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I pay more than CSA calculator says I should, what can I do?

January 8, 2016

I currently have my 3 sons a minimum of 12 nights a month, an average of 3 nights per week, Minimum.

I work full time, with no help towards my Rent, bills, gas, electric etc.

I currently also Co own a house with a mortgage with the children’s mother, at first I was happy paying the £355 per month the Child maintenance as I was under the impression the mother who forced me out the family home was paying the mortgage, I have recently found out that is not the case and we now have a £4000 debt.

As I now have to find someway of paying that debt along with my other out goings I am struggling to live.

The CSA online calculator says that due to the amount of nights I have my children I should be paying in the region of £100 per month.

I am fully aware that the this is for the up keep of the children, but I have them 50% of the time, how is this fair, I work hard for my boys, when other fathers aren’t even around.

I would really appreciate some help and advice on this matter, before I lose both homes due to my financial status.

Written by James Callister · Filed Under CSA Advice 

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Comments

  • Steve Parrish says:
    January 8, 2016 at 4:24 pm

    Hi James, my name is Steven and I work for the CSA. And hopefully I’ll be able to help.

    With regards to shared care on a CSA case, the number of nights that a child stays over is averaged out over a YEAR rather than a week or a month. Also, the child also has to stay OVERNIGHT for it to be included in the assessment.

    The bandwiths for shared care allowance currently are:

    between 52-103 nights = 1/7 of assessment decucted from assessment.
    between 104-155 nights = 2/7 etc
    between 156-174 nights = 3/7 etc
    between 175-182 nights = 0.5 of assessment deducted and a further abatement of £7.00 also deducted from assessment.

    This last bandwith is important as obviously the 364 days in a year halved is 182 days.

    Using the examples that you have given for the nights that your children stop over per week and monthly equates to 156 and 144 nights respectively.

    What I suggest is using a calender to physically count the number of nights that you have your children overnight so that you can be as accurate as you can when inputting this information into the calculator. This way you can be sure that you are only being asked to pay an amount of child support that is fair to your circumstances. Hope this helps.

  • King Canute says:
    January 25, 2016 at 4:38 pm

    ” I work hard for my boys, when other fathers aren’t even around”. .. The reason that some are not around is that they have had their human rights taken away from them by the CSA. The CSA, in whatever guise is a totally unaccountable agency (Agency being the important word here) whose main sphere of excellence manifests itself in its signal ability to excel in maladministration.

    Most of its staff are agency workers are not even vetted. Their main raison d’etre is to extract as much of the filthy lucre from the absent father as possible. Accuracy is an anomaly.

    I have had the misfortune to have dealings with the CSA from their inception and believe me, I have tried to be the good absent father and co-operate with the agency. I could tell you all the things they have done wrong (including making me homeless and making me lose my job and home through their wilful mistakes) plus a load of other stuff over the last 20 years or so but I fear that would need more words than ‘War & Peace’.

    Take my advice – have nothing to do with them and face up to facts – you are going to lose that house and the CSA won’t bat an eyelid whether thev’e got it right or wrong, nor the consequences.

  • Stephen says:
    March 2, 2021 at 7:38 pm

    Hello wanto ask.i earn 17,000 a year have 1 child and pay 487 pounds a month and the csa tell me its correct wen I was earning more I payed 780 a month is this right

  • Stephen says:
    March 2, 2021 at 7:40 pm

    I get 478 taken from my pay with is 1400 a month and have 1 child ..csa say its correct ..and I struggle to pay my bills 😩

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