In the first six months of 2009 they CSA attempted to take a approx £200 month out of my bank account for maintenance payments for a child I had with me. They ignored 3 solicitors letters and I was told due to a ” computer fault they could not stop them or update any of my records “. I spoke to the bank and they said the CSA had to stop them. They eventually stopped in Jun 09. I have now recieved a letter stating that I have £1800 of arrears for the child that lives with me. They are now stating if a dont pay they will collect through a DEO.

As for the my proper application to claim maintenance for my daughter, they have no record of 2 written applications, 1 online application and numerous conversations.

Congrats to the CSA, in 18 months you have managed to try and take £1000 in D/D from me, now say I owe £1800 in arrears for a child living with me and have not collected a single penny from my ex.

In the CSA world I am both the PWC, NRP and should expect to pay and recieve maintenance for the 1 child I have!!!!!!

I then told the CSA how many nights I had the children and they lowered maintenance slightly. It suddenly went up again without any notice. When I rang the CSA they said my ex had stated I had them for 3 nights when infact in this period of time I had them for nineteen nights. Fraud! Did they do any thing? Warn her, send her letters. No!

I had to prove I had them for those nineteen nights which I did which took a lot of time. I work fulltime as registered nurse. My Ex does not work (she does not need to), although she did when we were together.

The CSA are useless they do not look after the best interests of either parent or more importantly my children. I want to support my children not be taxed for them. My ex has a large chunk of my income every month and I don’t believe it is being spent on the children.

The CSA are totally incompetent and I believe our children deserve better.

I was workin as a builder and my wages werent always the same, so some weeks i couldnt afford to pay my csa. Then the ressesion came about and my wages took a big drop so couldnt afford it at all. I spent 2 years homeless after my split. Which cost me alot living in bnb and hostels.

Now 2 n half years later iv got the csa hounding me for £12,000 and iv got a new girlfreind and a baby so i jus cannot afford to pay it. My wages are due to b arrested next week which is gona leave my family skint. And she lives with her boyfriend, their new baby and my kids n they have 4 times the income of me n my family.

It has been a struggle and I am disgusted that someone can bring a child into the world but not feel any responsibility towards their upkeep. As for the CSA I stopped bothering them as they didn’t do anything to get the money off my ex-partner because I was working and not claiming benefits. At one point, someone put the phone down on me saying they were not paid enough to ‘take this shit!’

The CSA have let my child down big time; although she has had everything I could provide, she would have had more if she’d just received a little bit from her ‘father’ – I use the term loosely!

If the UK Gov needs to do any budget cust why don’t they start with the CSA. Don’t get me wrong I am all for paying. To send a wage attachment order when I have not missed a payment and have pro activly gone out of my way to make payment and have gone out of my way to chase them up. Something very wrong with this picture.

In Oct 09 I had to get the CSA to take £5 per week out of his benefit money for my son and 3 other children my ex has from a previous relationship. Payments only started in December and i have had payments of £2.50 paid fortnightly until May 26th this year.

I contacted the CSA to see why i wasnt recieving the money and they said to call back in 2-3 weeks as they’re having problems with the systems. THERE’S NOTHING WRONG WITH THE SYSTEMS!

I have now got so fed up with the incompetent morons at the csa that ive now complained twice in the last 3 weeks and my case is now apparently with a complaints case worker. They cannot tell me WHY the payments have stopped, WHY myself and the other 3 children’s mother have not had any payments since may, WHEN the missing payments will be added to my ex’s already high arrears for the children and WHEN i will be contacted regarding my complaints within a certain time frame.

THEY CAN’T TELL ME ANYTHING AT ALL!!!!! It’s absolutely disgusting! There have been failings ever since my case was opened 14 months ago because they couldnt be bothered to chase after my ex because he is a persistent offender at failing to pay child support for his children.

He abuses the system and they know it. CSA/CMEC are a load of old…..

I dealt with basildon, then my case went to belfast as my ex had a previous family living there, then it went to hastings, then belfast, then liverpool, then scotland, this went on for four years with no payment, then when it went to scotland they lost my file for three years, by this time seven years went by…

Then, because they “lost” my file i was put on the new system and those seven years were wiped off and i started as a new claim. I wasnt entitled to any back pay.

It took another two years before they actually got hold of my ex to get any monies from him, but they didnt enforce that till a year later, now we are ten years down the line. In the end i found ICE, an independant case examiner who investigated the csa, and i was awarded £2,000 compensation, plus £16,000 plus interest, i was finally paid out in 2006 and csa were named and shamed – so never give up. Now i get paid regularly, weekly, from my ex by standing order, the csa are an embarrassment and a new way of collecting absent parents maintenance should be done.

The schedule DOESN’T tell you that the employer has until the 19th of the FOLLOWING month to send the payment then up to a furthur 10 days for the payment to reach my account. I am fed up with being passed around and constantly told different information. My ex’s employer then didn’t deduct the first payment stating that they couldn’t hold on to the money to send it to the CSA.

So I have had to wait another month. I still have to pay for a full time childminder due to the hours that I have to work. I am behind in my rent as well as other bills. I finally received my first payment only to find that it was £60 short. I have made several phone calls only to be told that they will get back to me.

The CSA didn’t even realise that the payment was short. How difficult is it to sort out payments? I know that some may consider me to be lucky that I have received some money, however, I don’t feel it at all. I have had to borrow money so that my daughter doesn’t go without. I have sent in a complaint to them but I am not holding my breath. A complete reform is again needed.

From what i can see the CSA is the biggest waste of time and money with no powers to do anything. I was told with the information id given them they didnt have the powers to check things out? I told them the bank he banks at, the places he sub contracts for, he even got a farm tennancy and i gave them the phone number and name of the man that runs the estate but “No” cant look into that. Dont see why i should just give up and let it drop for my sons case but i can see why the CSA fails so many children and showing no signs of improving!

Thank-you for taking the time to read my story and this is the shortened version!

The first time I spoke to them they sent me a document to fill out which I did. The the second time the guy asked for the details over the phone which I was a bit uneasy about but still gave them and I took the CSA banking details as I wanted to make payments. A couple of months went by and I email and I called them and was told to wait until I had 2 wage slip and then I should send those in. In the mean time I got my xwife to also chase them up (check this out I the person paying my xwife the person getting the money are chasing the people CSA).

Anyway they called me back twice and to be fair I didn’t take the call as I was driving at the time and the law in the UK is quite clear not allowed to use your mobile phone unless it is on a car kit. Which by the way I do not have. So there fore when driving I don’t take calls.

I need to point out (1) the called Id is hidden and (2) No voicemail. So who are you supposed to call back? Then you get a rude letter threating you a couple of days later.

Anyway I called then and went through the whole thing with them. They claimed I didn’t tell them that I was moving companies. Which I then responed by say (a) How did I get your banking details. Couldn’t give me an answer. I then told them that I record all incoming and outgoing calls. Well at this point suddenly they didn’t want to carry on the call. As they knoew then that everything they said would be a matter of record. I strongly urge anyone who deals with the CSA to record all calls and also to make a note of the date and time. Don’t worry about the name they give you as in most case it is false.

By the way the law is very clear as long as one party agrees to the call being recorded that is fine. I would say there is only a very small amount of people at the CSA who know what they are doing, the others are usless.

They say they can not send you emails, hello! CSA, you managed to send one to my employer. They give you a fax number which is engaged all the time. When you call in they refute your call and do not even capture the fact correctly.

I think Mr Cameron Should start there with regards to budget cuts get rid of the dead wood and employ people who really want to work. Also give every called a ref number that is tied to the call.