To ask whether your 11 year old has a phone and what "rules" you have in place?

[devadreams]

DS is 11 and about to start secondary school. He currently has an iPod (my old iPhone although he doesn't know that!) He really wants his own phone and I feel he should have one as due to logistics of school drop off and pick up now being complicated with staggered start and finish times because of Covid (I have other DC at a different school) it is likely I will have to drop him at his friend's house to walk a short distance to school and he will be waiting around for 10-15mins after school for me to pick him up. So I'd be happier knowing he is contactable and can contact me etc.

I could get a SIM card for the iPod, this is likely the cheapest option. I think it's an iPhone 6 though and he'd like a more up to date phone!

Is it more normal to get a pay monthly contract for a tween/young teen, or a pay as you go? I don't want to spend a lot, he's only 11! What is a reasonable monthly amount for this age would you say?

I'd also be interested to know what "rules" you have in place re use of the phone, eg not allowed it at night, are they allowed it with them all day or do you restrict use etc? It's all new to me as DS is my eldest! (and his idea of what is normal or reasonable isn't necessarily the case!)

I think pay as you go is a waste of money. See what deal you can get adding another sim to your account
DDs phone/tablet etc comes out of her room at night. You will find others have no curfew and will message at stupid times!

My youngest is 13 and he has a second hand iPhone 7. I wouldn't bother trying to give him a brick or anything but then, nor would I be supplying the latest model. Something in the middle and you can pick up smart phones cheaply when second hand. I'd go PAYG.

I remove all devices from his room at bedtime

My DD11 just got a phone during lockdown, to keep in touch with her friends as she transitions to big school.
It's a PAYG, one of our old samsung phones, she has Whatsapp only, and it's left downstairs when they go up to bed.
We also restrict use during the day if she's been on it ages, and she knows we can read the chat.
To be honest, she's a bit bored with it already. The class group chats are all exceedingly dull and repetitive and she'd rather do other stuff.
I'm sure this will change as she gets older and gets on to social media, but we've had plenty of good chats around how harmful SM like tiktok can be, so fingers crossed.

My 10 year old just got a second hand iPhone SE and we pay 9 pounds a month for unlimited calls and 1GB of data. Rules:

Phone is locked down so the only things that work after 8pm are calls and SMS.
All app download requests come to my phone
I can inspect anything at all on the phone whenever I ask
It doesn't go up to bed with her

Works well so far

DS has had one since the end of year 6 and he was one of the last ones to get it! We have a tracker on his phone (he knows it's there). He has WhatsApp, which we monitor. Monitoring it was hard in the beginning because primary kids seemed to be more active so there were hundreds of inane messages every hour! We pay monthly, it only goes upstairs if he is watching a youtube video or talking to a friend and there is too much noise downstairs. Never in his room overnight

I think pay as you go is a waste of money. Dd mostly uses WhatsApp on WiFi so is on pay as you go - it has cost £30 over the last 14 months so much cheaper than monthly payments!

We only have phones downstairs - too much temptation to google things they shouldn’t in their bedrooms. I don’t look over her shoulder but Using it downstairs reminds her to be sensible. Phone stays downstairs at night on charger/docking station and she isn’t allowed to delete any WhatsApp messages even if they’re bad as I need to be able to see so I can support her in dealing with things as they come up. Initially I checked her phone regularly - not judging when friends swore etc but so I could guide her re approach to certain situations. She’s to come to me if things don’t feel right. She’s done that a few times so has built the trust and now I only check if I feel something is up. We’ve had bullying (of dd and of her friends from a nasty group) and a suicidal 12 year old - too much for a dc too deal with without parental support. I make it clear that checking messages isn’t about me controlling her - I need to know what she’s dealt with so I can support her as I didn’t have a phone at 11/12 and many adults get it wrong re tone etc.

All of my children have had phones at the start of secondary school.
For me it was a security feature first and foremost.
I’ve never upgraded their phones, they’re all iPhones which do what they need to do.
Have just purchased SIMS from giffgaff which cost £10 a month each and have unlimited texts and calls and a certain amount of data.

DS12 had my old iPhone 7 when he was 11. I added it to my account so got a discount and pay £9 per month. Unlimited calls, unlimited texts, 5gb data. It's capped at £0 so he can't spend on in app purchases or chargeable phone calls (but you can adjust that cap if need be).

In addition if you're thinking of school journey etc. We use Life360 which is a tracker so I can see where he is when I need to pick him up. (I found this app more accurate than some others.)

Other rules in place re general phone use - I know the password and he's not to be friends with anyone on social media or other apps, that he isn't friends with in real life.

Their phones are important. It’s how they communicate with each other these days and he may well ask for a good one for Christmas if he doesn’t get one now. Also, getting him a decent one means that you won’t have to listen to the nagging and moaning - maybe get him a SIM for now, but with the promise of a decent one for Christmas. Mobiles.co.uk often have good deals.

There are some cheap starter phones/under 150/ and you can add extra sim to your contract for few pounds.
My 12y old has Honor7, we pay £7/month for unlimited calls and 4gb data.
"Family link" is very useful - all the apps need my permission to install, has tracking function and you can set bedtime so the phone cannot be used after certain hour.

We did an old phone, so that 6 sounds great for 2020. Doesn’t make dc a big target for a mugging etc. We had basic insurance for up to 4 phones that covered it, but had consequences because the phone would have to be sent away for repair. We did payg topped up online, and allowed WiFi use in the home (the access was controlled hours). In addition all phones on charger on the kitchen before bedtime and never used in the bedroom, only downstairs.
Even now (teen) in the car she’ll ask to hotspot from her dad to save her data.

My son has one on my account, he was told it is still considered ours so like all his gadgets I gold the passwords and he needs us to add apps pay for things etc. And we are free to check through if we need too.

He is not into his phone so plays a couple of games and texts us and that is about it so we have not needed to carry out any checks on it

Often things like headphones are more visible to peers because the phone might be in a (blazer?) pocket when out and about. Lots of options that are compatible with an i6!

DS got a phone when he went to middle school aged 9 as that's when most kids around here get their first one and no parents are allowed in the yard at his school so I had to leave him on his own each morning.

We have it on contract as an additional line on my own contract and pay £12 a month for unlimited calls/texts and 4GB of data, he has a mid-range android that is fancy enough he won't get picked on for having a shit phone but not so fancy that anyone would be tempted to steal it and that wouldn't cost a fortune to repair/replace if it was broken.

Our rules are:

• a spending cap of £0 so he can't add any purchases like games to the phone bill and in-app purchases are blocked via settings

• any passwords that he sets have to be shared with me and his dad, partly in case he forgets and also so we have access

• he's only allowed to add the phone numbers of people he knows, so no friend of a friend or random acquaintance numbers, and they have to be saved under their real names

• no deleting messages and if anyone sends him anything that upsets him, makes him feel unsure, or asks him not to tell anyone else then he has to tell us

• the phone stays downstairs at night

I do check his phone and he knows this but I don't do it in front of him.

Do show that you will be checking the phone. DD changed the unlock password the first week. She was embarrassed and future checks have shown no future password changes.

Much easier to start with tough restrictions and to ease up on them later, than to start lax and then try to tighten.

My 11 year old is due to start secondary school in a few weeks.

He now has his first phone. He has to pop on charge in main room at 8 pm to avoid temptation of looking at it!

I have secure teen app installed and filters on google content.

It's working well so far.

Oh, and we have a rule is that if any of the conditions of having one are broken then he loses the phone for the day/weekend/week depending on what it is he's done.

A mobile phone at age 11? Good grief :-D

We had BT charge cards. Use them in any phone box and they would be charged to our parents' accounts. I didn't get my first mobile until 23, final year of university.

For computer games, we had Sega, Nintendo etc.

Ours got a phone just before secondary too. We did a contract with the biggest data (same as for ours). I wouldn't want to faff about with PAYG and the games they play on them/watching YouTube videos etc use up a lot of data. I'd be nervous anyway about PAYG in case he ran out and couldn't contact us. We always buy the phone outright as the contracts charge a huge amount of extra money for the phone otherwise.

Ps, he doesn't take it up to bed, we charge it downstairs.

We check phones very rarely and always in front of DC. Then you can read DC expression about whether you are getting close to the suspect content..

Dt are 11, have a rolling monthly contract with smarty £6 a month but get discounts for not using all data /other contracts. So usually nearer to £5 a month which is cheaper than pay as you go.

Rules
Phones are kept downstairs at night.
I know their pin.
Any unkind behaviour/lack of respect to others they get phone withdrawn. Never needed to do this but they know I would.
I have Google family so any apps have to be authorised by me.
They have WhatsApp as this is how they communicate with friends however no Instagram, tictok, Facebook, Snapchat as yet. Their older sibling has them and some friends so I'm sure they'll soon want them but I felt they had to prove they are responsible before they can.

Dd mostly uses WhatsApp on WiFi so is on pay as you go - it has cost £30 over the last 14 months so much cheaper than monthly payments!

I can beat that - DD's PAYG needs topping up by a minimum of £5 every three months, and that appears to be far more than she needs! Again, mainly using wifi at home - she keeps data turned off as a default - and phones not allowed in school so no usage there.

I don’t know any 11 year olds (and DS is 11 so I know plenty) that don’t have a phone! The rules are: we are allowed to check his phone, he charges it every night ready for school (well when he starts in Sept), he’s just check with us before accepting any friends on social media or replying to any messages from new people (which hasn’t happened), he’s not allowed to use it after he’s gone to bed.