I often have clients as me the question, why do I have to produce lots of information about my finances in family mediation. The simple answer is that it is a contempt of court to state that you have shown the information to your ex spouse when you have not.
I will always advise that it is critical clients produce all the financial disclosure information that is agreed at the mediation session as this is the information which will help you to reach a viable and realistic settlement proposal.
Courts approach
In practice, a divorce judge would order you to produce the same information so that they could make a decision for you so you would eventually have to produce these documents if you do not reach private agreement in family mediation.
Solicitors approach
If the other side’s solicitors suspect that you have been anything less than completely transparent about your finances, they can use that suspicion to upend the entire mediated agreement. They would argue that you cannot fully enter into an agreement without knowing exactly what it entails. For example, if you were to discover—20 years later—that your ex-partner had a Swiss bank account with an opening balance of £1 million that they failed to disclose, you would have every right to return to court to seek a further settlement! The same principle applies even to more modest assets, such as a small pension. The size of the asset is less important than the fact that you might have received more money had you known it existed.
Get help with the finances now
So, if you are still asking yourself why do I have to produce lots of information about my finances in family mediation, then remember that in mediation, you stay in charge of the topics of discussion, you decide the order of priority of agenda items and decide the settlement yourselves, the mediator only helps facilitate constructive discussions to help you reach your own separation agreement. Call us on 0300 365 2700 or email us at admin@familymediationservices.co.uk
Find out what is the best way to secure a fair share of the assets of the marriage in our next blog on negotiation strategies…