I separated from my son’s mum around 6 years ago. We were never married. It was relatively amicable & at the time I decided to pay child maintenance without using the CSA. The agreement was that I would pay all my ex’s household bills up to a certain amount & I would give her any extra in cash. At the time this seemed like the best option & easiest as I had moved out of the home & all the bills / direct debits were in my name. However, over the years it has caused some issues. Such as the fuel bills rising for suspicious circumstances & on various occasions, I have had to sort out the renewals to keep the price down. At the time I was living in a one bed flat & the agreement was that my son would come to my house for a few hours after work on a Tuesday & Thursday & I would have him stay over Saturday. My son is now 12 & started high school last year. I wanted to get him into a decent school, but it wasn’t on a bus route from his mum’s house. Due to this I moved to a new house closer to his school. He now stays at mine Monday, Tuesday, Saturday & Sunday. So basically 4 nights he stays over. I am still paying my ex £225 a month child maintenance. The £225 was calculated on the .gov website but not for him staying 4 nights. According to the website I should now be paying her £140 a month. As well as paying child maintenance I take him to school each morning, pay for his trainers, hair cutting, holidays & clothes. His mum is unemployed & has been for over 10 years. She still asks to borrow money from me which I agree to mainly because I do not want my son missing out on things if she is struggling for money. However, I am slightly concerned as to why she is always short of money when she claims income support as well as housing benefit plus my child maintenance.

The money is not only the issue. I do not think me son is been cared for properly when he is there. She has now got a new partner who is also unemployed & it’s been noted that she is asking to borrow money from other members of the family. There’s mention of substance abuse going on & only last week she changed plans & asked if I would have my son an extra night. This then turned into 2 nights.

The thing that I am worried about is losing access to seeing my son if I start confronting her. I am pretty sure that if I reduce her maintenance she will limit when I see him to counter this. Then I am putting him in an environment that I do not think is good for his emotional health. Things that concern me is that she is trying to get my son to hug her new partner & he doesn’t feel comfortable doing it. She constantly lies to him & I can see he is getting visibly upset. He feels like he is being pushed out for this new guy.

She tells me our son misbehaves for her & she can’t handle it. This is why I offered to increase the time he stays with me. He is good as gold for me & I think is bad behaviour for his mum is due to what goes on in that house.

I have no idea what to do for the best. The only thing that I can think of doing is visiting the CAB.

Any advice please?