Carer allowance
I have been paying maintenance to CSA via s/order, i was paying slightly over the calculation to work off some arrears from the commencement of the calculation.
My assessment stated that the amount included a carer allowance of £16.64 per week. The accompanying guidance provided in booklet CSA 2024 indicated that this would only be payable until the child became 16 years of age.Therefore from approx 6 weeks ago when my daughter turned 16yo then I reduced my payment by £16. This way I am still slightly overpaying to clear the arrears.
I now have the CSA threatening me with bully boy tactics to get me paying more now than my original payment saying the assessment is not changed and I am working outside the legislation and they will deduct from earnings or take me to court. They also accuse me of being out of compliance for over 13 weeks although I only reduced 6 weeks ago!!!
What are my options how can they send me this information and then tell me it s/I am wrong?
What is the position re the carer allowance. If they state it is not payable after 16th Birthday surely this is true? If the position has changed aren’t the CSA legally obliged to inform all NRP’s with current maintenance assessments?
I welcome all advice.
2 thoughts on “Carer allowance”
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Although the carer allowance is supposed to stop at the age of 16 you cant just stop paying it yourself. Unfortunatly what you have to do is contact the csa to let them know she has turned 16 and then they will do a re-assesment. It may take them a while to do so but any over payments during that time will be sorted. Now the problem is that your payments would not reduce by the amount stated. I am in the same boat of having to pay this. Now the full 100% carers allowance is roughly £64.
You pay this upto the child turning 11 then 25% is taken off. Another 25% is taken off at 14. The last 50% is taken off at 16. So from that £16 should be knocked off at the age of 11 and another 16 at 14. Finaly the last 32 at 16. When my daughter turned 14 i had the re-assesment and they told me the payments will not drop by more than £10 therefore there will be no change. They dont reduce your payments unless it is more than £10. I said i thought it should be dropping by £16 (I pay £100 a week). They said no because when the carer allowance is taken out it means you have more disposable income so then a percentage of that will be added back into the normal csa payment.
To put it bluntly the CSA stink and make up the rules as they go along. Thats when they are not just blatently lying to you.
I am currently experiencing a similar problem. Mine includes amendments to my mortgage. Long story short. Mortgage payments up and daughter reaching 14. Informed the CSA. They recalculated. They reduced my payments based purely on the mortgage. When quizzed they informed me that the mortgage calculation was back dated to my last payment, June 26. But, my daughter was still only 13 on that date and therefore would not be included (birthday July 1st).
Due to an error at the building society the new mortgage would not be active until August, so I rang the CSA again with the update. Was accused of informing them because I thought I would benefit.
Be warned, learn from my costly mistake. Make sure everything drops in place, timing is critical.