What Is Ancillary Relief?

Ancillary relief is a legal term derived from Latin - which doesn't make it particularly user friendly for people going through a divorce.

Technically it means "an order or application which is incidental to or part of another order or application".

Most people will first see the phrase in a divorce petition like this:

 "Ancillary relief

  That the petitioner may be granted the following ancillary relief:

  (a) an order for maintenance pending suit

  a periodical payments order

  a secured provision order

  a lump sum order

  a property adjustment order

  an order under section 24B, 25B or 25C of the Act of 1973

  (Pension Sharing/Attachment Order)

  (b) For the children

  a periodical payments order

  a secured provision order

  a lump sum order

  a property adjustment order "

Many people are alarmed by the wording and want to cross it out but it is important not to do so without taking advice first.

You are not asking the court to make any of the orders immediately and will have to fill in further forms later if you actually do want to proceed with "ancillary relief".

So what is ancillary relief in divorce?

Firstly, it is called "ancillary relief" because it is ancillary to (or incidental to) the divorce itself. You cannot apply for the types of order listed above unless you have first applied for a divorce.

Secondly, the type of "relief" or order you are applying for may be any one of those listed in the divorce petition referred to above, the most common of which are periodical payments, lump sum and property adjustment orders.

Pension sharing orders are also common where the pension is large and one of the main or only assets or where the parties to the marriage are close enough to retirement age to make it worth doing.

So what does it all mean? "Periodical payments" means maintenance, a "lump sum" is a payment of cash and a "property adjustment order" is an order relating to property you own or your spouse owns. This might be an order that it is sold for example or transferred to one or other of you.

There are many different ways of ordering maintenance, lump sums and property adjustment and to list them all here might be misleading as so many don't apply to a lot of cases. It is not a "one size fits all" situation unfortunately.

It is important to emphasise however, that the vast majority of orders are made by agreement between the husband and wife.

It's a fact* that in 2008 the court service in England and Wales made 94,431 orders for ancillary relief on divorce. Of those 70% were by agreement to begin with, 77% of those that went to court settled before a final hearing and only 7% of cases had a court imposed order made.

Most people seek help from a solicitor when their marriage breaks down and these figures confirm that they reach agreement about their property in around 93% of cases without the court making a decision for them.

It is also important to check your rights before you go ahead and fill in a divorce petition on your own and it is usually well worth paying a solicitor for some advice, even if it costs a couple of hundred pounds. The wrong choice made by you at the outset could cost you a lot more in the long run.

*figures supplied by the Ministry of Justice. Click here to go to their website.