Please help!!
My stepdaugher will be 19 yrs old on 27th April 2008, we currently pay £250 per month to her mother as arrange by the court in 2002 which was before my husband and I met, we met in January 2004. My stepdaughter is on her 3rd course at College and has now found the one she likes, she has decided to continue with follow on courses starting this September, according to the CSA the law states that parents no longer have to support a child from the age of 19yrs, but her mother told us we will pay as long as it takes and to look at the divorce papers, His divorce papers state that he must pay until the daughter is 17yrs old or has ended full time education which ever is the later. The daughter lives with her boyfriend for more than half the week, probably 2/3rds and growing, the mother does not give the daughter any money from the £250 she has to live off her EMA and money from her part-time job. It is fair to say that if the daughter had not messed around trying course as advised by her mother after we refused to give her "payments for an extra year to help her out" as she put it in 2005, she would have finished her full time education by now. All the courses that she has taken so far she could have done day release from a job associated with the course (hairdressing, Hospitality, travel & tourism) My husband left Colchester to live in Leicester in 2005 and we married in 2006, he travels by train weekly back to colchester to work at our expense approx £300 per month. We also pay for the daughters train fares to come and visit us and also supply her food and usually clothing and have never deducted anything from the maintenance payments. Her mother works full-time and has done for severl years now. What we want to know is when can we legally stop paying, surley if the daughter is old enough to co-habit she is old enough to take responsibility for herself? We are not young fly-by-nights I am nearly 53 and my husband is nearly 51, we are both the blameless parties due to adulteress partners....we are trying to build a life and at some point have to think of our future, neither of us has a pension worth a carrot....I am at breaking point. I got nothing from my ex and struggled with 3 children, I put 1 through college and another through university, I am now penalised with payments for another child. Will the government subsidise me in my old age due to the fact that I have paid (I have never claimed benefits) for my children and have been unable to save for my old age? If the CSA state payments stop at 19yrs, surely the court cannot state differently? If they do, surely it makes a mockery of the whole maintenance system, it has to be one or the other...not both!

Child support legislation is different from the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973, which is the legislation under which the court order was made so the court order stands until it is varied, dismissed or expires.

"Ended full time education" is ambiguous and judges appear to interpret it differently.

It sounds as though there have been several significant changes to circumstances which gives your husband grounds to apply for a variation, but it could be very expensive going to court. It would be much cheaper to negotiate and change the order by consent.

Thanks for your reply....my husband will contact the mother tonight hopefully and see what we can arrange.

Entirely agree with Fiona

Idea of costs between £3k and £6k depending on how far each pushes for any court outcome

I suspect that your order is none retrospective and therefore could well stand, and as Fiona says, one Judge can see it differently to another.

If you can 'prove' the ex is not using the money for the support of the daughter then that's a plus, but who will evidence it!

Why doesn't your partner pay the money directly to his daughter. She may then want to make arrangements to pay her mother a contribution towards her upkeep, but that would be between them. Paying directly towards his daughter may make your partner feel much better about the whole thing, though it may not help you.

Sadie

I would be inclined to agree, that your partner should pay the maintenance direct to his daughter. It would then be up to his x wife to ask her daughter for some sort of keep. After all, I would imagine that the daughter shops for most of the things that the maintenance payment would cover. He could discuss reducing the payment with his daughter on a gradual basis. I would guess that the onus would then be on his x wife to go back to the court if she wasn't happy with the arrangement. I would say that his daughter does need to learn to stand on her own 2 feet though, he can't subsidise her forever. Good luck with it all.

Regards, Sarah

We too have same sort of problems.Step daughter is 17 and in full time education
x gets £200 per month and step daughter comes to us all the time asking for money.We pay mobile phone, hols,nights out, some clothing,driving lessons
I keep record of all payments made to step daughter and deduct it from £200 every month.
X has been to sol and threatened to go back to court. We have provided all details of payments and dates and she has now dropped case- obviously advised to do so by sol.
I thought that on attaining age of 18 and if child is still in full time ed then the child can apply for maintenance.
We are stopping the cm payments at age 18
There is alot of conflicting information.
Good luck with your case. We too feel we are working to pay the x- she gets £2k pcm and is taking us back to court for more money.