In honour of Child Support Awareness Month, we look at how the system works in the UK and what you might need to know as a single parent.
What is Child Support Awareness Month?
August is Child Support Awareness Month, an opportunity to highlight how important child support and maintenance is to the development of a child. Child support is typically paid by the parent that doesn’t live in the same house as their son or daughter full-time and is designed to cover part of the costs associated with raising a child. Failing to pay child support could lead to children of single parents potentially missing out and being prevented from reaching their full potential. With Child Support Awareness Month, advocates hope to motivate people and organisations to ensure these essential payments are made.
How does child maintenance work in the UK?
In the UK, child support is more commonly known as child maintenance. It’s typically an arrangement made between separated parents and outlines how the child’s living costs will be covered by parents living in different households. That’s because both parents are responsible for paying for their child’s essential needs, even if they’re no longer together or one parent has moved away and no longer sees their child regularly.
Depending on your personal situation, you could arrange child maintenance privately or seek support from the government via the Child Maintenance Service (CMS). Both parents will be responsible for paying towards their child’s needs until they turn either 16 or 20, depending on whether they’re still in full-time education.
Is child maintenance a legal requirement?
In most cases, child maintenance will be a legal requirement. However, there are exceptions to this rule such as if one parent is in prison or a full-time student. Child maintenance also won’t need to be paid if the child or children spend an equal amount of time living with both parents. The CMS has the power to force parents to make child support payments and there can be serious legal consequences for those who fail to contribute the mandated amount.
How can I arrange child maintenance?
If you have a good relationship with your child’s other parent, you can make what’s known as a family-based arrangement. This is a private agreement and you’ll both decide together how much needs to be paid and when. However, it’s worth double-checking that the amount you’ve landed on is reasonable by seeing how well it measures up against the amount the CMS would award you.
You may also want to include:
- Whether the payment amount should be the same every month or change throughout the year.
- If the amount should be based on a percentage of the parent’s earnings and what would happen if those earnings fell in the future.
- Whether the payment should also include things like school uniform, activities, and holidays or if these will need to be paid on top of the base amount.
If you need help creating a family-based arrangement and ironing out all the details, but don’t want to formally apply to the CMS, consider seeking support from organisations like Citizens’ Advice.
Should I apply to the Child Maintenance Service (CMS) to arrange maintenance?
You might want to apply to the CMS to help you arrange maintenance if:
- You haven’t been able to make a family-based agreement
- Your family-based agreement has broken down
- You’ve experienced domestic violence or abuse
You can make an application online or over the phone.
Preparing a few details before applying to make the process as straightforward as possible. You’ll likely be asked to provide:
- Your National Insurance number
- Your bank account details
- Your child’s name and their date of birth
- The number of nights a week the child spends with each parent
- The full names of both parents
How much child maintenance should I pay?
When you apply to make a formal child maintenance arrangement through the CMS, it will calculate how much each parent should pay.
This will usually depend on:
- The number of children you have
- How much the non-primary parent earns
- How much time the children spend with each parent
- Whether the non-primary parent is paying child maintenance for any other children
How does shared care impact child maintenance?
One of the biggest factors that impacts the amount of child maintenance that needs to be paid is the split of shared custody. It’s assumed that the non-primary parent will cover all the costs for everything the child needs while they are staying with them and so the more, the children stay with this parent, the less maintenance they’ll need to pay.
If the child spends between 52 and 103 nights with the paying parent, their maintenance will be reduced by one seventh per child. If they spend between 104 and 155 nights, the amount will be reduced by two sevenths; between 156 and 174 nights, by three sevenths; and if they live with the other parent 175 nights or more then the bill will be cut by 50% and there will be an extra £7 a week reduction per child.
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