DH cross I have questioned bank statement

[bank100]

Name changed for this.

DH and I have a joint current account that we both use for pretty much everything. DH is generally the one to keep an eye on our account and look out for any error transactions.

Today I had a good look through the Dec transactions as I noticed the balance was lower that usual. We are expecting a baby next month and was hoping the balance would look a bit healthier. I made a list of things I hadn't realised we were spending on. Including £100 he'd spent at various pubs (after work drinks), £100 cash withdrawn for imo no reason, £50+ at a sports venue, £70 on another hobby & numerous starbucks etc.

His reaction to me questioning these things was to grab my list, shout that he earns most of the money so he's allowed to spend on whatever he wants. He then tried to find things I had spent on... literally couldn't, I don't spend much on myself. There was one cheap beauty appointment. So was IBU for questioning this, or is he being U for being so cross? I feel weird about it.

I've been with my partner for 10 years and I would NEVER ever have a joint bank account. I dont understand why people do this?? It causes so many arguments from stories I've heard from friends.

We have our own accounts and a house account (in my name as I already had it set up, he moved in with me and rented his house out) that we both put money into that for the house then we each have our own money.

I wouldn't want to answer to anyone, if I want to buy a new top or have lunch with a friend, if I can afford it I just do it!

On the other side when I was on maternity leave he let me keep my maternity pay and put extra in for bills and when he was off sick after an operation I put in extra.

You need to have a serious word with him as being on maternity leave can make women financially vulnerable

My advice - open your own bank account and take control!

I think joint accounts work if you have very similar approaches to money, but not if you don't.
It does seem very unfair if one person is spending lots and the other is being careful, but not getting to put by any money just for themselves.

This is why I have a separate account.

It sounds like you had both sensibly talked about money and had decided about your own "rules" and it was working well. Then he changed the goal posts and when you questioned it, threw his toys out of the pram.

Time to sit down and check with him that he is still keen to try and save £400 a month. And to check with him that he only said that about his money because he was caught on the back foot and regrets it. Otherwise, things are looking grim for you .

Who earns what is irrelevant imo. Myself and DH have always earned vastly differing amounts over the years. Both work equally as hard but the money is household income. That's how it works for us.

I've been with my partner for 10 years and I would NEVER ever have a joint bank account. I dont understand why people do this?? It causes so many arguments from stories I've heard from friends

I don't think it is a joint bank account that causes the issues it is having different attitudes to money and not being on the same page.

We have a joint account because with DC we found it practically impossible to separate personal spending from household. We hardly used it in the years before had children apart from bills.

I do have a credit card in my name that I use for all my spending both family and personal. I pay it off when I get paid and pay the rest into the joint account. DH does the same and it works fine. I also have savings in my name and my salary is paid into my account. It's just horses for courses, personally I wouldn't want DH trawling through a statement listing every fiver I've spent - that would be a step too far for me. I think also money is easier to manage either way if you have enough and if the OP is worried about buying coffeees things are obviously tight do it would be tricky whichever way.

@Teateaandmoretea if you have a credit card that you pay off monthly, why bother with a credit card at all?

Unless you use it for air miles or something which then I understand

Who do you think does that in a 2 adult working household? The fairies?

Normally all this invisible work is done by the woman in a heterosexual couple. Sometimes the male "helps" a lot (ie it's not really his responsibility) but very rarely does he do the planning and thinking about that stuff.

It's one of the reasons women are held back in their careers, because they come home to do their second shif and are rarely as free as their male partners, to concentrate on climbing the greasy pole. It's sometimes the reason women throw in the towel and give up on paid work altogether for a few years, for the sake of their marriage and sanity.

It's a bit rude to be questioning his spending when you've set up your accounts so that all money is joint and you both can spend it how you like it on yourselves individually or jointly. But it's also a bit rude for him to fly off the handle.

It sounds like you both need a different way to manage your money. I have no idea what dh spends money on every money and he has no idea what I spent mine on (though it's mostly wine, Pret and train fare). We have a joint account for joint expenses. When I was on maternity, I paid very little into this as I kept a lot of my mat pay for personal use and dh covered more of our joint expenses. Now that I am back to working full time, we pay in a similar ish amount (more or less depending on our earnings for that month) and the rest we spend or save how we like.

If you're both getting hung up on personal spending from the joint account, it's time to take that out of the equation and just contribute to joint expenses proportionately.

if you have a credit card that you pay off monthly, why bother with a credit card at all?

1. So my spending is personal not via current account. Privacy.
2. I know that I am not going to go overdrawn on the joint account which has money flying everywhere.
3. I get rewards for using it
4. It's handy to have MasterCard and visa debit in case one is down

But why not? 🤷🏻‍♀️. Isn't that what about 25% of the adult population do use a cc and pay it off monthly? 😂😂

I think it's more like about 60/70% of credit cards are paid off in full every month.

It's also easier and probably cheaper to hire a car if you have a credit card. Many hotels want to swipe a credit card when you stay there. In both cases they will put a 'hold' on some of your credit limit for the duration of the hire/stay. Easy enough with a credit card, but even if they will accept a debit card, many people will struggle if the hotel or car hire company earmarks up to £1-2k of the money in your current account for a few days. On a smaller scale, supermarkets also do this with the estimated amount of an online order and then they charge you the real amount, but it can take a few days to for the 'hold' to drop off. Iv'e seen endless complaints about the problems people on tight budgets have due to this.

It's a good cashflow management tool, especially if you have to pay and reclaim work expenses - it gives you a few weeks to claim back the money before it has to leave your current account.

You get purchase protection against supplier failure or poor workmanship. I got all the costs back of more expensive flights when Monarch went bust 2 days before we were due to fly with them. People who had paid by debit card might have got the original cost of the lost flights back, but not the consequential extra expense of replacement flights at short notice, and that's if they had enough spare money to book more flights while waiting for a refund - many didn't.

Following the Thomas Cook collapse, Moneysavingexpert advised that it was unwise to pay for big purchases using debit cards due to lack of consumer protection.

I've never had a credit card and have been overdrawn once by £20.

Credit cards are for people who can't manage their money properly.

I was making up the percentage (clearly) but also guessing not everyone has a credit card

Credit cards are for people who can't manage their money properly.

Hahaha what utter nonsense

Credit cards are for people who can't manage their money properly

Only people who are financially illiterate would ever think that.

Pay % wise of your incomings into a joint account to cover bills and keep the rest for yourselves in separate accounts.
The he can fritter and you can save and it has no bearing on the other.
Suspicious over reaction though.

This is why we only ahve a joint account for bills, wages go into our own accounts and set amount goes into the join accont each month to cpver bills savings etc. That way we have our own money and do not need to justify to someone what we spend it on.

If you have a credit card that you pay off monthly, why bother with a credit card at all?

Because it helps me manage my money. And you can use 0% deals to spread the cost of big purchases without it costing anything. CCs are a very useful money management tool.

Dandelion that's such a daft thing to say. You can get more financial protection from using a credit card than a debit one.
Also it allows you to keep finances separate if you have to claim lots of work expenses back.

Credit cards are for people who can't manage their money properly.

LOL.

That is so outdated.

They are very useful for building up your credit score so that you can get a mortgage.

I had a major problem getting a mortgage years ago because I'd never had a credit card, so had no credit history. I'd always been good at managing money so didn't think I needed one.

A few years ago I had some building work done which needed fixing. The building firm refused to come out, until I rang the credit card company. I'd only paid the deposit by credit card, not the whole thing, but just the deposit alone was enough to give me the consumer rights I needed to get this shower of bastards to come and fix their handiwork.

Used correctly, credit cards are an invaluable money management tool.

DH is generally the one to keep an eye on our account and look out for any error transactions.

What does he normally do when he finds an unusual transaction?

If it's exactly what you did, i.e. mention it and ask about it, then he's being completely unreasonable.

I get using a credit card for big purchases or purchases that need protection (like holidays) but they're not the daily purchases that PP said they were using their CC for.

It makes sense if you're earning rewards but I don't understand the privacy comment or the "it's what everyone else does" comment.
I definitely don't understand the "it helps me manage my money" comment. If your limit is any higher than your "spare cash" amount and you're using it on a day to day basis it makes no sense to me as you can just have your own current account to spend from.
Obviously each to their own, I just genuinely wanted to understand the logic

I have a credit card, mostly for travel and cash flow purposes. I have not paid it off in full a total of 5 times in almost 20 years (3 of those when I had a minor cash flow issue that I knew was short term so didn’t raid my long term savings, and 1 of the other 2 was a bank issue as it had been set up).

But as I’m charged per transaction in my current account, it works out a lot cheaper to mostly use the credit card for day-to-day spends, and then pay it off monthly so no interest is charged.

And I have plenty of savings, adding to them monthly.

Sorry, deviation, but lots of people have credit cards without budgeting problems.

It not at all unreasonable for you to ask him about anything on your statement, his reaction is wrong.....a simple explanation would have been fine.