My sister is a single mum of an eight year old girl. A few years ago her husband had an affair and walked out on them. He was always a difficult man with a nasty temper and he hit her once or twice so she wasn't exactly in despair when he left. The problem now is that he is purposely making life very difficult for her and my niece. He is supposed to have my niece every other weekend and for 3 weeks during the Summer holidays but he thinks nothing of calling at the last minute to say he can't have her this weekend because he is going away with his girlfriend. Last year he only had her for one week during the holidays as he called two days before he was supposed to pick her up to say that he was in Las Vegas for two weeks! My sister had to take emergency unpaid holiday from work to look after her for those two weeks. Yet when my sister went away to Greece for a week (during the time my niece was with her father) he told her she was selfish and needed to sort out her priorities! Also, he refuses to pay a decent amount of child support. When they divorced it was agreed in writing that he would pay £250 per month for my niece, which at the time was 15% of his monthly salary. My sister's solicitor did not spot the fact that £250 had been written down as a sum of money rather than as a percentage so because of this he has never paid a penny more than £250 per month even though he now has a new job and is earning nearly twice as much as he was when they got divorced. In fact, he is so mean that if he has to have my niece for even a day more than he usually does, in return he subtracts some money from what he pays my sister! My sister can't afford a solicitor so is there anything else she can do to force her ex to pay her the 15% that was originally agreed and also to stick to the terms of his access to my niece? Thanks!
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