Child maintenance and overnight stays — the shared-care reduction brackets
The Child Maintenance Service reduces a paying parent's liability for shared care — measured purely in overnights per year. The brackets are statutory and mechanical:
The brackets (2012 Regulations)
| Nights/year | Roughly | Reduction |
|---|---|---|
| 52–103 nights/year | 1–2 nights a week on average | 1/7th off |
| 104–155 nights/year | 2–3 nights a week on average | 2/7ths off |
| 156–174 nights/year | 3–4 nights a week on average | 3/7ths off |
| 175+ nights/year | equal shared care | 50% off plus £7 a week |
Source-checked against the CMS framework via GOV.UK child maintenance. The 175+ bracket (equal/shared care) also triggers the flat £7/week reduction on top of the 50% — the difference between 174 and 175 nights is real money.
What counts as an overnight
- Night, not hours A contact from Saturday 10:00 to Sunday 18:00 = one overnight (Saturday). Two day visits a week = zero overnights. This surprises fathers who "have them loads" but rarely overnight.
- Only actual nights count Proposed schedules don't count until they happen. A pattern of cancelled overnights both lowers your bracket AND is evidence (log it).
- Holidays count heavily Half-terms and summers are where fathers quietly cross bracket thresholds. A fortnight's summer contact ≈ 14 nights ≈ 10% of the entire year's bracket.
Proving your nights — and challenging theirs
- Keep the contact log forever — CMS disputes are decided on contemporaneous records, not memory.
- Annualise honestly: "Weekends × 26 + half of holidays" is a calculation the CMS accepts where patterns are stable.
- Request a mandatory reconsideration with your night-count evidence attached if the CMS used her figures; then appeal to tribunal if needed.
- Run your numbers first: the overnight-stays calculator shows what each bracket is worth on your income.
Strategy without cynicism: overnights matter for the child, and the bracket follows naturally. But if you're at 100 nights and "not bothered" about 4 more weekends — remember 104 nights is where the second-sevenths starts. Structure holidays deliberately; both your child and your arithmetic benefit.
Before your hearing
Turning scattered messages, notes and dates into evidence takes structure. apply this guide to your own documents — EvidenceCanvas is a guided toolkit that helps you draft a child-focused witness statement, answer a Scott Schedule point by point, and assemble a paginated court bundle. It is not a law firm and does not give legal advice.