Private debt collectors to chase parents defaulting child support payments

Private debt collectors to chase parents defaulting child support payments

	Published : Thu, 19 Jan 2006 11:05 By : David Simms Print this Story

LONDON: Services of private debt collection firms will be used to collect defaulted child support money payments from absent parents, according to a reform plan mooted for the Child Support Agency. These private firms will have powers to seize cars and household possessions to help collect the arrears on child support payments, while they will be entitled to retain a portion of the collections as their reward.

The total dues on this account are estimated to be of the order of 3 billion pounds.

The CSA has not been effective in its handling of the situation. In 2005, its enforcement unit incurred more costs to operate than it recovered. The backlog is growing at 30 million pounds a month as the agency has not been able to overcome the hazards of the task like chasing parents who wish to evade obligations to their children.

The department of works and pensions is finalising the details of the reform plans for the CSA. The plan talks about the newly set up Revenue and Customs agency (which came into being after the merger of Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise) being entrusted with the regular collection of child support payments.

The CSA has had its own set of problems ever since it was set up in 1993 and many lone parents have not received payments and several millions of uncollected maintenance has been written off. Prime minister Tony Blair has once said the CSA is not properly suited to take up the task of investigating, adjudicating and enforcing child support cases.

With the collection work taken away, the CSA will be left with the responsibility of assessing child support payments and tackling a backlog of 350,000 cases. The agency is also saddled with cases of refunds to more than 3,000 men, who were wrongly implicated by mothers in paternity cases.