Survivors of domestic abuse amongst those most impacted by changes to child maintenance

Child maintenance arrangements currently made through the Child Support Agency (CSA) will be ending between now and 2017, to be replaced by the newly established Child Maintenance Service (CMS). Parents who are unable to agree an informal arrangement between themselves will be able to apply to the CMS for assistance. It is hoped that the new service will offer a number of key improvements to the system, including:

• Faster processing of applications
  The CMS will obtain the paying parent’s gross annual income from the latest available tax year, directly from HMRC, enabling the service promptly to work out the accurate amount due without waiting for the paying parent to provide the information. The parents will then be provided with a maintenance calculation and schedule for payments.

• Autonomy and regular communicationParents will be given information on how to arrange the payments directly between themselves – “direct pay” – and both the paying and receiving parent will receive an annual statement confirming the sums paid or received, enabling them to keep track of payments.

• Annual reviews
  Every year the CMS will automatically review the paying parent’s income, benefit status and other circumstances and provide the parents with a yearly updated calculation. This will ensure that the amount of child maintenance they pay for the next 12 months is still correct and fair.

• A more vigorous collections service
  If a paying parent fails to pay the correct amount of child maintenance on time, then the CMS will take appropriate action to get the money owed. Paying parents will have a grace period of 72 hours, after which the CMS will contact them to seek to rectify the position and avoid arrears building up. If the paying parent continues to default on payments, the CMS can do one of three things: (i) take the money direct from their earnings; (ii) take the money from their bank or building society account; or (iii) take action through the courts.

It is also, however, anticipated that there will be some drawbacks, both financial and practical.

First, for those currently receiving payments through the CSA, it is possible that there will be a gap between payments on transfer to the CMS. In practice, parents will receive a letter from the CSA telling them when their child maintenance will end with the CSA (usually on 6 months’ notice) and how and when to make the new arrangements with the CMS. However, even if parents act quickly and request a transfer to the CMS as soon as they receive the CSA closure letter, they may still experience a gap as the CMS will only be able to start administering the new child maintenance once the CSA case has been closed, which may take up to 6 weeks.

Secondly, the service isn’t free. Those aged 18 or over who wish to use the service will pay a fee of £20. Whilst the fee is waived for victims of domestic abuse, they have to voluntarily declare a history of abuse rather than being directly asked. The Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) itself has acknowledged that this will mean many survivors (who are expected to make up 50% of applicants) end up paying the fee. Further concerns have been raised concerning the “direct pay” system which requires the parent with care of the children to supply their bank details to the other parent. The charities Gingerbread and Women’s Aid have reported that some parents are too frightened to go ahead with direct payments in case their abuser gets hold of their personal details.

In addition, charges are imposed if the CMS has to step in to collect the payments on the parent’s behalf, both on the paying parent and the parent in receipt. The paying parent is charged an additional 20% (which goes to the CMS) and the receiving parent receives only 96% of the sum due. Not only does the receiving parent lose out financially, but some have informed the charities that they won’t move into the collection system for fear of upsetting the other parent. In this regard, the CMS has come under criticism for the lack of specialist training for staff to enable them to deal appropriately and sensitively with survivors of domestic abuse and to recognise the signs of financial coercion, particularly in circumstances of non-compliant paying parents.

Charities are therefore calling on the DWP to roll out specialist training and clear guidance for CMS staff on how to recognise and work with domestic abuse survivors, to offer survivors the option to fast-track directly to using the CMS collection service and for the respective collection charges for parents in cases of domestic abuse to be dropped, so as to provide a safer and more effective service for all.

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