to be fucking beyond furious with my ten year old daughter

[ovaryhill]

Had a call from fraud prevention at my bank today
Daughter has been playing Movistar Planet and has taken my bank acard nd spent £266 over the past couple of months!!!
I'm so upset I could cry

My sister and BIL have three adult children. Only one did this....they all had the same parenting.

So it's not simply a case of "if you parent properly they won't do it" . If Ceyes thinks that is the case then at some point she may have a huge shock.

Children are independent beings, you can give them all the ground rules you like but sometimes they will ignore them. The skill is in reigning them back in when they've done something they know to be wrong.

I know a lot of people are saying that 10 is very young, but it's worth pointing out that 10 is the age of criminal responsibility. I know it's a slightly arbitrary cut off but she could be prosecuted for theft at that age. She needs to learn that her actions have consequences. She also needs to learn about thee value of money - whether it's coins & notes or plastic - and I think OP should take this opportunity to have that chat with her. I would be explaining how many days it took me to earn £266 after tax for one, or showing her how many of her toys/books/clothes could be bought with that amount of money.

goldenbear
I do not CONSTANTLY refer to children as little shits. Only the the ones who are indeed being little shits.

Gosh you sound a very angry person Ceyes.

I loathe the term "little shits*. Horrible expression.

I'm not angry at all, Alfie. Perfectly happy. Probably because I don't have to deal with a 10-year-old who steals my money :)

Ceyes03 do you have children?!!

BMW6, that's alright then ??

I've just read the whole thread and I'm with ceyes. There's a reason that the age of criminal responsibility in England is 10 years old - technically a child aged between 10 and 17 can be arrested and taken to court if they commit a crime.

My DD has always saved every penny she's been given so even at 10 would have had the money to repay - but I can't see her doing that in the first place.

Anyway, glad that the OP has made her decision and as usual, has had a variety of different views.

Ceyes03 do you have children?!!

Ahhhh, there it is :)

Goldenbear, if you really can't come up with a better argument than that to justify why you think no punishment for stealing is the correct course of action, I'm not even going to dignify your ridiculous question with a response.

I think Ceyes just likes to try and be a wee rebel and wind people up.

Wow! Some seriously spiteful responses here. Selling your DDs doll collection would be a horrible thing to do, and cancelling Christmas - blimey dragging out a punishment for that length of time for a 10 year old CHILD???

I think you need to take account of your own lack of supervision and controls on your computers. Of course using your cards was wrong but I really don't believe that many 10 year olds know the true value of money nor do we realise how addictive some of these apps are. So now she's in her room, crying hysterically, having also lost her friends (I'd be interested to know how much of this was at their behest, and whether she was the stooge that agreed to use your card for all three of them, and I would be involving their parents too), I should think her punishment has already begun. I hope she doesn't feel she has no one to turn to now that her friends have dumped her and grassed her up too - that would be a concern to me.

You need to find a proper punishment that is fair and teaches her how hard you work to earn money and how this impacts the family finances. No unsupervised computer access either, and a sensible approach to her repaying at least part of the money. Not some vindictive selling of her possessions and dragging it out for months.

Hmm, took me too long to post, I seem to be behind the curve :)

Bloody hell, does anyone parent their children any more?

Take the dolls away and then give her them back?
Don't buy her an ice cream or treats?
Ask her what her punishment should be?

WTAF!

She stole. Not accidentally. She took her mothers cards on multiple occasions and stole money. Would this be different if she was putting her hand in a jar and taking bank notes?

It is not the mothers fault. Yes she could have possibly prevented it happening but it is still the daughters fault. The daughter stole the money.

Victim blaming is OK when it's a mother and daughter?

Don't leave your child unsupervised or your card out of a safe or your child will steal your money and you can't blame anyone else but yourself. If you had parented better your money would still be there. Children can't be blamed if it's just there to be taken.

=

Don't get too drunk or someone will rape you and you can't blame anyone else but yourself. If you hadn't of gotten drunk you would have been ok. Men can't be blamed if it's just there to be taken.

Seriously.

If this was my daughter I would sit her down and let her know exactly what she has done and why it is wrong. I would then work out a payment plan. We would sell her dolls and then whatever money was left to be repaid after the doll money would be made up from her pocket money. Not a little bit from her pocket money each week, the whole lot until every penny was paid back. She needs to learn what happens when you steal. She needs to learn the value of money. The effort that goes into getting it. The sacrifices that are made to earn it. A bit here and there and no ice creams is not going to do this. Quit being so bloody soft.

You are not going to emotionally damage your child by parenting her.

We had the same issue, with my son and iTunes. We contacted iTunes and got a refund with no difficulties at all.

Im not sure of all the legalities but because shes a child, she cant make a legal contract, or something along those lines, so anyone under 16 using your card cant be held liable.

If you don't get anywhere, take it up with VISA or whoever is on your card.

I don't think half of the people who came on here ranting about selling dolls and PUNISH HER PUNISH HER PUNISH HER would actually behave that way with their children. It's that weird frothing at the mouth side of mumsnet again.

And the people raging about OP not being strict enough clearly have something missing in their real lives that they get from frothing on here. It's a bit odd! OP had decided what she has decided. How do more digs at her help?

We had the same issue, with my son and iTunes. We contacted iTunes and got a refund with no difficulties at all.

That is absolutely appalling. Way to get someone else to take responsibility for your child's theft.

One of my daughters did this almost. She had access to my itunes password which allowed her to buy stuff. I trusted her. We were both wrong. I was extremely lucky and they refunded everything the first time. She got the rollocking of her life - we had no spare cash, so if they hadn't refunded it she wouldn't have got anything for christmas.

I then had all the kids on family sharing and the same thing happened with my DSD. This time I felt it wasn't really her fault as it wasn't clear, she was new to the ipad environment, and the games were set up so that this would happen. A professional con really. No longer on family sharing though.

Well. I would be livid too but I have all purchases password protected on the tablet, so if DS1 (7) managed to get through those then I'd probably be in awe at his brilliance, as well as murderously angry.

Would I sell his stuff - not his precious collection, no. In his case, his HTTYD dragons - no. But I'd take other stuff and sell it, and he'd be barred from getting the occasional treat he does now, and he'd be reminded every single fucking time he asked for something why he wasn't getting it, to drive the point home.
Would I cancel his birthday - no. But I'd reduce it.
If he got pocket money then that would be cancelled as well until the rest of the debt was paid off; but he doesn't so can't do that.

He'd also have zero unsupervised screen time - he gets very little as it is now - and I'd probably delete games from the tablet that have the option to spend real money (most of them, to be fair).

However, he has been warned many times already not to even think about spending real money on the games (he can't anyway) so I'd not only be livid but massively disappointed in him for disobeying me.

I can see the "gotta be harsh to drive the point home" attitudes, and understand them - but I'm also a person who gets attached to things, and if someone had taken my most precious stuff and sold it, it would NOT have achieved what it wanted, it would have turned me bitter and made me think "fuck the lot of you then" - counterproductive.
Luckily my parents didn't do that, as both of them had parents who gave away/sold their most precious possessions at a young age, not even as a punishment :(

One of my daughters did this almost. She had access to my itunes password which allowed her to buy stuff. I trusted her. We were both wrong. I was extremely lucky and they refunded everything the first time. She got the rollocking of her life - we had no spare cash, so if they hadn't refunded it she wouldn't have got anything for christmas.

So you got the company to refund you for your child's wrongdoing - and yours, by your own admission - and she still got Christmas presents as normal? What punishment did she get? None. And then you wonder why your DSD then went and did exactly the same thing?

Jesus Christ some people on here shouldn't be allowed within 10 feet of a child. Cancel Christmas and sell her dolls? Seriously?

She's 10! She did a very wrong and stupid thing and definatly needs a bollocking and a form of punishment maybe chores.

However some of try responses are plain cruel and vile.

My 4 are older now and have done daft things too, not that but run up bills on mobile phones etc and we talked it through and applied appropriate checks and balances with moderate punishments but cancelling christmas absolutely vile cruelty to a child.

I'm not getting this "success! The company who initially benefited by my child's theft ended up by refunding us so we won" attitude. How is that teaching anyone anything?