Child maintenance not paid in the UK: your options, from a reminder to the CMS

The child maintenance payment has stopped arriving, or only part of it turns up, and every month you are left juggling the shortfall. In the UK you are not on your own: there is a clear sequence of steps, from a written reminder to the Child Maintenance Service and, where a court order is involved, the family court itself. The key is to act in the right order and to arrive at each step with a precise record of what was due, received and missing. Here is a calm, practical walkthrough of your options when child maintenance is not paid.

Step 1: check what your arrangement is and date the missed payments

Before you contact anyone, get clear on one question: what kind of maintenance arrangement do you actually have? The answer determines which doors are open to you. In the UK there are three main possibilities:

• A family-based arrangement: an agreement made privately between the two of you, whether written down or simply discussed. It is flexible and free, but it is not legally enforceable on its own.
• A Child Maintenance Service arrangement: the CMS has calculated the amount, and payments are made either directly between parents (Direct Pay) or through the CMS itself (Collect and Pay).
• A consent order: a maintenance agreement approved by a court, usually as part of divorce or separation proceedings. It carries the force of a court order.

Once you know which category you are in, date the missed payments precisely. For each period, note what was due, what was actually paid, on which date and by which channel: bank transfer, cash, or a bill paid directly. If a payment was partial, record the exact amount received and when. This chronological record is the one document every later step will rely on. If the other parent tends to be evasive about money more generally, the habits described in our guide on documenting child expenses when the other parent does not cooperate apply just as well to maintenance itself.

Step 2: a written, traceable reminder

A missed payment is not always a declaration of war. A changed bank account, a different pay date, an oversight after a house move: start with a written reminder, dated and kept. A clear email or a letter sent with proof of postage is enough at this stage. Mention:

• which arrangement the maintenance is based on: your agreement, the CMS assessment or the consent order;
• the periods that were missed and the total outstanding;
• a reasonable deadline to bring payments up to date;
• the fact that, if nothing changes, you will contact the Child Maintenance Service or the court.

Keep the tone factual and courteous. This message may later be read by a caseworker or a judge, and a neutral, precise reminder works in your favour. If the dispute also covers shared costs such as school expenses or medical bills, the same logic applies, as we explain in our article on what to do when a parent does not repay child expenses.

Step 3: the Child Maintenance Service

If the reminder changes nothing, the central public route is the Child Maintenance Service, the government service that calculates, and where necessary collects, child maintenance. What it can do for you depends on where you started.

If you had a family-based arrangement

A private agreement cannot be enforced by itself, but it is not a dead end. You can apply to the CMS, which will make its own assessment of what the paying parent should contribute and set up a formal arrangement. From then on, missed payments are no longer just a broken promise: they are a failure to pay under a statutory scheme, and the CMS can act on them. The application steps and conditions are set out on gov.uk.

If your CMS arrangement is not being paid: Collect and Pay

Many CMS arrangements run on Direct Pay: the CMS fixes the amount and the parents handle the transfers themselves. When those payments stop, you can ask the CMS to move the case to Collect and Pay. Under Collect and Pay, the CMS collects the money from the paying parent, for example directly through their employer, and passes it on to you. You no longer have to chase the other parent yourself, which often takes a great deal of heat out of the situation. Be aware that collection fees apply on Collect and Pay, for both parents, and that the conditions for switching can change: check the current rules and figures on gov.uk.

The CMS enforcement powers

When a paying parent still does not pay, the CMS has real teeth. It can take money directly from earnings through the employer, and it can pursue court-based enforcement measures for arrears, which in serious cases can reach a parent's assets or other income. The details are technical and evolve over time, so treat them as a spectrum: the further a case goes, the more intrusive the measures become. For you, the practical point is simpler: the more precise your record of missed payments, the faster the CMS can act.

Step 4: consent orders and the family court

If your maintenance is set out in a consent order, the route is different. A consent order is a court order, so unpaid maintenance under it is enforced through the family court, not through the CMS. You can apply to the court to enforce the order, and it has a range of powers to recover what is owed from a parent who can pay but will not. In some situations, depending on how long the order has been in place, applying to the CMS may also become possible; the rules are specific, so verify your position on gov.uk or with a legal adviser. Whichever door you take, the court will expect the same thing the CMS does: a clear, dated statement of what was ordered, paid and missing, backed by bank statements and correspondence.

Mediation, a parallel route worth keeping open

Enforcement and mediation are not opposites. If the relationship allows it, family mediation can run alongside the formal steps, or even replace them when the missed payments come from a genuine change in circumstances rather than refusal. A mediator can help you agree a realistic catch-up plan, adjust the arrangement to a new income situation, and put the result in writing. An agreement reached together is usually paid more reliably than one imposed. Mediation is not the right tool when the other parent simply will not engage, but it is worth considering before, or alongside, the firmer options.

Which route for which situation?

These routes are not always mutually exclusive: gov.uk, Citizens Advice and family law advisers can help you sequence the steps for your circumstances.

Elsewhere in Europe: many European countries have a dedicated public collection agency for unpaid child maintenance, such as SECAL in Belgium or the LBIO in the Netherlands, each with its own conditions and procedures.

Documentation, the key to every route

One thread runs through this whole article: the quality of your records determines the strength of your case. Reminder letter, CMS application, move to Collect and Pay, enforcement hearing: at every step, you will be asked for the same things.

• A precise statement of what was due and what was received, period by period.
• The exact dates of every payment, even partial ones, and of every reminder you sent.
• The evidence: bank statements, identified transfers, letters and emails, all kept together.

A forgotten partial payment or an approximate date is enough to weaken an application, or at least to slow it down while figures are checked. A record kept day by day, where every payment and every shared cost is logged with its proof, turns a stressful reconstruction into a simple export. That is exactly what an app like Kidivi is built for: keeping the amounts, dates and receipts between separated parents in one place, intact and ready the day you need to build a file. And if the disagreement ends up in front of a judge, those same records become your foundation, as we explain in our guide on proving child expenses in court.

Unpaid child maintenance is never a dead end in the UK. Check what your arrangement really is, put every exchange in writing, involve the CMS or the family court as soon as the conditions are met, and keep your evidence in order: each step taken methodically brings you closer to payments that actually arrive.