Child Maintenance Service (CMS)

4. Mr C complains that CMS: • did not promptly review his maintenance liability after he told it he was making payments towards another child in January 2017 • did not offer to translate a court order that Mr C provided written in Polish • took inappropriate enforcement action while he was disputing his ongoing maintenance liability • failed to consider representations he has made since November 2020 informing it his income had reduced.

5. Mr C tells us he suffered from depression due to the poor handling of his CMS account. Mr C also says, as his maintenance liability was not changed when his income was reduced, this led to financial hardship, and while he was struggling financially CMS continued to demand money from him that he did not have. This caused him further anxiety and depression. Mr C also believes this adversely affected his relationship with his daughter, who has witnessed him struggling and was aware of the ongoing dispute.

6. Mr C would like CMS to make service improvements to help people who do not speak English as their first language understand the process and offer to translate documents written in another language when this is appropriate. He would also like CMS to provide him a full breakdown of his account so he can understand what his maintenance liability currently is and any outstanding arrears.

7. CMS operates under the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). Its role is to help separated or divorced parents ensure that children receive financial support from both parents, even if they do not live together.

8. Child maintenance is financial support that helps towards a child’s everyday living costs. For people who cannot make their own family-based arrangements, CMS can calculate how much maintenance the paying parent should pay to the receiving parent.

9. CMS organises child maintenance payments through two different arrangements. Direct Pay, where the CMS calculates the rate of maintenance, but payments are made directly between parents, and ‘Collect and Pay’, where the CMS calculates, collects, and passes on payments between parents. ‘Collect and Pay’ attracts fees, whereas Direct Pay does not.

10. CMS can provide different functions depending on the parents’ circumstances. The CMS can: •try to find the non-resident parent if the parent with care does not know where they live, to arrange child maintenance •help to sort out disagreements about parentage •work out how much child maintenance should be paid •arrange for the non-resident or ‘paying’ parent to pay child maintenance – by non-resident or paying parent we mean the parent who does not have main day-to-day care of the child •pass payments on to the ‘receiving’ parent, for example the parent who has main day-to-day care of the child •look at the payments again when changes in parents’ circumstances are reported •review the payment amount every year •act if payments are not made.

11. In January 2017 Mr C’s ex-partner made an application to CMS for child maintenance for a child she had with him. CMS wrote to Mr C to inform him and included his proposed child maintenance liability.

12. When he received the letter from CMS, Mr C called and told it he had another child in Poland that he was currently paying maintenance for. CMS asked Mr C to provide it with a court order to confirm this arrangement was in place.

13. In February 2017, Mr C told CMS he had applied for a Polish court order to confirm the agreement in place for him to pay child maintenance in Poland. He told CMS this could take four weeks to receive. CMS told Mr C that when he provided the evidence of his payments it would treat this as a change of circumstances review.

14. CMS sent a refusal to review decision notification to Mr C, which included Mandatory Reconsideration (MR) rights. An MR is the first step of the statutory appeals process. CMS told Mr C it could not include his other child in his maintenance calculations as he had not yet provided suitable evidence for it to review the decision.

15. CMS received a copy of the court order from Mr C in March 2017. As it was written in Polish, CMS asked Mr C to have it translated. At that time CMS did not offer to have the document translated and did not raise a MR or change of circumstance.

16. CMS received a partially translated copy of the court order on 26 April 2017. It showed Mr C was paying around £85 per month in child support for his child in Poland. In July 2017 Mr C contacted CMS again and requested an update on his case and a response to the court order he had supplied.

17. In June 2017 Mr C’s ex-partner contacted CMS to tell it she had not received the previous two weeks direct payments from Mr C. CMS sent Mr C a collect and pay warning letter explaining that it had been told he had now missed 16 payments totalling £783.52. Mr C did not respond or pay the arrears. CMS wrote to Mr C to confirm it had changed his account to collect and pay.

18. As Mr C did not comply with his payment plan, CMS started enforcement action against him to recover the arrears he owed.

19. In October 2017, Mr C emailed CMS asking it to update his case to include the payments he was paying for his child in Poland. He also told CMS that his income had reduced due to his health and provided copies of bank statements as evidence of his reduced income.

20. In November 2017, Mr C emailed CMS again and asked it to update his maintenance calculations to include his child in Poland. CMS did not respond to Mr C’s emails.

21. Mr C wrote to CMS again in January 2018. In that letter Mr C told CMS that his weekly income was now less than £200, and he included bank statements for all of 2017. He also said CMS had repeatedly not answered his previous letters. Mr C told CMS that he disagreed with it charging him collection fees and he had stopped making his maintenance payments because CMS had not replied to his previous correspondence. He also said he would like CMS to take him to court in relation to the non-payment of his maintenance as this would mean it would have to address the issues he was reporting.

22. In January 2018, CMS completed its annual review of Mr C’s maintenance liability. CMS sent the decision notification for the annual review to Mr C and included MR rights.

23. On 16 February 2018, Mr C disputed the annual review. He told CMS it had still not included the payments he made for his child in Poland or considered what he had told CMS previously in relation to his income reducing. Although Mr C had disputed his annual review, CMS did not raise an MR.

24. As Mr C was not making regular payments towards his child maintenance liability, CMS referred his case for a Liability Order (LO) in June 2018. This was for arrears of £3,401.78. When it made this referral, CMS recorded that there were no changes outstanding on Mr C’s case. CMS sent Mr C notification of the LO application.

25. CMS can use a LO when a parent who should pay child maintenance does not pay the child maintenance they owe. CMS can try to take it from their earnings or from their bank, building society or Post Office account. If it cannot do that, it can apply for an order from a court that will let CMS take legal action in the form of a LO.

26. Mr C wrote to CMS in June 2018 to tell it he had reported changes to it and CMS had not yet responded.

27. On 12 September 2018, Mr C received a court summons for the LO with a hearing date of 8 October 2018.

28. On 4 October 2018, prior to the LO hearing, the CMS court presenting officer asked CMS to review Mr C’s case to consider the outstanding changes on his case in relation to his other child in Poland and the income changes that he had reported.

29. CMS asked the court presenting officer to proceed with the LO application and noted CMS needed to ask Mr C to provide a certified profit and loss statement if his income had changed. CMS also said it needed to see a translated copy of the court order before it could decide if it should include the child Mr C was paying for in Poland in its calculations.

30. On 8 October 2018, Mr C attended the LO hearing. The hearing was adjourned until 10 December 2018 due to the outstanding changes on Mr C’s account, which included outstanding issues where CMS should have raised an MR.

31. On 19 November 2018, CMS wrote to Mr C and told him that before it could consider the court order in relation to his other child in Poland it required a copy that had been fully translated into English. CMS also said an official notary needed to complete the translation. A notary is an official authorised to perform certain legal formalities, especially witnessing signatures on documents. Their main job is to help prevent fraud by verifying the identity of signers and ensuring that documents are signed willingly and knowingly. CMS did not offer to have the court order translated.

32. On 6 December 2018, CMS recorded that Mr C had not provided it with evidence that his income had reduced, so it had refused his income review request. CMS sent a review refusal notice to Mr C the same day which included MR rights. On the same day, CMS received a letter from Mr C that said he would provide the relevant information to the court when his case was next heard.

33. On 10 December 2018, a court hearing granted CMS a LO for £3,401.78.

34. In January 2019, CMS completed an annual review on Mr C’s account. This review calculated Mr C’s liability to be £26.40 a week from that date. This was based on the latest income figures provided by HMRC that showed Mr C’s income had reduced from its previous figures. With fees and arrears added, CMS calculated Mr C should pay £135.34 a week.

35. On 30 January 2019, Mr C wrote to CMS and told it he accepted the latest annual review and would be paying his ex-partner directly by standing order £26.40 per week. Mr C said that he would start to repay the debt from previous years when CMS recalculated what he owed, taking into consideration the changes he had reported. Any change in relation to his child in Poland had still not been actioned at this time.

36. In June 2019 Mr C again wrote to CMS and told it he was still waiting for the changes to his account to be actioned. He confirmed he had sent CMS a translated copy of the court order in April 2017as it had requested but CMS had not responded to him. CMS did not respond.

37. On 1 October 2019, CMS received an email from Mr C’s MP. He raised concerns that CMS had not acted on the information Mr C provided in relation to his child in Poland, had not replied to many pieces of correspondence Mr C had sent it, and that his income had been calculated incorrectly.

38. On 4 October 2019, CMS sent an enquiry to its advice and guidance team to clarify what date Mr C’s other child should have been included from and the date he should be removed. CMS received a response the same day and advised the other child should be included up until their 20th birthday, which was in December 2018.

39. On 4 October 2019 CMS wrote to Mr C’s MP. It told him: • Mr C told CMS about his child in Poland on 21 January 2017 • on 6 February 2017 CMS asked Mr C for evidence relating to his child • CMS completed the initial maintenance calculation on 24 February 2017 • CMS received a copy of the court order on 27 March 2017, but it was written in Polish • on 25 April 2017 and 12 July 2017 CMS received further copies of the court order with handwritten translations but they could not be used • on 11 April 2019 CMS had received a full translated copy of the court order • CMS had not taken any action in relation to that until October 2019 • CMS apologised for not always responding to Mr C’s letters • the 2018 annual review had been completed using income figures from HMRC • Mr C disputed the figures used but did not provide sufficient evidence to change its decision • bank statements had been provided to show the reduced income, but they were not sufficient. However, CMS should have treated this as request for an MR, and it would now complete that process • the 2019 annual review had been completed, and Mr C had agreed with the income used.

40. On 6 November 2019 CMS raised MRs in relation to maintenance calculations completed on 22 January 2017 and 22 January 2018. CMS sent notices to both Mr C and his ex-partner, and they had opportunity to provide any new or relevant information within 14 days. CMS received no new information, and it considered both MRs on 25 November 2019.

41. The first MR was in relation CMS adding Mr C’s child in Poland to his liability. This reduced his liability effective from 22 January 2017 until his 20th birthday in December 2018, when CMS would remove them from the calculations. CMS also completed other calculations in relation to annual reviews in 2018 and 2019. It then sent notifications of all decisions to Mr C with appeal rights. There is no evidence that Mr C appealed any of these decisions.

42. On 5 November 2020, Mr C made a further complaint to CMS. He told it his circumstances had changed, and he was now receiving Universal Credit (UC). He also had another child who he paid maintenance for, and CMS had not included in his maintenance calculations.

43. On 17 November 2020, the DWP complaints team replied to Mr C and told him it had no record of UC payments being made to him, and it could only consider a change of circumstances if his income had changed by more than 25%. It also said it has already completed the change to include his other child, but CMS had removed them from the calculations from their 20th birthday. It also told Mr C that if he was referring to a different child, he would need to provide further details.

44. On 22 January 2021, CMS completed the annual review of Mr C’s liability based on HMRC income figure for tax year 2019/20. CMS sent a decision notification to Mr C that included MR rights.

45. On 10 February 2021, Mr C wrote to CMS and said he disagreed with the income used for the 2021 annual review and referred to his complaint sent in November 2020, in which he told CMS he was no longer working and had no current income. CMS did not raise an MR in relation to Mr C’s letter and did not send him any response.

46. On 11 March 2021 Mr C again wrote to CMS. He again told it he was no longer working, and his only income was from UC. CMS took no action in relation to this further letter and did not send a response to Mr C.

47. Mr C escalated his complaint to the Independent Case Examiner (ICE), and ICE accepted it for investigation in May 2021.

48. ICE told Mr C in November 2021 that CMS had made an offer to resolve his complaint. CMS offered to reconsider the MR for his 2021 review and offered a consolatory payment of £100 to recognise its failure in not addressing all his concerns. Mr C declined this offer.

49. On 23 March 2023 ICE issued its final report and upheld three elements of Mr C’s complaint. ICE found that CMS: • did not take timely action to review his maintenance liability from January 2017 • took inappropriate enforcement action since 2018 as his disputes in relation to his maintenance liability had not been resolved • did not consider representations since September 2020 that his earnings had reduced substantially.

50. ICE recommended that because of the failings it found DWP should: • apologise and make a consolatory payment of £250 in relation to the service failures it had identified • remove the charges applied to the maintenance accounts while the service type was set as collect and pay • make the appropriate adjustments to the maintenance accounts to reflect the recalculations on 25 November 2019 • consider the challenge of the 2021 annual review and provide Mr C with a formal decision notification with signposting to HM Courts and Tribunals service if Mr C still thinks the decision is wrong • complete an audit of Mr C’s account and provide him with an account breakdown.

51. In March 2024 as Mr C remained dissatisfied with how his complaints had been dealt with, he approached our office via his MP.

Findings

Translation of the Polish court order

And

CMS’s review of Mr C’s maintenance liability in January 2017

55. Mr C told us, ‘In January/February 2017, I informed CMS that I have a son for whom I pay alimony in Poland. After preliminary arrangements regarding payments for my daughter, the amount of child support was to be changed after considering the amount paid to for my son’.

56. When Mr C contacted CMS in October 2017 he told it, ‘I’ve sent you [a] translated polish court order which states how much I pay for my first child, so can you please take that into consideration? Up until now I still don’t have any answer’.

57. CMS responded in November 2018. It said, ‘You have raised concerns that you have not received a response regarding the Polish Court order that you currently pay. We wrote to you on 30 April 2017 to confirm we received a copy of this from you, however, before we can consider if this is a valid court order, we require a copy to be translated to English. We cannot accept a handwritten response to this; we require the court order to be translated by an official notary. Once you have obtained this and forwarded this on to us we will reconsider our decision’.

58. In a letter to Mr C’s MP, CMS said, ‘On 30 April 2017, we wrote to Mr C to ask him to send us an English version of the court order as we said we had no way of translating or reading it. In fact, we do have a translation service which caseworkers can use to have individual items of correspondence translated. The use of the service is at the caseworker’s discretion and will be offered only where regular communication has failed and it is necessary for effective communication to progress the case’.

59. In relation to translation services in its final report ICE concluded that, ‘CMS received a copy of a court order from you, but it was written in Polish. CMS should have raised a MR and offered to have the document translated for you but failed to do so’.

60. DWP translation guidance in place in March 2017 sets out that CMS provides a translation service if a person provides documents in a language other than English. The guidance states that the translation service can be used by any caseworker sending or receiving written correspondence to or from a client.

61. The evidence shows Mr C initially provided a copy of the Polish court order in March 2017. CMS contacted him on 6 April 2017 and told him, ‘We have received the copy of your court order for a child you financially support in Poland. Please can you obtain a copy of this to send in English as we have no way of translating it or reading it and therefore actioning your case to take the child into account’.

62. Mr C sent CMS another copy of the court order on 26 April 2017 with some parts partially translated to set out that he paid £85 a month towards his child in Poland. Between April 2017 and October 2018 Mr C contacted CMS several times asking for an update on his case as CMS had not updated his liability to include the payments he was making for his son in Poland.

63. It was not until November 2018 that CMS wrote to Mr C in relation to this. It told him it needed a copy of the court order fully translated into English, and that it needed an official notary to translate the court order. The evidence shows this was the first time CMS told Mr C of this, even though he had provided a partially translated copy one year and six months before and had contacted it several times asking for an update.

64. Based on the above, we have found CMS did not act in line with its translation policy in April 2017 and November 2018. It should have offered to translate Mr C’s Polish court order rather than insisting he did so. This is therefore a failing.

65. We find this also led to a delay in any reconsideration of Mr C’s maintenance liability, as it was not until October 2019 that CMS addressed this matter. This was despite Mr C providing a court order in April 2017.

66. CMS eventually completed a MR of the decision in November 2019. If CMS had followed the relevant translation guidance at the time and translated the court order, it could have used this to reconsider Mr C’s maintenance liability much sooner.

67. CMS should raise an MR when a parent formally disputes a decision and believes it was made using incorrect or incomplete information. The right to request a MR is contained in the ‘Child Support Maintenance Calculation Regulations 2012’. Regulation 14A(1) sets out that a person who is notified of a maintenance calculation decision may request that the decision be reconsidered by the Secretary of State before appealing to the tribunal.

68. When Mr C disputed the initial calculation, CMS did not complete an MR as it should have done. This was partly due to the failure of CMS to translate the Polish court document. This caused a delay of around two years and seven months before CMS completed a MR of Mr C’s child maintenance liability to take into consideration the child he was making payments towards in Poland.

69. As this was such a long delay, and we can see that during this time Mr C was contacting CMS regularly, we can see that it would affect his mental health and contribute to the anxiety he has told us about. We are sorry to hear about the negative impact these issues have had on Mr C.

70. We have found failings in this part of the complaint. We will therefore consider the impact of this on Mr C and the actions CMS have taken to put this right, in our recommendations section later in this report.

Enforcement action

71. Mr C complains that he was receiving regular text messages and having court action taken against him. Mr C told us he believes this should not have happened as there were still issues CMS were not addressing in relation to his account which meant CMS never fully updated his account before taking enforcement action against him.

72. When investigating Mr C’s complaint ICE said, ‘Before the LO was granted by the court, CMS wrote to you on 14 November 2018 and asked you to provide, within 14 days, audited account statements or a self- assessment tax form for proof of your self-employed income. You did not provide that information, and your income review request was refused on 6 December 2018, a decision notification with MR rights was sent to you the following day. The court granted the LO for £3,401.78 on 10 December 2018’.

73. CMS should raise an MR when a parent formally disputes a decision and believes it was made using incorrect or incomplete information, as explained above.

74. The evidence shows Mr C contacted CMS when it completed its initial calculations and explained he had another child he was making maintenance payments to in Poland. Mr C wanted CMS to include this information when it calculated his liability. As this had not been resolved by time CMS completed the first annual review in January 2018 Mr C also disputed this. In relation to both, CMS did not raise an MR as it should have done, in line with its regulations.

75. As CMS did not take the action it should have when Mr C disputed the calculations, it proceeded to consider enforcement action with the impression that there were no outstanding issues in Mr C’s case.

76. We can see that, when CMS considered enforcement action against Mr C, it considered several factors. For example, if CMS believed it had the correct contact address for Mr C, if it had made efforts to contact him to try to resolve the issues, and if taking action might have a negative impact on the welfare of the child involved. We can also see that, when CMS made the decision to apply for a LO, CMS did not consider the matters Mr C had raised with it in relation to his other child or disputing the latest annual review. This was because these matters had not been raised as they should have been. Because of this, the person making the decision on enforcement action was not aware of the outstanding issues when deciding on enforcement action.

77. To decide if CMS should have taken enforcement action when it did, we have considered what CMS should have done as set out in the DWP ‘Child Maintenance: Liability orders’ guidance.

78. The guidance sets out what CMS must consider when deciding to take enforcement action. There are actions CMS should take to ensure referral criteria is met. These actions include ensuring:

• CMS have a confident address for the Paying Parent (PP) • the PP has missed payment of child maintenance • CMS is aware that the PP has an account with a specific bank or building society • the PP has refused to make or comply with a payment agreement • a DEO is not possible to collect the arrears at an acceptable rate is not possible • there are no outstanding mandatory reconsiderations or appeals • there are no issues concerning welfare of any children involved • an arrears warning notice has been issued and the PP has not since been compliant for a continuous period of 12 weeks • the RP has been contacted to ensure they want the debt collected.

79. We found CMS did consider these criteria. At the time CMS decided to take enforcement action there were no outstanding MR’s. This was not because all the issues had been addressed, but because CMS had not raised MRs as explained fully above. Due to this previous failing when the officer made their consideration and checked for outstanding issues they found none.

80. We have found that when CMS took enforcement action against Mr C it did so following the relevant guidance. The officer taking the action did so based on the information available to them at the time. We know because of the issues above that this was not a true reflection of Mr C’s position, but the officer was not aware of this. As such we can only judge their actions based on the information known to them at the time.

81. Although the court did grant a LO, CMS did not take any further enforcement action against Mr C as CMS became aware Mr C was making direct payments to his ex-partner in relation to his child maintenance liability. This meant not all the criteria for taking further action were then being met, so no further enforcement action was required.

82. As the decision to request a LO was properly considered in line with the relevant guidance, we have not found any failings in relation to this issue. We appreciate this is frustrating for Mr C.

Representations made since November 2020

83. Mr C told us that he informed CMS his circumstances had changed in November 2020. At that time, he was receiving Universal Credit (UC), so his income had decreased. Mr C says that CMS did not complete a review of his liability when he told it about this change, or when he disputed this again at his next annual review in January 2021.

84. In its complaint response in November 2020 DWP said, ‘You have told us you are now in receipt of UC. We have access to the main databases maintained by HMRC, this records what benefit individuals are in receipt of, when their claim was made and how much is in payment. At present the HMRC system shows no details of any benefits paid to you whatsoever’.

85. The ICE report said, ‘The 2021 annual review was automatically completed on 22 January 2021, based on your annual HMRC income figure of £I2,822 for tax year 2019/2020. Your challenge of that decision was received by CMS on 10 February 2021, but CMS did not raise a MR as they should have done’.

86. We can see that Mr C contacted CMS on 5 November 2020 to inform it he was now in receipt of UC and his income had reduced. In its response on 17 November 2020 CMS confirm it has checked HMRC systems and there was no evidence of Mr C being in receipt of benefits. This reply also confirmed that it can only consider a change to his income if he supplies evidence of his current income, and as he had not done so, it could not change his liability at that time.

87. Section 23 of the ‘Child Support Maintenance Calculation Regulations 2012’ sets out that CMS should make a new calculation if the paying parent reports a change of income. However, CMS can only complete this calculation if the paying parent can show their income has changed by at least 25%. As Mr C did not provide evidence to show his income had changed at this time CMS did not have the information it would need to complete a change of income request.

88. We can see the next activity on Mr C’s account is the annual review that CMS completed on 22 January 2021. We can see that, following this, Mr C wrote to CMS on 7 February 2021 to tell it he was now unemployed and had been without income for several months.

89. As Mr C had disputed the income used to calculate his maintenance liability at this point CMS should have raised an MR, but it did not do so.

90. As already explained, this is not in line with both the ‘Child Support Maintenance Calculation Regulations 2012’ and the DWP ‘Our Customer charter’ that sets out CMS will follow processes correctly. As such, we find there are failings in CMS not raising a MR when Mr C disputed the 2021 annual review and told it his income had reduced.

91. We have found failings in this part of the complaint. We will therefore consider the impact of this on Mr C and the actions CMS have taken to put this right, in our impact section below.

Impact

92. Mr C told us that throughout this time he suffered from depression and because of the issues we have found CMS caused him added stress and anxiety. Mr C also told us this adversely affected his relationship with his daughter, who witnessed him struggling and was aware of the ongoing dispute. He also told us he suffered from financial hardship, and while he was struggling financially CMS continued to demand money from him that he did not have.

93. We can see this has been a difficult time for Mr C and it gone on for several years. The failings identified began at the start of his CMS case in January 2017, which he immediately raised concerns about in February 2017. The issue with his other child not being considered was not resolved until October 2019.

94. We can see that the issues we found, and the amount of times Mr C had to contact CMS to follow up on the concerns he raised would cause him stress and anxiety along with added frustration. We are sorry to hear of the negative impact this has had on Mr C and his family.

95. We can also see there were delays in relation to MRs that CMS should have raised in January 2017, January 2018 and January 2021. CMS did not complete the January 2017 and 2018 MRs until November 2019 and March 2023 for the January 2021 MR, which was completed following the ICE investigation. We can also see there have been several instances when Mr C sent letters to CMS that it did not acknowledge or act on.

96. In relation to all these matters we can see that the issues were ongoing since the start of 2017 and were not fully addressed until the ICE report made recommendations in March 2023.

97. Based on this, we understand how this would be a stressful period, and Mr C would have experienced anxiety during it.

98. We have considered if the failing identified had a financial impact on Mr C. From the information available we can see in June 2017 Mr C stopped making his regular child maintenance payments. Since that time his account has always been in arrears. As this is the case, any subsequent changes that may have been made, if it was not for the failings identified in this report, would only reduce the arrears he owes.

99. Our view is that we cannot say the failings identified in this report have led to the financial hardship Mr C has told us about. This is because for much of the time he was not making the regular payments he should have been, and it is this that has caused most of the arrears now on his case. We cannot say Mr C was paying more than he should have been as he was not making the regular payments to cover his liability. We understand the main reason Mr C stopped making regular payments was due to his confusion about the process and we can understand that at the time he struggled to fully understand what was happening with his account. We are sorry to hear that Mr C was struggling at this time, and the action he took now means he has arrears on his account.

100. Mr C says these issues impacted his relationship with his daughter. We appreciate this has been a difficult time for him and his family and are sorry to hear that this relationship has suffered. We know it can be difficult circumstances when CMS become involved in cases of this kind. Personal circumstances can be difficult after the breakdown of a relationship, and where children are involved, this can make things more difficult for all parties.

101. As there are so many factors that could affect Mr C’s relationship with his daughter it would be extremely difficult to say how much of this may be because of the issues with CMS he has told us about. As this is the case, we cannot directly link this to the failings we have identified in this report. This is because we would never be able to say this is the only thing that could have an impact on the relationship Mr C has with his daughter.

102. After fully considering the impact on Mr C, we find he experienced added stress and anxiety because of the failings we have identified in this report. We find this added stress and anxiety went on for a significant amount of time.

1. We are sorry to learn of the reasons for Mr C’s complaint about the Child Maintenance Service (CMS). We understand the issues complained about caused Mr C added stress and anxiety over a significant period.

2. We found CMS did not act in line with the applicable standards and guidance when it did not offer to translate a court order and not consider representations made by Mr C about his maintenance liability. We also found it did not properly consider representations he made in both January 2017 and November 2020. We found this caused Mr C added stress and anxiety over a significant period. We found no failings in how CMS took enforcement action while he was disputing his ongoing maintenance liability. Therefore, we partly uphold Mr C’s complaint.

3. To put this right, we have recommended CMS create an action plan to document learning from this and show how it will put things in place to stop it happening again. These recommendations are detailed in full at the end of this report.

103. We make recommendations in line with our Principles for Remedy which say public bodies should acknowledge failures, apologise, make amends, and use the opportunity to improve their services. The Principles say we aim to ensure the public body puts the complainant back in the position they would have been in had nothing gone wrong. If that is not possible, the public body should compensate them appropriately.

104. Our Principles for Remedy are reflected in the UK Central Government Complaint Standards which say organisations should offer fair remedies to put things right and identify learning and use it to improve services.

105. Our Principles for Remedy also say organisations should look for continuous improvement and learn lessons from complaints to make sure poor service is not repeated. We therefore recommend that within three months of the final report CMS provides evidence to us of how it will improve (or already has improved) its service. CMS should produce an action plan: • to address the failings we identified in its translation services • to address the failings in not properly raising an MR when it should • to identify the reasons for the failings • to explain the learning taken and set out what it will do differently in the future (or does differently now) 106. For each action it should state who is/was responsible, timescale for completion, and how it will be/was monitored. It must also share the action plan with us within three months from the date of this report.

107. This concludes our report. We wish Mr C all the best for the future.