CSA staff are untrained and make countless mistakes

November 24, 2011

I can not believe what I have just read regarding the CSA and their UNTRAINED staff! My case has been going on since 1999 and still not concluded! My children have grown up now and left home, I’m even a proud Grandmother! Its taken 4 Tribunals, 3 of which saw no change to my ex’s circumstances even though he has two thriving businesses and was discovered to earn in excess of £50,000 p/a.

He has managed to convince the CSA that he only earnt £25.25 p/week and they never checked The latest tribunal heard in July this year (2011) found in my favour and he now has to pay considerably more,but only for the last year that the children were qualified for maintence. 6 months down the line I am still waiting for some kind of payment. They write to you expecting you to provide private and sensitive information regarding the NRP and tell you that they are going to execute thier extensive powers and list them, they also tell you in writting that it is a CRIMINAL OFFENCE to deliberately provide false information and yet they still do nothing!

I have a friend who is a magistrate and he told me that when the CSA present cases to them for a Court Payment Order they do so in their 100s, the magistrate then signs the top 1 and the final 1 and all the others inbetween are deemed as signed. In doing this this it makes the Payment Order LAW and they can act accordingly, however, it never works that way they write to the NRP and allow 28 days for a reply, failure to reply within said time sets off another letter allowing a further 28 days. Then they arrange a Court date which can also take around 28 days, failure for the NRP to attend the Court heafring DOES NOT automatically mean that CSA will have the NRP’s goods siezed or they have recieved any payments to give to the recipient, no it means yet another 28 day or longer to get the NRP back into court. Their powers are such that they can have the NRP summoned to appear, or prevent them from signing over assets or conviently going unemployed as they can now take the minimum payments from the NRP dole money.

They can also have a 28 day prision sentence attached to a NRP refusal to pay – this 28 day seems to be the norm for the CSA dragging a case out over years rather then months unlike other law enforcements agencys. As I mentioned in the beginning my children have all grown up and left home, at the time of submitting a request in 1999 my children were young and I needed thier help. Ive achieved what I have with my family on my own and some 12years later I am still fighting for what, respectfully is owed to me. Im shocked to find that there are no regulators to whom you can turn too should you feel that the CSA is not treating your case seriously or efficently and as a Government Department its at liberty to treat people who need help with such contempt.

There has be some course of action, a private case maybe, to actively seek compensation to those who have had to wait an extensive time for ANY action to be taken, a maybe NO WIN NO FEE situation could run with this and if the CSA has been found incompitant of doing their job efficently and correctly they pay ALL costs and compensation for the amount of years its taken to resolve the situation, I can see case numbers reduced to the increased press coverage and the sheer amount of compensation being paid. I am not the only angry parent I’m sure, and I shall continue to fight.

Comments

  • Polly says:

    All the stafff at the CSA should be sacked, they are incompetent, rude, liars who have no interest in a childs welfare. I have not come across one member of staff at the CSA who can do thier job properly in over 13 years! In my years of dealing with these incompetent liars i have over 700 promises of call backs that never happen, they lose recoded delivery letters, they talk to me like dirt, when i ring up they tell me no one is working on my case despite there being over 14k of arrears. I go to complaints who fail to secure the maintainance i should get, then they close my complaint, and ask me to write back to have it re-opened despite never once securing regular maintenance. The supervisors know very little and also lie, even to the point of telling me i will get a payment in the bank in 5 days, even giving me an amount down to the last penny, only for me to ring up when it doesn’t arrive and be told that they had made a mistake! I ask how can someone cruelly tell me that i’m going to get a payment when they haven’t even recieved one at the CSA. I constantly get told, “yes we are the arrears are building up but you will get them in the future”!!!
    They do not care about children, they do not do what they are supposed to do, which is secure regular maintenance, they lie, they waste time, they tell you they do one thing and do another, the staff are rude, incompetent and are incapable of doing their job properly. If they cannot do the job properly, they should hand the process back to the court system, instead of messing poor parents with care around. By the time my 2 children get the money they are due they will both be married themselves!!! The name even makes my blood boil – child support agency – a joke in itself!!! My case was once “lost” for 6 months, no one could find it. I go to my MP every few months, which ends up in complaints dept again, who get me one small payment which is never anywhere near what the assesment is, then they close the case -USEFULL!!!!!
    I have 6 x boxfiles of every phone call, letter etc and any dealings i have had with the csa, it reads like a farcical play. If i add up the time i’ve spent on hold on the phone (you know the one, the delaying tactics they use when they can’t deal with your call in the hope that you get bored and hang up) it runs into weeks!!!!
    I want some TV programme like panorama to pick up my case and expose them for what they realy are, they seem to be untouchable. Never before have i come across a government department run in such a dreadful way. At the end of the day, i work full time on a rubbish wage (thanks Mr Cameron) with 2 children to suppport and the CSA have done nothing for my kids. The staff treat me as an inconvenience, depite that fact that the taxes i pay keep their useless incompetent liars in a job. They are untrained, don’t know what one dept. is doing, they work at one pace – which calling it slow would be a massive overstatement. I do half the work for them, i have to ring them, god forbid i expect anyone to call me – they obvisouley canot use thier hands. They write the occasion letter, usually with the wrong information on it! They make every phone call a living nightmare – even to the point of me asking if they have somehting personal against me as i am treated so badly.
    Have you ever heard of an organisation that cannot send emails as they do not have the facility. Who can’t find me on the system – despite me being with them for 13 years! Who won’t let you take to a supervisor as “they can’t tell you anything diferent from what the cal centre staff can”!
    The following is a list of my favourite csa quotes:
    i ask “can i speak to whoever is working on my case” – “no one is working on your case”,
    i say “but there’s over 14k of arrears, sureley someone is working on my case”
    “sorry we can’t help you but i will send an email to get someone to call you back”
    i say “you already did that – 4 times in the last 2 weeks, and no one has been in touch with me”
    2 weeks later i call back “why has no one ben in touch with me”?
    i get the reply “no emalis have been sent as we don’t have the facility”!!!
    BACK TO MY MP!!
    when i qureied why a supervisor had lied and told me i would recieve £260 within ten days, and the response was an uncomfortable laugh and the response “i’m sorry he must have been looking at the figures for what i SHOULD recive and not what payemnts had come in”!!!
    By this point i was crying and asked if someone would like to tell my kids this.
    They should all be thouroughly ashamed of themselves. I know my employer would sack me for such unproffessional behavoir!
    I’m closing now – my advice to anyone would be – make a nuisance of yourself and pray to god that you have an MP who will help!!

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