Husbands money

I'm usually on the side of it being family money, but this seems different.

You can access joint money that is earned usually. Your husband is working extra hours to build up some savings, so is keeping it separate.
I can actually see why he wants it separate, given you've searched for it TWICE already.
It's sounding like you're someone who is not great at saving, so your husband needs to hide that money in order to keep it.

Are you desperately short of money, have no access to an atm or just believe you should be able to spend the money, as you're doing childcare to cover the overtime?
Does your husband usually restrict your access to money unfairly?

So much contradiction in this thread, mainly because of the number of posters that are always determined to put the man in the wrong.

He is avoiding childcare by doing overtime that he doen't need to .... but OP needed to take the money for essential child related expenses

It's a secret savings pot just for him .... that OP knows about and can dip into when she wants

He doesn't get to dictate what the money is spent on ... but if OP needs it, it's fine for her to take it as she wants with no discussion

I can't tell whether OP is bad with money, which is why the money hasn't gone into the joint account but a cash savings pot, or whether the household genuinely needs the overtime to cover basics. If it's the latter, then clearly the overtime is necessary and not the DH skiving, and it (or some of it) needs to be made available in the joint account.

If the OP just took the cash out of convenience and there is plenty of money in the joint account for day to day expenses, then she just needs to take £40 out the joint account to replenish the savings and this is a non-event.

(As an aside, I can't think of an essential child related cost that is as much as £40 where you have to use cash. But happy to be enlightened).

If you had gone to use it and he had spent it on himself then that would be a different scenario but he hadn't.
Twice you went to dip into it when he specifically told you he was saving it, regardless of what it was for. Do you have access to the bank account to draw the £40 you took out? I hope so OP....because yet again that would be a different scenario if you don't.

i have a feeling you maybe a little bit frivolous with money if he's keeping it on him rather than where you can access it. My husband is absolutely terrible with money. I am not. We have separate bank accounts for our money after bills have been paid 50/50 as he spends his money like they're winnings and i use it as needed. I recently sold my old phone. I had £320 in my purse and it was driving him insane i wasn't spending it. So i paid it into my bank because the constant badgering if I still had it on me / what you spending it on / why don't we order chinese ect drove me insane

Just talk to each other! And if you don't have enough money for basics then he can't be saving ATM.

Cause from your little info what I read is: I agreed with my husband that he can have money put away in savings but twice I went straight in there and took money out.
(And I would be really frustrated if I was your husband)

Hmmm maybe, but OP did say it eas for something for the child

He worked extra shifts to build up some savings.

You took £40 of it for day to day expenses.

Would you have spent that £40 if he hadn't worked the extra shifts and if so how would you have paid for it?

This all hinges on whether you had enough to live on before he worked the overtime.

It sounds like he’s trying to hide it from you because he can’t trust you not to spend the savings. Just get cash out if you need cash?

Your joint account should have different pots within it like Monzo where you can divide up all the money into what you both need and any benefits go there.

So you could have a saving pot not to be touched and doesn't need to be touched because you have another pot for emergency spends.
Another pot for ongoing needs like food .

It's so much easier.

Imo it isn't just his money if you are caring for the dc to enable him to work those shifts.

"Not my experience of mumsnet. Women are often told on here to go back to work or increase their hours / get a second job to help support the family."

They are also told to have secret savings.....

Save for what though? Is it for the family? A holiday/ emergency savings fund/ car? Or is it savings entirely for himself? Why is it in cash? Shouldn’t OP know that? While he’s doing that overtime she is doing the childcare. Does she have the same option to have money set aside? Everyone’s assuming she’s irresponsible with money, maybe she is but maybe she isn’t and just has a very low budget that could be eased by the extra coming in?

Not my experience of mumsnet. Women are often told on here to go back to work or increase their hours / get a second job to help support the family.

If he is doing some overtime to get some savings and the OP has already dipped into it once and this would have been twice if he hadn't had it in his wallet the first time then I can see why it's not in a joint account.

She said it was for somewhere that didn’t take cash so it’s hardly Tescos is it?

Yeah, they need to communicate. I appreciate that may be harder than it sounds with a disabled child and a newborn, but it still has to happen.

Opinions will probably differ widely on this as there are relevant information missing. One of the key things is what were you using the money for? You said it was for a child and could only use cash?? Was it something essential? Would DH agree it was essential? If so, wasn’t there enough in the joint account? I assume you’re on maternity leave. Do you normally work? Have you agreed how money is to be used whilst you’re on maternity leave? Do either of you save savings separately or joint savings already? Whats DH wanting to save for? Is it for something he wants or for the family / household emergency? If you don’t have savings, clearly a good idea to try to save if you can. Is saving realistic though given income and expenditure? It sounds as if you have different views on spending and savings. You need to sit down and agree some principles together!

You need a proper conversation to get an agreement about what this money is for and how it is used. No point the rest of us guessing.

Financially abused ? Seriously . Not in this situation

We would consider it as joint money, but I would respect DH wants to sav some money. He'd made the comment about neither of you spending it, so does he want to try and save some money? The fact that you needed to take £40 from it, shows that you're not managing to live on the funds you have.

What did you need the £40 for? If it was food, ie an essentials like bread, milk, a toiletry or needed something like a couple of cans to add to a meal, but you were suddenly taking £40 when there should be a sum put aside for food.

He says he wants to save the money, that doesn’t mean he wants it for himself, maybe he is saving it and it will come in use for something for the family home or a treat both of which would benefit the family.
He tells you he’s saving the money and the first thing you do is to go and look for it to spend it! No wonder he didn’t leave it lying around. Savings are to be saved not to be dipped into otherwise the money won’t grow

Not only is it not moot, it's the absolutely central point here. If one partner wants to work overtime and not be available to do their equal share of looking after the children outside work, either they pay for childcare or the other partner does it and thus is entitled to an equal say. It's not about favours, it's about taking on more than they otherwise would do.

That said, the communication about money here sounds like the bigger problem. What exactly did you plan to do with the cash OP, was it a want or a need? If one of them needed new shoes that's a different answer to frittering.

There are two likely explanations here:

(1). Husband is worried that money easily gets frittered away by the two of you. You have very little in savings and that worries him. He’s taken on overtime in order to sensibly put money away for a rainy day - especially important to have savings if you have a newborn and a disabled child. He doesn’t want you dipping into it here and there, because he worries that it will quickly start disappearing and defeats the object of him doing overtime in the first place. However you are keen to start dipping into it whenever you need cash and it’s really upsetting him.

(2). Husband is quite controlling with money. He doesn’t value the hard work it takes in being on maternity leave leave looking after a newborn plus a disabled older child. He only sees that he is the one “working”. He is being selfish keeping that money all for himself, when both of you are sacrificing for the family. Perhaps he’s even taken on overtime to get out of helping you with the kids.

In each scenario the other person is being unreasonable. So it’s difficult to vote without you giving us more detail.

And really only you know which is the correct scenario @bababoy so please take some time to think it all over and think objectively whether he or you are being unreasonable.

Did you have a discussion about him doing overtime, and therefore less available to care for his children?

You're hell-bent on spending that cash, likely because you know it's there somewhere, burning a hole in the furniture, or wherever he put it.

he told you he wanted to keep it in cash, but you won't take no for an answer.

id be pretty fed up if I were him, just because you won't let the matter rest.

People are saying 'all money should go into one pot and decisions about what to do with it should be joint'. But that's not really relevant because this situation perfectly illustrates the main problem with that - what happens if you just don't agree? He's adamant it should be saved, the OP is adamant it should be spent. So one person ends up doing what they want against the wishes of the other, and in this case it's the person who did extra shifts to earn it that's 'lost'.

Whether or not YABU depends on a whole lot of contextual information that's missing. If you genuinely needed that extra money for essentials then clearly YANBU. If you used it for scratchcards and cigs YA. Why did your husband want to save it? Does he know there's going to be an unusual expense coming up? Does he want to save so you can have a better/extra holiday or something like that? Without this info you're effectively asking us to sanction a blanket rule of 'I want to spend it so I can', which can't be right.