Reasonable consequences for teen losing expensive door key twice?

[Zoo2tropolis]

This may be a mix of AIBU and WWYD

My DC is early teens. Usually very responsible, well behaved, very few problems at any age. At the start of the school year they were given a door key. In a pouch, to go inside their school bag and stay there. Told to keep it safe, we have a special door and lock so it's really expensive. It would only be needed every now and then when noone gets home in time to let them in.

Around Xmas time, they lost the key. Then eventually found it, but we were mad they hadn't looked after it. They had taken it out of the pouch, left it loose. The responsibility and importance of keeping it safe, and consequences of not doing that were impressed on them. We helped them devise a means to keep it safe - put it in a zipped pouch, again within school bag and it should stay there.

Today they said it's lost again, this time the zip on the pouch apparently broke, they put the key tucked just inside their phone case and it's gone. The phone has been taken multiple places and they have no idea when it went or whether in or outside the house.

I'm saying the consequences for this should be:

1. Grounded for 1 month, due to seriousness of the issue and it being lost despite previous conversations (but they can still go to clubs)
2. Loss of phone except for travel to and from school for communicating
3. They should use their laptop to come up with a way to earn money to cover cost of a new key, as this is about taking responsibility

So AIBU, or what would you do in the same position?

All of your suggestions are far too harsh. Just get them to pay for the key or give them some chores. You cant ground them for a month for losing a key. Thats ridiculous.

Agree with pps about getting a key safe

None of them are fair. People often lose objects like keys. It's a common mishap not a deliberate bad act that deserves punishment. The only reason this is a big deal is because your lock is special and expensive, which is not your child's fault, and the fact the consequences are more costly don't make the 'offence' worse.

I think the obvious:

Lock. Them. Out.

Have them sit outside and think about their carelessness and then perhaps write a 5 page essay on how actions have consequences and their plans for success in the future.
Single spaced.
Depending on the quality of that essay, you remove the phone & tablet for 1 to 4 weeks.

That’s punishment.

Or lol “I will not lose tfe key” 500 times by hand.

Be creative and wicked but harmless. Torturous.

OP, no matter how expensive it is or how irritating the loss, it’s a key. Your proposed punishments/ consequences are draconian. If you come up with this sort of sanction, your child is going to live in fear of you - you really are being very unreasonable. It’s irritating indeed that it’s so expensive, but that doesn’t mean your DC needs a disproportionate consequence. Grounding them for a month is ridiculous - what are you going to do when they do something that is really worthy of punishment? Lock them in the cellar on bread and water for a month? Get a grip - it’s an easily lost KEY.

Argument in semantics isn't it- you are not punishing for losing the key but are punishing for not keeping the key safe due to losing the key!

I wouldn't have any consequences as it can happen to anyone.

Make sure the have a proper look for the key. If they can’t find it they should apologise. Buy them a key with an AirTag.,

Grounded for a month? Jeez. Way too much. Kids lose stuff, get a key safe.

For me the consequences would be they didn't get another key.

Ridiculous consequences, we all lose things occasionally because we are all human.

I'm very interested to know what type of door requires a very expensive key??

Your suggested punishments are all harsh. If you feel the need for a punishment, I'd keep things in proportion and ensure the consequence is logical. Contributing towards the cost of a replacement, for example, or not getting trusted with a key for a third time.

Ffs. Put the key in a key safe and job done. They don’t need to carry it around then. No punishment.

Exactly. Why was it not on a chunky key ring and attached to the schoolbag?

Paying for the replacement key would be reasonable.

I don't agree with the punishments you suggest.

Your system of keeping a loose key in a pouch is a bad one. Keys go on key rings to make them noticable and easy to find. My dc started walking home when they were ten and had a key on a piece of elastic attached to the inside pocket of their school bags. Then when they started secondary school they had the, on keyrings with an apple tag.

If you lost the door key what consequences would you expect to follow? Any of your 1 - 3?

If the answer is no then don’t impose them of your child who made a mistake and is otherwise a good egg.

This mindset I see so often of asking for punishments of teenage children for ordinary mistakes is so toxic and absolutely

Why would you punish a responsible well behaved teenager for an accidental loss of a key?

Absolutely horrible it should have said.

Have you got through life without losing anything? You only have one chance of being a mum, why be punitive.

Just take the phone for a bit - journeys to and from school included. Teens never "lose" those, do they? And when he gets the phone back, find a way to attach the key to it.

I don’t understand why you are ignoring all the suggestions of an AirTag or similar. This way you could avoid this happening again.
We have similar for ourselves, let alone kids.

Surely the lesson to be learned here is not punishment but prevention of the same thing happening again. An AirTag would do this.

Maybe make them buy the AirTag. That is a natural consequence.

I think considering you provided a loose pouch to keep it safe, rather than on a retractable keyring attached inside the bag, you set them up for failure. I do agree that putting it in a phone case seems a bizarre choice (I don't see how it would even fit!) and I would look into natural consequences for that. I do feel your choice of consequences are too harsh

The consequences should be having to sit on the doorstep until someone's home to let them in.

Presume you are perfect and have never lost anything.
Ridiculous punishments. I'd probably ask him to give me the cost of a normal key from any allowance he has. Not his fault you have such an expensive lock.

As others have said - punishing a normally responsible teen for an accident is a toxic way of parenting. Those aren't the sorts of consequences you'd have if you lost the key and the initial way of keeping it safe seems quite poor for something that is expensive but would be used only occasionally. And they avoided telling you about the broken pouch - why is this? Did your first roasting of them make them reluctant to talk to you about it?

Even part 3 - coming up with ways to earn the entire cost of an expensive key seems a little unreasonable as it wasn't their decision to have an unusually expensive key in the first place.

I think reasonable would be sharing the cost of replacement with them (with the share being dependent on their age and their access to money). And that's it.

I grew up in a very small town - maybe 5000 people.
Our house was old and the doors had skeleton keys.
We kept the key under the mat and I’d wager that 4000 people in town knew it.
I miss that. I miss living in an old-fashioned safe place where you trust everybody and if you DID get robbed, there’d be 4000 suspects hahaha.