Child Maintenance Service Reviews 

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!

Criminal money grabbing system built to do what it can to profit my ex lied to cms saying I havent paid for months even though I had but because I put the reference as my sons name and not CMS therfore the payments dont exist so I got moved to collect and pay and had to pay double and fees for ages resulting in and extra 3000£ payout even though I paid the exact amount they asked for on the right date period i also had texts evidencing she basically lied but they have been dismissing me over and over again this company will ruin you does not help anyone

Absolute shocking service wait nearly an hour to get onto phone, they are just very rude in responses and don’t actually mean to help atall, very blunt with any responses to questions asked, also all need training as when do speak ti someone everyone gives you different answers to questions

this child maintenance service has set extremely low ethical standards, we are going to dicuss relevant cases with examples. This should be an wide angle eye opener for all british citizens. Their phone service is occupied by professional arrogant stupids who r uncaring, discourteous, uneducated and unprofessional. This is an assessment of over 95% callers. This is the primary reason people do not contact them. In one scenario, a child is over 18 and called the service informing that he was adult and no more eligible and wishes for maintenance. We want to share here, this is legally binding on this service to accept and not to make judgemental , rude, premature, illegal reactions in such cases.

In another incident, women who was an applicant got re-married and was very well financially maintained, in addition she being a professional was making extremely handsome earnings, in addition children had grown up, some were adults and others were young adults but less than 18 who needed much less maintenance. But this (dis)service continued to exact extremely unjust amounts from their father incld their own hefty %ages, despite the fact they were well aware of chnage in circumstances of the applicant (mother). This could risk legal action.

In yet another incident, we found father who was the paying parent was married to a different women outside england and had children from his second wife but this service continued with its fleecing actions, which legally constitutes theft. They are again edging on the verge of legal action.

In addition, they are well known to post or call threatening and harrasing messages against paying parents, which in our conclusion are a 100% males. This is discrimination and a legal violation of a citizens rights and priviliges. In certain situations paying parents who in our observation are entirely males, continue to support their children privately and on a personal basis between them and their children. But despite that this dis(service) continue to harress and threat such male paying parents.

This is a service worthy of being disposed off to garbage bin with legal action pursued against its administration and top officials.

Why is it when you call, you wait for nearly an hour then you get to speak to some incompetent moron that has absolutely no idea of what they are doing and can’t answer any questions that you have.?
The system is so corrupt and seems to be a government run scam to bleed money from the paying parent. I am in total agreement that I should pay child maintenance but there comes a point when the figures just don’t add up. They take more than you should be paying and then they tell you that you have arrears on the account but can’t tell you why there are arrears and then the arrears go up £500 to a £1000 a month! When the money is taken directly from your wages.
You apply to take the CMS to court, wait 3 years to hear from the courts and then the courts tell you they won’t continue to a trial! WTF!
Anyone else going through the same deal?