Teenagers renegotiating allowance.

[StrumpersPlunkett]

I am aware there will be variation but we have been on £1 a year each month.
So aged £12 it was £12 per month.
Apparently this is not the going rate.
We can afford more but just don’t want to spend more than we need to

My 17 year old gets £25 a week for himself , we pay for his train ticket to school as it’s over £200 a month and also his weekly bus pass which is another £15, he takes a packed lunch to school but has an extra £5 a week for drinks, snacks etc.
We pay for his phone, clothes and toiletries but things like aftershave, and “fancy” toiletries he would pay for
It sounds like a huge amount but because of his training schedule and the fact he’s up at 5am just to get to sixth form and isn’t home until 10pm some night depending on training, he can’t get a part time job so we are just helping him through
He does have to feed the dog and cats every day, walk the dog at the weekend, and help in the house when he is actually in it :)

@Littlefish

My 16 year old gets £10 per week, but I pay for most of her clothes.

Snap!

I put my ds £20 on debit card and £20 in savings each month and then put extra £5 on debit card when weeks are 5 in a month.

A I also pay for his clothes, toiletries and his swimming etc.

He pays for sweets/drinks etc at college if he wants them and stuff for his computer etc.

DD 13 gets £25/month. Normally it increases at her birthday but we said we want to see how much she actually needs when COVID is over.

In normal times she would pay for all sweets and drinks when out on her own with friends. We cover lunch if she is out a whole day. She pays for cinema tickets unless it is a treat where she takes a friend, we then pay for both.

She has to save for all clothes we deem “unnecessary “, so the 10th Harry Potter top, more fluffy socks, paying towards a more expensive pair of shoes etc. We cover more than just the basic but I want her to learn that she has to budget for wishes.

She also buys all her make up, we cover the normal toiletries for all the family.

She also pays for all fancy stationery she deems she can’t live without.

She also buys the presents for friends unless it is a family friend where we have a slightly higher budget.

I would say £20/month is here the average in our area.

@MiscUser9823

As a secondary school kid, I got £20 a week for school lunch, and nothing else (managed to save maybe a pound or two from this). But my parents did cover my mobile phone bill (£5 per month, only minutes and text), and buy my clothes (nothing fancy).

I never understand why parents give kids an allowance to buy things they like. Maybe if kids did something to earn the money then okay. But growing up, I had to help around the house and still didnt get money for it.

And when parents and relatives did give me money, i had to put it in the bank and was never allowed to spend it.

My parents never gave me an allowance when I was growing up either. It meant if (say) I wanted to buy a friend a birthday present or go to the cinema I had to go and ask for money, which was sometimes given and sometimes not, but always involved a massive discussion. I used to not eat lunch and save my lunch money so I could do the normal things that my peers were doing. Like you, I now find it very difficult to spend money (I think because my mind still thinks there might not be any more so I need to squirrel it away). Much better to give children a (limited) allowance for things like this.

My children are expected to do weekly chores. This is not linked to money, because that gives the illusion that they can choose not to do them and not get paid, whereas the chores are part of being a person that lives in this house. If it was "extra" things (we paid DS to paint the fence one time) that would be different, but we don't have those sorts of jobs every week.

Mine are 15 & 17 they each get £10 per week.

We pay for basic phone contract £7.50 per month, basic clothes, basic toiletries, family Spotify

They tend to spend theirs on gifts for friends, music tickets, one spends a fair bit on snacks whilst out & additional phone data 🙄

We can comfortably afford this and when I started at what things actually cost such as cinema, a coffee out, what gifts you can buy a teen for £5 it doesn't go far.

My dd is 15 and gets £120 per month, but she is responsible for all her clothes, toiletries, presents, socialising, travel etc, and there is an expectation that she will save some as well. She has obviously saved quite a lot during lockdown, but I'm pleased about that as she used a lot of the savings that she had amassed previously to buy a laptop last March for remote learning.

I pay for a basic sim only phone contract. Her toiletries cost a bit more than most because she has eczema and has to be very careful about what she uses. She is also very generous with her gift giving, including for me and her dad!

She is expected to help out with chores at home, and she does this willingly, but it isn't tied to her allowance in any way. I don't get paid for contributing to family life, and I feel that this is just something you do to help each other out as a family.

I never understand why parents give kids an allowance to buy things they like.

I give to mine because if I don't they would have nothing. They are my children, not lesser human beings. I don't have any issue whatsoever with giving them things/money. Never have.

Maybe if kids did something to earn the money then okay.

Mine live within the family home and we all muck in to get things done. This is a basic part of life though. I don't need to pay them to do things, they are not my employees.

But growing up, I had to help around the house and still didnt get money for it.

It's a shame your own experience didn't make you think differently. The 'well that's what happened to me' train of thought has no value, so your opinion here is basically worthless.

Why don't you consider things from your own POV?

And when parents and relatives did give me money, i had to put it in the bank and was never allowed to spend it.

Ds(17) has had £100/month since he was around 13 (hasn't changed)

This covers :

School snack & lunches = approx £50 month
Mobile phone/giff gaff = £12 (he picks whichever goodie bag he wants from £8-£15)
He pays for Spotify and/or Netflix some months.

The rest goes on (pre lockdown) socialising - bus/train fares, eating out, cinema, astro turf hire, etc etc.

He is very frugal with his money and saves whatever he can for games or to contribute to more expensive trainers etc.

That seems really tight for a 12 year old. Even my 7 year old gets a fiver a week

£12 a month does seem really low for a 12 year old. I used to get £80 a month from mid secondary school age and this was 20+ years ago!

Not sure what the going rate is these days as my children are too young for pocket money but I'd bet your children are right that it's much more than £1 per year of age. Maybe per week but not per month.

DS (almost 17) gets £10 a week allowance and since his 16th birthday has also got his child benefit every four weeks.

The expectation is that he buys everything he needs, including essentials like underwear, college items etc, pays for his guitar lessons, contact lenses and presents for family and friends. This has been such a valuable lesson in budgeting for him and it's one of the most useful decisions we've made as parents.

We pay for his mobile phone, everyday toiletries and (in a few weeks time) will contribute towards his car insurance in exchange for use of it when he's not - this will help him and us out as we occasionally need a second car, but not often enough to justify buying one.

Non Covid he had a part time job which paid £40-£50 a week, most of which he either saved or went on guitars or drums.

I think you could up the allowance a bit more than a pound a month, frankly, if you can afford it.

Ours got £1 per year of age until high school. Then flat rate £25 in year 7,8,9 and £50 after that. Covers their spends, lunch if they choose to buy it (or they can make and take from home, always plenty of lunch type food in the fridge).
We pay mobile phone and bus fares and basic clothes but not much else. Has worked well for us, the older ones did babysitting when they wanted more money to buy extras.

Mine get 50p per year of age every month. They are 12 and 9.

It’s not much but they’re not at the point where they need to buy anything with it that isn’t pure need. I buy their clothes, pay for phones (so far £20 in a year so not much!) and they don’t need bus or train tickets or anything. I also regularly treat them so they’re not deprived.

I would consider increasing it if there was any indication they wanted or needed me to, but tbh there really isn’t at this stage.

We give DS1 (17) £15 a week, this we felt was a bit more than average but took into account that he attended secondary school in a different town so covered bus fare to see friends at the weekend too.

He's now at college so does better as we provide him with a train pass to get to the town college is in and that covers weekends so his allowance is just for him to spend on himself/treats.

He's very good with money and likes to save and is sensible with saving as much as he can for the summer holidays etc so he has more to play with.

We pay for his phone contract and within reason clothes - although he does like branded so doesn't get frequent clothes being bought for him! Last summer I gave him a lump sum to kit out his wardrobe ready for college and it was up to him how he spent it. It's been difficult this last year as he wanted a job and it's been a nightmare to find him one! Hoping that'll improve soon and I might cut back on the allowance (probably put it away towards Uni)

We give £50 (16 year old) and £30 (14 year old) per month and I thought that was on the lower end of the scale! We pay for mobile phones, clothese (unless something designer then they have to save for it) travel to college and they take packed lunches.

Things are so expensive these days that they need more than £10 a month to go out socialising and I'd rather they were out with friends than stuck on the PS4. I used to get £5 a week when i was a teenager - 30 years ago!

I was getting £20 per month back in the Nineties! So £12 really doesn’t seem a lot. £3 a week wouldn’t even buy a McDonalds.

Mine gets nothing , he doesn’t go anywhere to spend it! He’s 13, am I doing it wrong?

Ds is £17 and gets £10 per week pocket money.

Dd got more at that age £35 per week, because she wanted to buy her own clothes, toiletries and books etc for college.

Many local authorities publish the amount of pocket money that children in care are supposed to get. I used that table as a basis.

Age 14 - £7-8
Age 15 - £8.50-9
Age 16 - £10
Age 17 - £10-12

plus clothing, toiletries & basic mobile phone

@StrumpersPlunkett

I am aware there will be variation but we have been on £1 a year each month. So aged £12 it was £12 per month. Apparently this is not the going rate. We can afford more but just don’t want to spend more than we need to

A 12 year old in local authority care would be expected to get about £4 -£6.50 per week.

@Veuvestar

Mine gets nothing , he doesn’t go anywhere to spend it! He’s 13, am I doing it wrong?

My (just) 14 year old doesn't go out much at all, hence he has a good amount squirreled away in his savings account!

When restrictions lift, I'm hoping both kids are raring to get out and about so may start spending again. We're lucky that there are plenty of shops, food outlets, cinema, etc. within easy reach so there are things to do if they want to.

DS doesn't get a regular allowance (almost 15). But we pay for everything. My parents give him £5 a week and he has loads of cash left over from his birthday etc.

@Veuvestar

Mine gets nothing , he doesn’t go anywhere to spend it! He’s 13, am I doing it wrong?

Well we are in lockdown! At the moment my DC spend their money on

• presents for friends (£2-£3 say)
• presents for family
• getting the odd drink while out meeting friend
• occasional McDonalds/other takeaway/snack food
• clothes which they consider to be essential and I don't
• makeup
• computer games
• random shit

If we weren't in lockdown they would additionally be spending money on things like going to the cinema/getting the bus into town/going for a meal with friends/paying for things like bowling, crazy golf, swimming with friends etc. Some of the higher allowances on here reflect where they are in an area where there is more of a "meeting in coffee shops" regularly type culture. We're not in that sort of area, so my DC do do a lot of free socialising (e.g. hanging around in the park) but they might do something like a paid activity (e.g. cinema) once a month and get (say) a Subway once a month.
I'd rather give them a regular allowance and let them budget then have them constantly asking.

If your DC is 13, he was presumably 12 when lockdown started, so he was just at the start of moving into the "socialising without parents" stage, and has now effectively not moved there yet. You'll probably find (Covid allowing) that this changes over the next year or so.

@Veuvestar

Mine gets nothing , he doesn’t go anywhere to spend it! He’s 13, am I doing it wrong?

Well aside from lockdown does he never go out?

No, he doesn’t go anywhere
V occasionally his friends have been here or he’s been cinema/bowling for a birthday. He’s been to friends a couple of times