If you pay or receive child maintenance through the CMS, a change is coming that will affect what it costs you. Nothing has happened yet, but the direction is set, so it is worth understanding now.
What is changing
The government plans to abolish Direct Pay (where the CMS works out the amount but you arrange the payments between yourselves, for free) and move to a single CMS service that collects and passes on every payment. It set this out in its response to a consultation on 23 June 2025. This sits alongside the other announced CMS changes, see our earlier update on the CMS changes.
The new fees
On the new service, the fees would be:
- Paying parent who pays on time: 2% on top of the maintenance (down from the current 20% on Collect & Pay).
- Receiving parent: 2% taken off what they get (down from the current 4%).
- Paying parent who does not pay: still 20%.
The only way to pay no fees at all would be a family-based arrangement: sorting maintenance privately between yourselves, with no CMS involvement.
What it means for you
It depends where you are now:
- On Collect & Pay and paying on time? This is good news. Your fee drops from 20% to 2%.
- On Direct Pay? This is the catch. Direct Pay is free today. Once it goes, unless you and your ex agree a private family-based arrangement, you will be moved onto the paid service and start paying 2% where you currently pay nothing.
- Missing payments? No change. The 20% charge stays.
So the practical takeaway is the one we always come back to: if you can sort maintenance directly and keep it working, you avoid the fees and the friction. The CMS is there for when you genuinely cannot.
The honest caveat
This is a firm government plan, not the law. It needs new legislation, and the government has said it is aiming for 2027 to 2028, “Parliamentary time permitting”. So treat the 2% as coming, not here, and the date as a target, not a promise.
Source
The changes were set out in the government’s response to its consultation on improving how child maintenance is collected, published on 23 June 2025. See GOV.UK: government response on collecting and transferring child maintenance and Gingerbread on the CMS changes. There is more in our guide to child maintenance and the CMS.
Information, not legal advice. This is an announced plan and not yet in force, so check the official links above before you rely on anything here.