What is a Child Arrangements Order?
16 August 2022
A Child Arrangements Order used to be called a contact order or residence order and prior to that, it was called custody. A Child Arrangements Order is a global term for a type of order for either spending time with children or for a child to live with you.
In most cases, people do not need a child arrangements order because they are able to agree on arrangements between them. It might be that they go to mediation, it might be that they have a discussion between them and the arrangements are more informal. Unfortunately, sometimes if parents cannot agree on what time children might spend with one parent or even where the child will live, then an application to court might be needed and that is when you would apply to the court for a Child Arrangement Order. Generally, there would have to be a referral to mediation beforehand which is also another opportunity to try and resolve matters there.
If you have to make the application to court, then it can be quite a lengthy process and it can take many months for Cafcass to become involved. They will speak to the parties and sometimes to the children, depending on their ages and they will give a recommendation to the court in terms of what the Child Arrangements Order should look like. Each case is dealt with totally on its own facts and they will only consider the best interests of the children, not what the parents want to happen.
Here is a video recorded by Head of Family Law, Sharon Mckie:
For more information, contact our Family team on 01302 341414 or fill out our online enquiry form.
We have further articles on our website regarding children and separation, here are 3 that you may find informative:
