry mate!
if you read their web site you can sometimes claim maintainance from an absent parent if they move abroad, especially if they work for a British company, or it depends which country they go to as well. but if we go abroad it stops.

Weird, CSA told me that they have reciprocal agreements with all provinces in Canada apart from Quebec and to speak to the Ministry of Justice???

Typical of government departments, don't know their arse from their elbows........Will try ringing again tomorrow.

Thanks for responding!

Charlie

they have 'agreements' yes but there almost impossiable to maintain, my mother who is resident of england has been trying to her child maintenance payments from my sister father who has lived in canada for 7 years now and nothing, the missing parent can still pay maintenance is they want to but it the CSA will not go after than, i suggest you hire a solicitor in the UK

From what you have said on previous threads about the BM, you may not be successful. Your application has to be made in Canada (Ontario?), she has to be served in the UK and be given time to respond. Once you have a court order (and only then) can you apply to enforce it through REMO. Her travel costs to Canada (which you will have to cover if you go for maintenance) will be deductible from any amounts due. The LTR does not cover maintenance outside the jurisdiction, as basically when you are gone, the BM can tie you up in Ontario courts for years unless you equalize your situations. Child support laws are very different here. If you are working as well as your husband, your income as a step parent is taken into account, when they look at enforcing through REMO. If your combined income is higher than hers and you are not paying her travel costs, you won't get a cent.

http://www.officialsolicitor.gov.uk/os/remo.htm

Thanks Dingbat,
Yes we will be in Ontario, at the moment she pays £40 a month by agreement with us, that is the total for all 3 children, she has not paid for the last 3 months. She does not work and lives off benefit, I do plan to work.....

Final LTR hearing is on the 18th August.

Guess we're on our own financially unless she decides to go the morally correct thing which is highly unlikely.

Charlie

Perhaps I'm missing something here but it seems to me that:

- the amount involved is negligible
- you can't collect it in the UK
- a court in Ontario is not likely to judge that you should be able to collect from her as she has no earned income and both you and your partner intend to have income

From a strictly financial point of view it's not worth your while to pursue. I doubt it makes sense to chase the £40 a month from within the UK, never mind from abroad.

i think we are on our own as far as payments from abcent parents goes, not worth the hassle, they will just get away with it.............

On the other hand my husband has set up a direct debit from his bank for his son that is staying in the uk but thats the other sort of dad as he has always volenterily paid for his son. i have had next to nothing from my daughters father he just saw it as a bill he didnt want to pay........got it stopped out of his wages..............now he wont have to pay becouse we are not living here.

So the £40 awarded was before she went on benefit? My ex W****r left his job so he didnt have to pay! I was awarded 5p a year :curse: for each child. But he was to inform the courts when he started full time employment again.......yeah right.........that was ermmm, about 15 years ago!

Does the mum have regular contact with the children?

Is it really worth the hassle for 40 pounds a month? That is what you have to ask yourself really.

Does the Mum see the kids now? She may object to paying if she is not going to be able to see them soon.

Surley you have worked out finances before and don't have to rely on the Mums 40 pounds? Sorry if this comes across as harsh, I don't mean it to, just a little confused really.

The amount of money involved was never a factor in this, my OH and I support the children financially.....

The amount was set by her at a rate that she said she could afford and we were happy that she contributed to the financial aspect of raising her children.

I work full time nights to support them, why should she not contribute?

If it was the other way round and the children were with her, the CSA would have screwed us to the wall.....and taken a quarter of his salary. Which we would have paid to help raise his children as they are his responsibility as well.

The fact that they had separated does not negate that.


As above the rate was set by mutual agreement between us, no involvement off court or CSA. At the time she had very limited contact with the children, now see's them regularly.

No, it is not worth the hassle, but we don't see why we could never have escaped the financial responsibility never mind the moral.

We do not need to rely on the money, never have, as we have always struggled to get the money off her. Our affording to live in Canada was worked out on my OH wage (without bonus) and did not even include any income off me. It's about parental responsibility, you can't just churn children out and then not have an obligation towards them?

If this was the other way round, and a father was not supporting his children no one would have an issue about him paying?

Why should a mother not have the same obligation? I work damn hard to help provide, why shouldn't she?

As I said it is not about the amount involved, and as far as I am concerned it is not worth the hassle, we are already looking at Court costs of 10k in the UK, don't really want to start again in Canada.

When we set about moving to Canada we went down the correct legal route, and the mother signed Removal from Jurisdiction and we set up a contact agreement with her, we will fly her to Canada once a year and fly the children back to the UK in the summer.

Moving to Canada was about trying to improve our children's future, not about separating mother and children. We have always actively promoted contact between children and mother as we think it is in their best interest.

It was more about the moral obligation to your children.

I don't think your comment are harsh, at the end of the day if you put a comment out there you have to be prepared to take other people's opinion back. It's very hard to put all the ins and outs on here, and to be honest I wouldn't want to do my washing that publically!

It was just the moral issue, every parent, whether mother or father has an obligation to their children.

Charlie

confirmed by the CSA againe today, will stop but i will still get the back pay that is owed! well thats something!

I completely agree about the moral obligation and not abondoning children and all that stuff, unfortunatley not everyone has morals. My daughters biological idiot has not paid a penny since the day I escaped and sought refuge with my baby. I contacted the CSA, he denied the child was his - common story comming up.......refused the blood tests, CSA dropped the case due to the history of violence. That was it end of story, he never felt a moral obligation to support his child and left me with loads of debt too. On the other side of the fence my husband was incorrectly assessed and has paid a small fortune for his son - I had to work full time so we could make the payments. So no it's not fair, the assessments are not fair and quite often not done correctly, I also think the assessments should change as situations change too.

You know, you have a mega stressfull time comming up with your move to Canada. Yes the absent parent should pay towards the care of the children - whatever sex the parent is but really chasing the amount your talking about and the added stress to everything I would personally say it's not worth your health and worry. Good luck though if you do try to fight. One thing I suppose you could consider is retracting your offer to pay for her flight to Canada in lieu of non payment?

I don't want to fight for it, to be honest I can't be bothered, it is my OH who is mega peed off about the fact that we have had to pay tens of thusands out, and she escapes the moral obligation.

I asked the question, because my OH asked, I am hoping that he will see that it is just not worth it. We had put in the contact agreement that us paying for her flight was on the condition that she maintained payments. As we are now having to go to court to get Leave To Remove, even though she had previously consented, and signed LTR. I doubt we will be able to set that stipulation, it will be up to the Family Court.

Will just have to wait and see.....

Charlie