Child Maintenance Service Recensioni 

Dealing with Child Maintenance has been an absolute nightmare. They are incredibly difficult to get hold of, communication is poor, and I rarely receive any updates unless I spend ages chasing them myself. It feels like there is very little effort made to recover outstanding payments or enforce arrears.
My daughter turns 13 in September, and I separated from her father just before she turned two. He has never been involved in her life, doesn't see or speak to her, and has built up nearly £12,000 in arrears. Despite this, it feels like no meaningful action has been taken to recover what is owed.
To make matters worse, I constantly seem to get locked out of my online account, making it even harder to access information or contact anyone. The whole process is frustrating, stressful, and leaves you feeling completely unsupported. Families relying on Child Maintenance deserve better communication, better enforcement, and a service that actually keeps them informed.

SHAMEFUL FOR A GOVERNMENT RUN COMPANY. I have been waiting 11 months so far for a payment towards the arrears which is owed. I am continually promised a call from a manager or my case worker would call back instead. But nothing yet again. So tomorrow ill have to be put on hold for an hour and then speak to someone yet again who will promise someone will call me back with an update. Although this wont happen again. I think my next step is contacting my MP.

What a nightmare this service is over hour like waiting and still not answering it a joke there quick enough to get hold off you for money and other stuff very bad service

I’m glad this HORRIBLE SERVICE IS FINALLY BEING EXPOSED HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE LOST THEIR LIVES from CMS all this service does is financially cripple the paying parents not only are we bullied by our exs but also from this service my ex uses our child as a weapon causing alienating behaviour CMS is a money grab almost 3 years CMS collected money from me and lined up their own pockets through the collect and pay as your children do not receive the full amount the collect and pay robbing children and the paying parent you pay tax from your income and CMS collected money from me for 3 long years to top it off CMS says I owe them money …..I only just given birth to my 2nd child whilst in hospital CMS was harassing me with wrong information and outrageous wrong calculations even during my pregnancy CMS harassed me continuously no consideration to my pregnancy (high risk pregnancy)I was sick and I was not earning enough due to pregnancy complications and they expected me to still PAY THE SAME AMOUNT OF MONEY I WAS MAKING WHILST IN FULL TIME EMPLOYMENT WHICH IS NOT MUCH AS ITS minimum wage even my work place wrote to this horrible service to explain my low income! Even providing proof of my drop of income wasn’t good enough for this disgusting service if CMS can treat a pregnant woman this way I don’t know what else this horrible service is capable of my mental health through the years has declined because of the STRESS CMS has caused me and still continue to cause me till THIS very day and if you have immigration issues as I need to renew my visa every 2 and a half years I pay tax pay and pay for my own immigration application home office fees NHS fees and I’m not entitled to benefits this horrible service has nothing in place for people with immigration issues as I cannot receive child benefit so my 2nd child from my new relationship cant get recognised by child maintenance so my new born babies needs and financial support doesn’t matter I’ve explained to CMS I’m not entitled to public funding and I’m the main parent to my new born baby this doesn’t matter to them till NOW CMS won’t consider my new born baby so I have to pay my ex from my previous relationship same amount with no consideration of my new born baby and whilst on maternity leave they increased my payments knowing full well maternity pay decreases on top of that I have my 2nd child to take care of whilst my ex gets MORE money than I do CMS does not consider the paying parents bills nor tax. The staff are nothing but bullies and incompetent. How many lives are being lost by this service! Causing me stress during my pregnancy then after giving birth in my hospital bed till now I also have an autoimmune disease my health has declined the stress from CMS just makes it worse HORRIBLE DISGUSTING SERVICE!

I have noted these guys believes whatever these woman say without considering the other side ,my ex pired have been misleading n lying on several occasions after me sending my payments receipt when she claimed I was owing they still grant her wishes u are biased

I call csa as my income droped 20%.
They informed me I have to pay anyway the same amount? Brutal and unfair system
Will only drop your payment if is 25%.
Im paying taxes in uk for last 28 years and for first time im thinking about unemployment.
They push people for Universal credit
Bravo csa you support middle class and economy

My experience with the Child Maintenance Service has been appalling.
CMS allowed thousands of pounds of arrears to accrue over eight months before I was even notified that my children's father was in employment.
Although a Deduction from Earnings Order was eventually put in place, payments have been missed and sporadic, but CMS has continually failed to take effective action.
For the past four months, I've wasted countless hours on the phone trying to resolve ongoing issues, with no progress.
When I tried to make a formal complaint, I was told I had to wait indefinitely for a response to my "dissatisfaction" before I could access the complaints process.
Three weeks later, they’re still ‘looking into it’ and customer services refused to provide an update, let alone actually help me, leaving me completely stuck.
I have cancer and am raising two young children. The constant battle just to get answers is causing me enormous stress at a time when that has serious repercussions for my health and recovery.
A system that's supposed to support children should not be abandoning the families it exists to help!

Awful
Trying to contact the CSA is impossible unless you have time to wait for over an hour or so on the telephone , if you are lucky you will not be cut off once your call is answered . The only way to contact the service is by telephone or post ?? not by the most convenient way e-mail ? . In my experience as a Father I have been spoken to as though i have done something wrong or illegal ! although i have never missed a payment . The mothers word is taken as true and the fathers word is always under suspicion , on finding the father was telling the truth never an apology .

Automated message takes too long, also trying to get connected to a human takes excessively too long! They never call back if they cut it off or you lose signal which makes the whole process start again! They keep referring to online account and service now, even though it’s easier to talk to someone too do the accounts work! The information they calculate has probed to be wrong and add further to the whole process of frustration.

Takes forever to answer calls. Get a different answer each time I call, they need consistent training. No one ever does what they say and do not call back with answers. Should not be messing with finances for either parent this way.
How do they get away with such poor service for something so important for both parents involved?

Complete joke. Take forever to answer the phone then disconnect you. Zero ways to complain about the shocking service and just to add insult to injury take payments that you have in writing from them that shouldn’t have been taken but no way to complain. Completely unfit for prepose

This organisation has single handley caused me to have a breakdown....

They have impacted my mental health so bad,I don't think I'll be able to go back to work again...

They have made my life hellish....

The staff are shocking.... to say the least... inept unprofessional... disrespectful.... liar's....bone idle lazy.... thick.... useless.... etc etc

The organisation is not fit for purpose....

This organisation has caused the suicide's of grown men due to their threats and incompetence....

Horrible horrible horrible organisation....it needs closing down...

By far the worst Government organisation ever!!!! Customer service is appoaling, even with clear evidence presented about the father income they still cannot calculate the payments correctly, they don't care about the welfare of the child they protecting fathers and their income totally useless organisation!!

Disgraceful service, whoever is in charge here needs sacking now!!

Child maintenance is not open at the weekend, I received a notification to look at a letter in my account. It would not let me sign in even though the pin number was correct, tried resetting and now I am locked out of the account and I can't phone because they are closed for two days. Highly stressful because I know I will be getting less money as the parent who pays has gone self employed and won't know earnings for a year. Thank you for making this process extremely stressful, maybe in future don't send communications when your offices are closed.

If I could give zero stars I would, horrendous service have to call everytiime i get a letter because I don't trust them have to follow up with what they deteil in the letter then on hold for half an hour told me I was in over £1000 of arrears they looked into it and I wasn't ,was told I was owed money that couldn't tell me how much then on another occasion when I asked what the figure was I wasn't owed anything in a month I was in arrears again even though I made the payment was told 6 payment then I go on direct pay now it's one more payment get anxiety when I call them I have to have a drink before I call them

If a person does pay tax correctly, then HMRC would investigate.

When a paying parent wants to cheat paying for their child, there’s no real consequence or investigation for this.

I strongly believe this needs a review and paying parents should have a minimum payment they HAVE to make, as every child has the right to live with clothing/food/hot water etc. This is both parents responsibility and this payment should be liable until paid in full. So, it should be charged to the paying parents estate and taken upon death if necessary.

There needs to be stronger laws and no getting out if paying for child maintenance!!!!! If you can’t afford it now, then you pay when you can afford to …simple!

I've never known a company to be so corrupt in my life.
I've always worked. I've always paid. I understand some people try not to pay and therefore they're so strict as a result.
people like myself who off work now due to rupture quad, I have provided all evidence of my hospital letters, sick notes and payslips as requested on the start of March.
I was told it'll be backdated to then until the phone call today saying it be to May!
I've been honest from the word go and now they try and say owe them £800 of arrears.
The calculations are just ridiculous.
they say the lessons to all their phone calls which they clearly haven't because I'll talk back data to March.
I've still paid some money when I've been off as done so by the child matience calculator.
I can see why some dads pay £20,000 extra than what they should have done as they can't do basic maths.
The system is corrupt and I now may take legal action against them.

Corrupt and immoral service that is pushing more and more parents(mostly fathers)to despair and suicide due to nothing more than control and greed and it cares nothing about our children or us.

IT NEEDS ABOLISHING!