A man who unnecessarily paid over £8,500 in child support has received the money back after the national Ombudsman found failings by Child Maintenance Service (CMS).
Mr E was contacted by CMS in 2014 following the breakdown of a relationship. He told them that although he was on his ex-partner’s child’s birth certificate, he doubted he was the biological father.
Mr E asked his ex-partner to take a private DNA test, but she refused. He then asked for help from CMS to afford the test from their approved provider, but they never responded.
Mr E agreed to pay for a test via CMS’ approved provider but was told that he had ‘passed the point of no return’.
He raised the issue of paternity with CMS and requested a DNA test nine times over the next five years. Each time he was repeatedly – and wrongly - told that if his ex-partner refused any of his requests, he would remain the assumed father and could only rectify the issue by going to court.
In fact, a paternity dispute can be raised at any time during a child maintenance case.
It was only on the ninth call that a CMS employee realised he had been given inaccurate information and raised a dispute.
CMS then wrote to Mr E’s former partner to inform her she needed to take a DNA test. She refused and Mr E was then told he no longer needed to pay child support. By then, he had already paid a total of £8,580.39 for child maintenance.
Mr E said:
“I felt like I was living in a nightmare, my life was turned upside down and it affected my mental health.
“I tried one last time to resolve the issue with CMS and spoke to an amazing woman who gave me the correct information, finally. After years of trying and having the door shut in my face, I was told that my ex-partner had refused the paternity test and the case was closed.”
Mr E complained to CMS. They accepted that they had failed to take appropriate action on the case, had given Mr E inaccurate information, and that a dispute should have been raised in 2014 when he first began raising doubts about the child’s paternity.
Mr E took his complaint to the Independent Case Examiner (ICE). ICE came to the same conclusion and recommended that CMS pay Mr E £1,000 for the distress he had been caused, which they did.
Mr E then brought his case to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (PHSO).
The Ombudsman has now found that CMS’ mistakes amount to a failure of service and that they had not addressed the financial impact. Although CMS accepted their mistakes, they did not refund the money that Mr E had already paid on the basis that he was still named on the birth certificate. This view was also held by ICE, who had not required CMS to make any repayment.
However, PHSO recommended that CMS pay Mr E the £8,580.39. CMS have now done this.
Mr E said:
“I don’t blame the staff at CMS, but they obviously need better training so the advice they give is accurate.
“I’m happy to get the money back, I really didn’t expect that to happen. I hope bringing attention to my case helps others in the future to get justice. I can’t thank the Ombudsman enough for treating me with respect and doing a fantastic job of helping me.”
Ombudsman Rob Behrens said:
“The public rely on government services to provide them with correct information and when that doesn’t happen, as this case demonstrates, it can have a huge financial and emotional impact on those involved.
“I’m pleased to see that CMS has complied with all of our recommendations and hope they will learn from the mistakes made to improve their service for the future.”
Read the case summary.