Child Arrangements Order Guide vs Free Resources (GOV.UK, Kinship, Advicenow)
If you're weighing a paid child arrangements order process guide against the free resources from GOV.UK, Kinship and Advicenow, here is the honest answer: the free resources are genuinely useful and you should use them regardless. What a process guide adds is the one thing none of them provides — the entire application sequence in a single ordered document, with printable worksheets for the stages that cause the most confusion. Whether that is worth paying for depends on how comfortable you are stitching together information from a dozen different sources.
The free resources cover different pieces of the process well. GOV.UK gives you the forms and fee schedules. Kinship publishes factsheets on kinship carers' rights and financial support. Advicenow offers detailed guides for litigants in person. The gap is not in the information itself — it is in the assembly.
What Each Free Resource Actually Covers
GOV.UK and HMCTS
Strengths: The official source for court forms (C100, C2, C1A, C8, EX160). Provides the online application portal, fee schedules, and basic explanations of what each form does. The "Apply for a child arrangements order" digital service routes your application automatically to the right court.
Limitations: Blank forms with no guidance on the narrative sections. No walkthrough of the permission grounds under Section 10(9). No advice on MIAM exemption evidence requirements — just a list of categories. No Cafcass preparation guidance. No post-order templates for schools, GPs or benefits offices. GOV.UK describes each component but does not connect them into a process.
Kinship (formerly Grandparents Plus)
Strengths: The leading charity for kinship carers. Free advice line staffed by specialists who understand kinship care. Factsheets covering carers' rights, financial support, school and medical authority. Peer support groups. Campaigns for policy change including the Kinship Zones pilot.
Limitations: Factsheets cover topics individually — financial rights, education, housing — rather than the court application process end-to-end. The advice line is excellent but has wait times due to high demand. Published guidance focuses more on kinship care broadly than on the specific procedural steps of a CAO application for someone without a solicitor.
Advicenow
Strengths: High-quality, detailed self-help guides for litigants in person. Covers family court procedure, how to present your case, what to expect at hearings. Clear, accessible language. Regularly updated.
Limitations: Written for all litigants in person, not specifically for grandparents or relatives. Does not cover the permission (leave) requirement in depth — this is the procedural wrinkle that catches most non-parental applicants off guard. No printable preparation templates or worksheets.
Family Rights Group
Strengths: Free legal advice line for families involved with social services. Particularly useful if children's services are involved in your case or if there is a local authority dimension.
Limitations: Primarily focused on public law proceedings (where the local authority is involved). Limited coverage of private law CAO applications between family members.
Support Through Court
Strengths: Volunteers who provide in-person practical and emotional support at court hearings. Help you find the right courtroom, understand what is happening, and stay calm. Free.
Limitations: Cannot give legal advice, help complete forms, or assist with preparation before court day. Available only at the hearing itself.
Side-by-Side Comparison
| Dimension | Paid Process Guide | GOV.UK | Kinship | Advicenow |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full process, start to finish | Yes — 13 chapters following the court timeline | No — individual forms and pages | No — topic-based factsheets | Partial — general LIP guidance |
| Permission (leave) assessment | Step-by-step flowchart for the three exceptions | Brief mention on C100 instructions | Not covered in depth | Not specific to relatives |
| MIAM exemption evidence | Structured checklist with required documents per exemption | Lists exemption categories only | Not covered | General overview |
| Form C100 walkthrough | Field-by-field guidance including narrative sections and permission grounds | Blank form with basic instructions | Not covered | General form-filling tips |
| Help with Fees (EX160) | Income and benefit tests explained with eligibility overview | Official form and brief FAQ | Links to the form | General information |
| Cafcass preparation | Structured preparation log template | Not covered | Not covered | Brief mention |
| Hearing preparation | FHDRA guide + court bundle organisation checklist | Not covered | Not covered | General hearing guidance |
| Post-order admin | Templates for schools, GPs, DWP — enrolment, consent, benefits | Not covered | Factsheets cover some rights | Not covered |
| Wales-specific guidance | Dedicated chapter (Cafcass Cymru, bilingual options, Welsh language rights) | Basic Welsh language links | Limited Welsh coverage | Not specific to Wales |
| Printable worksheets | 9 standalone PDFs | None | None | None |
| Cost | $29 | Free | Free | Free |
Who Should Use Free Resources Alone
- People who are comfortable researching across multiple websites and assembling the information themselves
- Grandparents whose cases are very straightforward — the parent agrees, no permission is needed, no MIAM exemption to prove — and who primarily need the forms
- Anyone who wants to start by reading the free material and then decide whether they need more structured guidance
- Relatives who have already been through the process once (perhaps for a different child) and know the sequence
Free Download
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Everything in this article as a printable checklist — plus action plans and reference guides you can start using today.
Who Benefits from a Process Guide
- Grandparents going through this for the first time, who need the whole process laid out in order before they start
- Relatives who need to assess whether they have automatic entitlement to apply or need the court's permission — the permission decision is the most common point of confusion
- People who want printable worksheets for the high-anxiety stages: the Cafcass telephone call, the hearing day, the post-order admin
- Family members helping a grandparent — a single document is easier to work from together than a dozen browser tabs
- Anyone on a tight timeline who cannot spend hours piecing together information from different sources
Who Should Use Both
Most people. The free resources and a process guide are not competitors — they are complementary. Use the Kinship advice line to discuss your specific situation. Use Advicenow for general litigant-in-person guidance. Use Support Through Court on the day. Use the process guide as the administrative spine that connects all the stages and provides the worksheets that free resources do not offer.
Tradeoffs
Free resources strengths:
- Genuinely high quality, especially Kinship and Advicenow
- Free
- Backed by established charities and the government
- Advice lines offer personalised responses to your specific questions
Free resources limitations:
- Information is spread across multiple sites — no single ordered walkthrough
- Not specific to the grandparent/relative permission process
- No printable preparation templates or worksheets
- Assembling the full picture takes hours of research
Process guide strengths:
- Complete sequence in one document — permission through to post-order benefits
- Written specifically for grandparents and relatives, not generic LIPs
- 9 printable worksheets reduce anxiety at each stage
- Costs less than fifteen minutes of a solicitor's time
Process guide limitations:
- Not free
- Not legal advice — cannot tell you whether to apply or predict outcomes
- Cannot replace the personalised response of a charity advice line
Frequently Asked Questions
If the free resources are good, why would I pay for a guide?
The free resources are individually good — the problem is structural. GOV.UK covers forms but not procedure. Kinship covers rights but not the application process. Advicenow covers court skills but not the relative-specific permission step. A process guide puts the whole sequence into one document. The information overlaps in places; the value is in the organisation.
Does the guide just repackage the free information?
No. The permission self-assessment, MIAM exemption evidence checklist, Cafcass preparation log, hearing preparation checklist and post-order admin templates are original content — worksheets designed for the specific stages that the free resources do not cover in printable form. Where the guide covers the same ground as free resources (e.g. fee help), it adds context specific to relative applicants.
Can I use Kinship's advice line alongside a process guide?
Absolutely, and you should. The Kinship advice line can answer questions specific to your situation — whether you qualify for financial support, what your rights are as a kinship carer, how your local authority should be supporting you. The process guide covers the court application mechanics. They address different aspects of the same situation.
Is the GOV.UK online application portal enough on its own?
For the form submission itself, yes — the portal is functional and routes your application correctly. But the portal does not help you prepare what goes into the form. The narrative sections on permission grounds, the MIAM exemption evidence, the Cafcass telephone call, and the hearing preparation all happen outside the portal. That is where most grandparents get stuck.
What if I start with free resources and get stuck?
That is a perfectly sensible approach. Many grandparents start with the free material, realise they need more structured guidance around the permission assessment or Cafcass stage, and then get the process guide. The guide is a download — available whenever you need it.
The Child Arrangements Orders for Grandparents and Relatives Process Guide complements the free resources with the one thing they do not provide: the full administrative sequence — permission, MIAMs, forms, fees, Cafcass, hearings and post-order admin — in a single printable document with 9 worksheets.
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