To give my 14-year-old a budget for school lunches

[StuntNun]

DS1 is spending around £20 a week on school lunches. I asked him to reduce his spending and have bought reusable water bottles and snacks for him to take from home but he still spends £3-5 per day. As he is 14 years old AIBU to give him a set budget and if he runs out of credit on his school account he will have to use his own pocket money or make his own lunch to take in?

Yanbu

Sounds reasonable to me.

No thats perfectly reasonable.

Yes. Do it

Absolutely fair. I know many people that do this.

Do it. Valuable life lesson for him. I'm assuming you've checked the menu and he would beable to get lunch for the amount you want to give him.

I had the exact same thing when I was at school.
I was given £10 on Saturday (late 80s). This was my pocket money and dinner money.
If I spent it all on Saturday then I didn't have any lunch money for the week.

The downside was that it meant I only ate two packets of crisps and a dairy milk for lunch.

Mine gets £16 a week. £3 a day and an extra quid on Fridays to stop in the shop for some sweets. He knows if he spends too much he gets packed lunch til th following Monday. He hasn't done it yet.

I do that with my Ds.

Dd gets a top up of £9 per week and doesn't spend it all. £20 is far too much. Yanbu to set a lower limit

That's a lot to spend for school lunches a day, is he buying stuff for other students? Do you have the on-line system where you top the card up and can see exactly what he has bought?

Depends entirely on what prices are like in the canteen.

Oh and if I over spent then there was no more money and I wouldn't have been allowed a packed lunch from home. my parents were a bit nuts though

My 12 year olds have a budget for school lunches. They just need a little reminding now and then.

I work for my money obvs as an adult and I set a budget for my lunches too as it is such a waste of money.

Yanbu. £5 a day is too much. Why cant he take a packed lunch? Working people do that.

Of course YANBU. My year 7 son has a budget of £10 a week, and he chooses to take a packed lunch some days so he can spend a bit on snacks other days. He makes his own lunch and he can have whatever he fancies that we have in. Some days he will take drink and snacks from home and buy lunch, other days he takes a lunch and buys snacks. If he runs out of money mid week he has to make a packed lunch the other days!

That's fine to me but the budget has to be reasonable - my mum gave me £2 per day for lunch and that was less than even a sandwich cost :/ that was 7 years ago too ...

Yes, do it! Budgeting is an important skill to have

Isn't it normal to just give your child a certain amount for lunch each day? Seems odd not to.

Ds 13 gets a tenner.
Ds 15 £15 as they provide 10am butties for gcse exam year. .

It depends. DS school did set lunches so his cost was reasonable. DD school did a cafeteria system and anything decent was expensive (£5 for curry and rice)

Mid 1990s parents gave me £10 a week for lunches in high school. (Year 7 onwards). If I spent it all in one go that was my problem. I don't recall doing that, usually just got a ham/cheese roll at lunch and a chocolate bar.

It's all cashless nowadays Rebecca. So it's harder to keep track of it s you are t just handing over £2 every day.

I'm having exactly the same conversation with my 13 year old. I object to her buying drinks and fruit as she can't be bothered to pick up an apple from the fruit bowl.

My 13 year old gets £3 a day. Plenty for a main course / sandwich and something sweet. I have drinks he can bring in from home. If he goes over he has to make it back the next day or bring in sandwiches, works well for us

2rebecca It depends on the system. At DC's school, it's all online and the minimum top up is £20. I tend to put £20 and tell DC it must last the full week (the prices are quite expensive plus DS has breakfast at school so for us, £20pw is reasonable).

OP YANBU. My DC know that if they overspend they need to bring food from home --eat breakfast at home__