Husband owes money (overpaid benefits) should we have seperate accounts?

If you both have talked about it and are in agreement then do it. Nothing wrong with keeping seperate accounts and could help save several arguments or cause them. Good Luck

While we were married, we had mine, his and ours. They served different purposes but it was important to separate (sic) us into two people.

You answered your own question. You’d like to keep money separate.

We have His, Hers, Joint accounts. We put in a fixed percentage of our paychecks into the Joint account to be fair. Helps a lot.

If he can easily settle the financial obligation, what is he waiting for? Are you newly married? Something doesn’t seem right. Even with separate accounts your money is combined, everything earned during the marriage.

It can help to ease the financial disputes between you but it won’t alleviate the legal burden. You are still responsible for each others bills.

Do think that if you have separate accounts that they cannot take “your” money if he owes someone? In my state married means financially too.

When i retired, my wife and i decided that she should have her own bank account, in order to keep her social security money separate from mine. we now have three bank accounts. hers, mine and ours. she is responsible for the upkeep of her account. she is responsible for any mistakes she makes and paying for the mistake.

So far, so good. i suggest this for you. it works for us.

You mentioned in your description your husband had to repay overpaid benefits? Are you in the UK? If you are in the UK, and are both married and living together, he would have been claiming for you too? Please forgive me, I’m just trying to understand your question, if you mean should you claim seperately and have different bank accounts to pay it into? you would have to be seperated (no longer living together) to do that, if you live together they won’t allow you to claim seperately. Is that what you mean? I’m a bit confused, likewise if you are working, but your husband not, I don’t think he would be entitled to benefits at all? As a married couple, living together in the UK you are normally treated as one family unit (even without children) and so any claim for benefits would include all income coming into the home to determine whether any benefit is paid. I think this is how it works? maybe one of our fellow jellies will know a bit more. When I was ill for a while and not working, but hubby working, I wasn’t even entitled to help writing my CV at the job centre, where the girl who ended up helping me in her own time, told me to apply for income support (I didn’t) even though I wouldn’t get it (because of hubby working) so that I was in the system and entitled to help finding work. She said the way the system was set up was very unfair.

If it is tax credits (rather than an out of work benefit) you mean, then the same applies, in that any benefit paid to your husband would be based on your joint income coming into the home, to not disclose your earnings (if you had any) and pay them into another bank account would be considered fraud in that case. There is a great website with lots of info here sorry I couldn’t help more, but maybe one of our fellow jellies can help more.
hugs xx

When I was married all the money went into one account, never again… this is one of the reasons why I divorced her…credit card debts & other finance she took out & never bothered to pay.. No direct debits set up you see so I wouldn’t know what she was up to!! :-/
Until the debtors letters turned up!!!!

We always had joint accounts until we realized we needed to better account for our spending. Now we have a main joint account for household finances and separate accounts for our “allowances,” which we can use as we like. I have always assumed that, in the end, my money is his and his is mine in the eyes of the government.

It couldn’t hurt. If it were us, I would suggest it.

In my own experience, it is best to have several different accounts, joint, his and hers just to be sure you are covered.

Its all taken care-of now. Matter has been settled. Thanks everyone for your input! :)