Child Maintenance for my partners child.

J

Jan07

Registered User
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I'm looking for a bit of advice on a current situation involving child maintenance for my partner's child.

He is currently paying maintenance of €300/month (not by court order) to the mother of his child and has been paying this for a few of years.

My partner has regular contact, the child is as much a part of our lives as the mothers and we see the child regularly 3-4 nights/days a week including the weekends, and arrangements are relatively amicable.

The mother is in a steady relationship and has house/mortgage/part-time job/other child with her partner.

We a starting to feel like this might be an excessive amount to pay monthly considering the situation. Also, as far as we know no money has been put aside for the child's future by the mother i.e for college funds etc. This is something we would like to set up ourselves but feel that combined with maintenance payments it is too much.Also the mother has made comments about how the money is to be used to pay car tax, deposits on furniture, etc in the past: which I think is a unacceptable considering that maintenance is for the child and not her (letting off steam here).

We have a mortgage, bills to be paid and are engaged to be married. Also my partner has just started a new job and we think now is the time to review the situation. We have not sought any legal advice as of yet, but we are aware at present that my partner seems to have no rights to his child.

Any feedback is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

300 a month seems very little to me to support a chil as if you break this down it is 300*12/52 = 69 odd euro a week. This would not go too far in paying for necessities like clothes,shoes etc... even if the mother were to contribute another 69 euro herself to match this can't see much room for saving for college her out of this.
Seems to me that your partner has been happily paying this but now your own family circumstances are about tochange and so want to change the amount paid. Maybe this is a high amount for maintenace (never been in this situation) but having two kids can see how much money they cost per week to feed,clothe etc.. 300 a month seems to be modest (again depends on what % this is of your partners take home pay)
Think how the mother of the child manages their finances is irrelevant to the question of how much maintenance should be paid.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Have you checked CitizensInformation.ie for possibly relevant info?

[broken link removed] [broken link removed]

www.rollercoaster.ie might be another site worth checking for comments.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Thanks for your advice.

I do see your point on the breakdown, but I think if my partner and myself are actually "maintaining" the child from week to week, due to the regular contact as well as the mother. Also, I don't think clothing and necesseties add to this amount on a week to week basis? However, I know there is no set cost for a child per week. Also the age of a child needs to be taken into account. We do provide for the child i.e. outings, holidays, christmas and we do not wish to change this. This is not a personal attack on the mother either, but we do not wish to know what she intends to use the money for if it is not in relation to the child. To me, this is quite disrespectful to my partner. I know there is no set answer or solution, but I can't help feeling that some mother's benefit more than others in these situations, and I feel that some complications may arise in the future if this is not sorted i.e. when we marry and/or have kids of our own. My partner is honest, hardworking and most of all a wonderful Dad..and he doesn't get paid by anyone for doing that.

fobs said:
300 a month seems very little to me to support a chil as if you break this down it is 300*12/52 = 69 odd euro a week. This would not go too far in paying for necessities like clothes,shoes etc... even if the mother were to contribute another 69 euro herself to match this can't see much room for saving for college her out of this.
Seems to me that your partner has been happily paying this but now your own family circumstances are about tochange and so want to change the amount paid. Maybe this is a high amount for maintenace (never been in this situation) but having two kids can see how much money they cost per week to feed,clothe etc.. 300 a month seems to be modest (again depends on what % this is of your partners take home pay)
Think how the mother of the child manages their finances is irrelevant to the question of how much maintenance should be paid.
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Re: Child Maintenance

I agree that 300 euro a month seems very little – and no increase for a few years? My DP pays a huge amount more than that for his children and it is increased by rate of inflation every year – and we don’t complain about it. If you go to court you may find that the judge awards the child’s mother a big increase. It is certainly tactless of the ex to tell you what she spends the money on but that’s really none of your business. I presume the child is driven in the car and uses the furniture??? Be honest and fair - sit down and work out what it costs to run a home, a car, clothe, feed and educate a child and you will realise that you are doing well. And your dp’s ex is not getting “paid” to be a mother – your dp is simply handing over his share for the child that he helped create.

If you are truly concerned about the future college expenses and not just your change in lifestyle – then your dp should sit down and have a friendly chat with his ex and come up with a solution. Perhaps she would agree to forego an increase in the maintenance in order for your dp to put aside some money or maybe she would agree to a joint savings plan. If everything is amicable, it would be a shame to upset things now.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Starting to think this looks like we're being scabby. Sorry if my writing skills are not the best! I have heard of people paying less for maintenance and who's to say the mother wouldn't end up with less instead of more if we went to court. Of course the childs best interests are our concern. The child has two good homes and wants for nothing and I do feel it is my business when my partner and I are affected by certain issues. The child also sits on our furniture and is driven in our car if you want to put it like that. We are indeed "sharing" the costs per week anyway, maintenance aside. "Handing over his share" as you put it, makes it sound like he owes the mother something for having a child together, yet all responsibilities for that child are shared between the two. Maybe 300 euro isn't excessive for maintenance thats why I'm asking other peoples opinions. I agree with you that this may upset the situation. My partner is not the fighting type and a lot of the time the mother "gets her own way" because of this. Sometimes I just think he doesn't get the respect he deserves. I am of course concerned about the child's future. I am also concerned formy/our future, and I don't think that's something to be ashamed of or be made feel guilty about.

Thanks for sharing your situation/advice with me.

holly said:
I agree that 300 euro a month seems very little – and no increase for a few years? My DP pays a huge amount more than that for his children and it is increased by rate of inflation every year – and we don’t complain about it. If you go to court you may find that the judge awards the child’s mother a big increase. It is certainly tactless of the ex to tell you what she spends the money on but that’s really none of your business. I presume the child is driven in the car and uses the furniture??? Be honest and fair - sit down and work out what it costs to run a home, a car, clothe, feed and educate a child and you will realise that you are doing well. And your dp’s ex is not getting “paid” to be a mother – your dp is simply handing over his share for the child that he helped create.

If you are truly concerned about the future college expenses and not just your change in lifestyle – then your dp should sit down and have a friendly chat with his ex and come up with a solution. Perhaps she would agree to forego an increase in the maintenance in order for your dp to put aside some money or maybe she would agree to a joint savings plan. If everything is amicable, it would be a shame to upset things now.
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Re: Child Maintenance

Well it is interesting that the state is very reluctant to pay things like CB and Early Childcare Supplement to the father rather than the mother unless you go to special lengths to get them to do this!
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Yeh,

Its probably based on statistics and I have to agree that there are a lot of reasons why not to give it to the father. I think every situation is unique and I have witnessed both sides of this situation as I have friends/mother's in similar circumstances. I am pleased to get the different views. Although, I am surprised to see how people see the mother as the vulnerable party when this is not always the case. I expected some mixed feedback-lesson to be learned there. I suppose you don't really know what its like until you're in the situation yourself and I don't know how the state could review all these situations individually and be successful in doing so. So far from the advice, I think we'll grin and bare it. Things could be a lot worse.

ClubMan said:
Well it is interesting that the state is very reluctant to pay things like CB and Early Childcare Supplement to the father rather than the mother unless you go to special lengths to get them to do this!
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Re: Child Maintenance

I don't know of any specific statistics, do you? Maybe I can be enlightened. I'm sure there has to be some basis/research done for the law involving child support.

ClubMan said:
What specific statistics?
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Re: Child Maintenance

Jan07 said:
I can see how the law will stay the way it is. Your obviously in the fathers deserve no rights corner.
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How do you make this out?

I am making the point that neither the mother or the father get paid extra for being a parent.

Jan07 said:
He doesn't get paid any extra for being a father.
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If the father has to make a payment to the mother it is for the childs support.

I believe that both parents should have rights to their children under the law, something that is lacking at the moment.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Jan07, can you give us a rough idea of your partner's monthly income as it is hard to judge whether €300 per month is excessive or not without knowing this - if he is on minimum wage, €300 is a huge amount but if he's on €250,000, €300 would seem a bit on the light side! I understand what you're saying that the maintenance is effectively twice €69 per week because the child spends half her time being fed/housed by you but for an average child, €300 per month really doesn't go very far when you consider clothes, school books, activities etc.
I think your partner is very lucky that he has so much and such close contact with his child - I know a guy who desperately want to spend more time with his children and the mother blocks him at every turn (AND he has to pay a big whack of court-ordered maintenance). It obviously depends on the relationship but any attempt to reduce the maintenance may sour things with the mother and result in less access and having to go down the legal route which may swallow up several years worth of maintenance payments.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Jan - it's a shame to see you being attacked for asking a simple question.
My husband has a child with another woman also. He pays €300 a month too. We also tried to get this reduced when i had my second child. It didnt seem fair that we should be paying this when we didnt spend this amount on our own children a week. We went to our solicitor but he said that we would not be able to get a reduction. The thing is we wouldnt mind if the money was actually going to the child instead of the mothers boozy nights out! ( Wait for everybody to attack!) The mother used to dress the child in clothes that were 1 - 2 years too small for him so we started buying clothes for him every week when we saw him. The next week she'd put on the same clothes forcing us to buy more for him. This went on for months until our solicitor told us to stop doing this as she was only using us.
Cant stand the way everybody always stands up for the single mother. Alot of them are bitter and twisted! The majority are fine but people need to realise there are some that are not.
Anyway Jan, to answer your question, i dont think you'll be able to get it reduced.
 
Re: Child Maintenance

Jan07 said:
I don't know of any specific statistics, do you? Maybe I can be enlightened. I'm sure there has to be some basis/research done for the law involving child support.
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Sorry - I just assumed that since you were the one who mentioned statistics that you were aware of some that were relevant.
 
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