What Happens at a MIAM in Hastings

Why you are being asked to attend one

Under the Family Procedure Rules 2010, Part 3, a person applying to the family court for a child arrangements order or a financial order must normally have attended a Mediation Information and Assessment Meeting within the previous four months. Your solicitor has probably told you this, or you have found it on the C100 or Form A and wondered what it involves.

The requirement exists because a substantial proportion of family disputes settle without a hearing, and the court would rather establish that before listing one. It is not an attempt to talk you out of going to court.

What the meeting is

One meeting. Around an hour. You attend on your own, in person or by video. Your ex-partner is invited to a separate meeting of their own, and they do not have to accept. Their declining does not stop yours and does not delay your application.

People arrive expecting to be in a room with their ex-partner and are visibly relieved when told that is not what this is. If that is what you have been dreading, it is worth knowing before you get there.

What you will be asked

The mediator will ask what has happened, what is unresolved, and what you are hoping to achieve. They will ask about the children if there are any, about the financial position in outline, and about anything that might make mediation unsafe or unsuitable.

That last part is the assessment. It includes questions about whether you feel able to speak freely in front of your ex-partner, and about any history of abuse or controlling behaviour. They are asked of everyone and they are asked directly, because the alternative is a process that assumes safety it has not checked.

What you will be told

How mediation works and what it costs. What the alternatives are, including collaborative law, arbitration, solicitor negotiation and court. Whether you qualify for legal aid, and whether the Family Mediation Voucher Scheme applies to your case. What the court process would involve if you proceed with it.

The mediator does not advise you on what to do. They are not permitted to, and a mediator who tells you what settlement to accept is not doing the job.

Three ways it ends

Mediation is suitable and both of you are willing. Joint sessions are arranged.

Mediation is suitable and your ex-partner declines, or does not respond. The mediator signs the form confirming you attended and that mediation is not going ahead. Your application proceeds.

Mediation is not suitable. The mediator signs the form on that basis. This is a legitimate outcome and not a failure, and it is the right one in a substantial number of cases.

What it costs

A MIAM is charged as a single meeting, generally between 100 and 150 pounds. Where either party qualifies for legal aid, the MIAM is free for both of you. Where the case involves child arrangements, the Family Mediation Voucher Scheme may contribute up to 500 pounds towards the mediation that follows, though not to the MIAM itself.

When you do not need one

The exemptions are listed in the rules and they are specific. Evidenced domestic abuse. A genuine risk of harm to a child. Real urgency, meaning a risk of irreversible harm rather than a wish to move faster. Bankruptcy of either party. Having attended a MIAM on the same issue within the previous four months. There are a small number of others.

An exemption is claimed on the court form and the court can reject it. If it does, the application comes back to you and you attend the MIAM anyway, several weeks later than if you had booked one. Where an exemption is clear, claim it. Where it is arguable, attending is usually the faster route.

How to prepare

You do not need documents and you do not need a position. It helps to have thought about what you actually need as opposed to what you are angry about, because the two are often different and only one of them is negotiable.

If there is anything that makes you feel unsafe about the process, say it at the start rather than working up to it. The assessment exists for exactly that, and nothing you say is passed to your ex-partner.

Before you arrive

You do not need to prepare a case. A MIAM is not a hearing and nobody is going to test what you say. What helps is a rough sense of the shape of things: whether there is a property, whether there are pensions, roughly what each of you earns, and where the children are living now.

If there is a court deadline, bring it. If a solicitor has written to you, bring the letter. If you have already been to mediation before with the same person, say so, because a MIAM within the previous four months can count for the court form and there is no reason to repeat one unnecessarily.

You will be asked for identification. A passport or driving licence, and something with your address on it. This is a regulatory requirement and every accredited mediator asks for it.

The safeguarding conversation

A part of the meeting is set aside for questions about safety, and it happens in every MIAM regardless of how the relationship ended. The mediator asks about controlling behaviour, about fear, about anything that has happened involving the police or social services, and about whether you would feel able to speak freely with the other person present.

These questions can feel intrusive when the separation has been civil. They are asked of everyone precisely so that nobody has to volunteer something difficult unprompted. If your answers raise concerns, the mediator will not proceed to joint sessions in the ordinary way, and that is not a failure of the meeting. It is the meeting doing what it exists to do.

What you say in this part is confidential to you. It is not passed to the other person, and the mediator does not tell them what you said or why the assessment reached the conclusion it did.

What the mediator explains

The second half is information. The mediator sets out how mediation works, what it costs, how long it usually takes, and what happens at the end of it. They also explain the alternatives honestly, including the ones that are not mediation.

You will hear about the collaborative process, about solicitor negotiation, about arbitration, and about court. A mediator who only describes mediation is not giving you an assessment, they are giving you a sales pitch, and the professional standards are explicit that the meeting has to cover the options.

Where money is involved you will hear about the family mediation voucher, which contributes up to five hundred pounds toward mediation involving child arrangements, and about whether legal aid might be available. Legal aid for family mediation still exists even though it was withdrawn for most other family work, and it is assessed on income and capital.

What the mediator is assessing

Three things. Whether mediation is safe. Whether both of you are able to take part, which covers capacity, understanding, and whether the imbalance between you is one the process can manage. And whether mediation is likely to be useful given what is actually in dispute.

A mediator can decide that mediation is not suitable, and a reasonable proportion of MIAMs end that way. That is a legitimate outcome and it produces a signed form allowing the court application to go ahead.

The form, and what it is for

If you are going to apply to court, the mediator signs the relevant section of the application. For child arrangements that is the C100 and for financial matters the Form A. The signature confirms one of three things: that you attended and mediation is unsuitable, that you attended and the other person declined, or that you attended and mediation is being attempted.

The form is valid for four months. If your circumstances change and you decide to apply later than that, you will need a fresh MIAM.

If the other person will not come

This is common and it does not stop you. The mediator will contact them, usually by letter and then by phone or email. If there is no response, or a refusal, the mediator records that and signs your form. You attended, and that is what the requirement asks of you.

It is worth knowing that a court can take a party's unreasonable refusal to attend a MIAM into account when it decides who pays the costs of the proceedings. That is set out in the rules, and it is a point some people are unaware of when they decide not to bother replying.

Attending separately

Most MIAMs are individual meetings. You attend on your own, the other person attends on their own, and the two conversations do not overlap. Some services offer a joint MIAM where both parties are comfortable with it, which saves time and cost, but it is the exception and it is never the default where any safeguarding concern exists.

If you would rather attend separately, say so. You do not need to give a reason and you will not be asked for one.

After the meeting

You are under no obligation to continue. Many people attend a MIAM, take the information away, and decide over a week or two. Some decide mediation is right and book a first joint session. Some decide it is not and take the form to a solicitor. Both are ordinary outcomes.

Where you do continue, the first joint session usually follows within two to three weeks, and the mediator will tell you what to bring to it. For financial cases that is generally the start of disclosure. For child arrangements it is usually nothing beyond a willingness to talk about the practical week.

If you are anxious about it

Almost everyone is. The meeting is one person asking you questions in a room, or on a video call, with nobody arguing back and nothing being decided. People routinely say afterwards that the anticipation was harder than the meeting.

You are allowed to bring a support person to a MIAM in most circumstances, though they will not usually be present for the safeguarding questions. If that would help, ask when you book rather than arriving with someone unannounced.