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Government profits from money belonging to families

A single mum has discovered that child support payments made by absent parents to the Child Support Agency (CSA) are sitting in a Department for Work & Pensions bank account for days and weeks instead of being forwarded onto the families it is intended for potentially earning millions of pounds interest - with the full knowledge of the office of the Secretary of State for Work & Pensions.

The revelation comes after a single parent began to have her payments delayed by the CSA for up to two weeks despite her former husband paying the money on time to the government agency.

Caroline Weintz, single mother of three children from Helensburgh in Scotland, said:

“Let us be absolutely clear here, this is not a state benefit. The CSA merely acts as a ‘go-between’ for money paid from one parent for the upkeep of their children to another parent. I had received payments through the CSA for several years, and until recently generally what I thought was on time. However, three months ago, without warning, my child support payment failed to appear in my bank account on the usual day. The same happened over the following two months and I was shocked to discover that the CSA is holding onto money paid to them from absent parents for up to two weeks before passing it onto the resident parent. I was told by the CSA that this was its policy.”

In October of this year DWP Minister, Kitty Ussher announced that "It is good news that over £1.1 billion has been collected for over 778000 children.” However, there is anger that the government is earning millions of pounds each year by holding onto money which belongs to families.

Weintz said:

“If the figures quoted by the minister and the agency are correct, and that the majority of those families are having their payments delayed even just for a few days with the money sat in a government bank account, then by my estimation the government is making tens of millions of pounds in bank interest from that money which belongs to families. This makes me very angry because the delay in payments for child support has a huge knock on effect on household budgets – sometimes it can mean make or break for some families particularly in these tough times. It literally is the government taking food directly out of the mouths of children.”

Secretary of State for Work & Pensions office was made aware of the situation

“What makes it worse is that the office of the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions was made aware of the situation when I raised my concerns about the situation yet the practice has continued. They didn’t care when I contacted them about the practice nor did they care that my payments were being delayed by up to two weeks without warning even though my former husband had paid the CSA on time – even before he was due to in some cases. They simply fobbed me off back to the CSA. In fact I have an email trail from the DWP parliamentary office which demonstrates that they couldn’t even get the facts right or their stories the same as those given by the CSA.” Weintz added.

Extreme hardship for many families

“This is not just about one case or one family. In these difficult economic times, most families are finding it increasingly difficult to make ends meet and for a government agency to be delaying payments of money – for whatever reason–.which actually belongs to them is utterly disgraceful. Someone needs to be held accountable for this situation which has clearly been the policy for quite sometime with the CSA. This is absolutely outrageous and it is clear that government officials are fully aware that this is happening.”

Weintz added:

“During November I called the CSA when my payment didn’t appear, the staff member processed it whilst I was on the phone because it hadn’t been done despite in an earlier conversation having been told that it had been done the day before.

Despite being told that her money would be in her bank account on 9th of each month at the latest the December payment for Weintz failed to materialise despite the agency receiving the money from her former husband before the end of last month.

Weintz also attempted to get information surrounding policy and figures for the CSA in relation to the matter in general (without personal data) however the CSA has failed to comply under the appropriate legislation.” (see editor notes for more details)

The CSA is not required to declare interest earned within its annual reports because it uses a central bank account with other agencies within the DWP.

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Government profits from money belonging to families

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