Self Employed Bailiffs? Scraping a living? Earning £70 a week? Surely not...?

[Lisa1967]

Good evening everyone

 

This isn't so much a bailiff problem, more a problem with a bailiff I was once married to....

 

I have been divorced from my ex husband (a certificated bailiff/enforcement officer for Marsdens) for almost four years, and have since remarried. I have a 9 year old son from my previous marriage and have struggled and struggled to get any kind of child maintenance.... My ex-husband has constantly insists he cannot afford to pay me anything...

 

I have recently had my hand forced and in desperation turned to the Child Maintenance Service who have now intervened and "forced" my ex-husband (a certificated bailiff/enforcement officer remember?) into paying maintenance for his son.

 

I have learnt today that my son's maintenance award is £7 per week!!!! Yes, £7 per week..... £1 a day!!!!! My ex-husband is, it turns out, SELF EMPLOYED and on a very low income.... £70 a week!!!!! He is a certificated bailiff !!! Surely this cannot be right???

 

If this is so, then SURELY there is something wrong with the system.....I don't mean the maintenance system, I mean the LEGAL enforcement system!!! Surely someone in such a powerful position, who deals daily with vulnerable people, who has the power and legal rights of arrest (so he reckons) shouldn't be motivated by commission? Self employment? Surely they should be untouchable..... On a salary.... Not self employed?

 

Is this right? Any opinions or views appreciated.

 

Thanks

Lisa

[lookinforinfo]

Private bailiffs will mostly be classified as self employed. I would expect that someone in the business for that length of time would be earning more than that or why continue

doing it.

It may be that he gets a basic pay of £70 per week, but on top of that he will get paid commission for the work that he brings in. In addition, if he was doing that badly, I doubt the bailiff company would keep him on.

[Lisa1967]

Thank you for your reply, much appreciated.

 

Yes thats pretty much what i thought, but child maintenance services tell me that my ex husband was un co operative with their enquiries and so they went straight to HMRC for his P60.

 

It just begs the question that someone in such a responsible job with such powers of enforcement should be scraping by on a low income, and could possibly be open to bribes and dare i say it shady practice. I know for sure that hes done and probably will carry on doing private jobs, but HMRC dont see that, how can this possibly be right.?

 

The one thing i do know is that he does lease his van on a private lease hire (through Marsdens) and that costs him £80 per week and HMRC are quite happy for him to do so,but he only pays me £7-00 per week for his son.

[i hate bailiffs]

Surely someone in such a powerful position, who deals daily with vulnerable people, who has the power and legal rights of arrest (so he reckons) shouldn't be motivated by commission?

 

As always bailiffs lie

He is playing the system

[brassnecked]

His accountant will be most creative to leave little available income in case he gets a bailiff visit himself, and his Berlingo will be safe from siezure too.

[ploddertom]

2 scenarios, if he is self employed then he won't have a P60 and they will be looking at his Self Assessment figures which if he has a decent accountant will show as little as possible once all overheads are taken into consideration. If he is employed by Marstons then his P60 should show how much he has earned in the year, I would suspect the £70 per week comes from an I&E which shows his disposable income as £70.

[seanamarts]

Oh the irony!

Im so sorry to hear that you have fallen foul of the 'system'. I know many absent parents who earn a lot less, pay more for child maintenance.

Im surprised that he was not ordered to show bank statements to show how much is really going into his bank.

Absent parents on benefits who get less than £70 a week to live on have to pay about the same amount, but these are genuine cases who cannot afford to pay this amount but are forced too.

If he has only £70 left each week to live on, being a bailiff etc, then I can only imagine that he is living way beyond his means.

[tomtubby]

Firstly, given the popularity of this forum most bailiff companies view posts on here so you may want to edit your post to remove the name of your ex husband's employer.

 

I am slightly confused to hear that he is self employed AND that HMRC approached the company for his P60.

 

A large percentage of bailiffs are indeed self employed but to earn just £70 per week !!! Hardly....

 

It is very likely that he may be EMPLOYED on a basic wage and that from this his employer deducts the weekly van rental. The commission payments can also be paid to a TRADING NAME. A lot of bailiffs operate in this way. Most bailiffs are not too inventive and their trading names usually consists of their initials followed by the word bailiffs !!! PS: I am not joking either....

[seanamarts]

Firstly, given the popularity of this forum most bailiff companies view posts on here so you may want to edit your post to remove the name of your ex husband.

....

The op hasnt named her ex husband TT only his employer. Did you mean to say her ex's employer?

[tomtubby]

Thank you. My error. I meant to say the employer.

[seanamarts]

Thank you. My error. I meant to say the employer.

 

We are allowed errors first thing in the morning, I think our brains dont engage with our fingers until that first or second cuppa kicks in. With me its a large pot of coffee

[wonkeydonkey]

As always bailiffs lie

He is playing the system

 

Dodging the former CSA is a pastime to some people and lying through their teeth is the norm.

 

I was recently sent evidence to there being a ccj of 14k in respect of a maintenance award that is still outstanding approx 7 years on. http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?117450-Living-abroad-can-I-leave-uk-debts-behind/page2

 

The poster on this thread actually lives in the UK and was never a Pilot for any airline......when recently challenged openly, he claims he won at a tribunal to have the debt expunged,that there is no record of this 'tribunal' I think says it all.

 

The 14K is still owed and he boasts an income of ' in excess of £10,000 per month from private clients’ and furthermore; on yet another forum he states'

“My website went from a single page earning me a big fat zero pounds a week, but over the last 18 months, its sales are now the kind of numbers not even I dare mention”

Given he boasts such a lucrative change in his financial circumstances, I wonder if the ex wife will now get what is owed to her?

 

[url=http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?117450-Living-abroad-can-I-leave-uk-debts-behind/page2][/url]

[wonkeydonkey]

duplicate post removed

[HCEOs]

A decent bailiff should earn anywhere between £30-40k pa.

[tomtubby]

 

A decent bailiff should earn anywhere between £30-40k pa.

 

Thats more like it !!

[lookinforinfo]

I read an interesting Code of Conduct for Bailiffs who work for Blackpool council and one of their stipulations was that the bailiffs were to be PAYE employees with their Company.

 

Lisa1967, if you are sure your ex is paying that much per week for his van, then I suggest you go back to the CSA and ask them if they know this and if they do, then I guess

that they areb saying that the £70 per week is his disposable income per week. if that is the case £7 seems a very low payment for the CSA to have accepted as in the past they

have been notoriously heavy when looking for payments.

[tomtubby]

Wonky Donkey:

 

The 'Tribunal' that you refer to would be the 'First Tier Tribunal'. However, this was only created in late 2008 as part of the Tribunals Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 !!!

 

What date is the Judgment?

[wonkeydonkey]

Wonky Donkey:

 

The 'Tribunal' that you refer to would be the 'First Tier Tribunal'. However, this was only created in late 2008 as part of the Tribunals Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 !!!

 

What date is the Judgment?

 

Judgment dated 4 August 2008

[sweep1]

Under current regulations (for applications after 29 July 2013) The Child Maintenance Enforcement Commission (CMEC) for a single child will still use a "net calculation" for assesment. and as morally wrong as it may be,the ex -partner has used this to their advantage.

 

The following links may be of interest

 

http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed113401

 

http://www.familylawweek.co.uk/site.aspx?i=ed104950

 

On a personal note, the issue of person(s) being self-employed whilst working for a company is something I know HMRC have been known to take a dim view of (IR35)

 

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/ir35/guidance.pdf