How much money do you give Teenage DC a month.

[Bringminimoons]

Hey ! Just that really how much do you give teenagers a month and what do they use it for / expectations on what it should include ?
Asking after ds told my sister how much he got and her reaction to it.

We gave DS a lump sum last summer for college clothes - in the hope he'd budget as he knew what he needed. Additional I bought him a coat as I'm a bit of a stickler for a decent coat and didn't want him buying something flimsy to keep back money for a ridiculous branded T-shirt

Sorry that was meant to be food outside of the house.

I never spend an extra penny on him in a month. He pays for his sports and uniforms / equipment needed.
He pays for all travel, phone bill,
For instance If we went to say Thorpe
Park altogether he would pay his own way.
Birthday/ Xmas presents for friends and families.
Non essential school trips for example if there was a ski trip or something he wanted to attend.
Clothes I don’t buy him any clothes extra.

Haha @ALevelhelp I am the same with coats I try to heavily influence his decisions 😂

Erm what 😕 when I was 16 and living at home I had a little Saturday job and my mum expected me to pay her for living at home lol, I never got any pocket money a month, funny how different other families are! She still goes on about it how I was living in her house “rent free” 🤨

£40 each and they are expected to do certain chores to keep it that way. We transfer into their accounts each month although I may start "forgetting" if the eldest keeps "forgetting" the chores 😂

We pay any bus fares, toiletries, phone, hair cuts, basic clothes and shoes but if they want anything on top of that they save up for it. Eg youngest has 4 perfectly good, high quality hoodies, however she had seen another one she wanted - that came out of her bank account.

Sorry should specify it's £40 a month not per week!

In some ways what you are doing is good in that he has to make that money last a month and needs to budget. In reality I think it is a lot of money for a 15 year old for a month and I would probably have more control over where it was spent. So for example I would pay for extracurricular activities, bus fares, clothes, shoes etc and he would be expected to pay for his phone, meals out with friends, anything that I deem not a necessity basically.

My kids are only preschoolers so I have a long time before this is an issue for me but I do not believe in paying them to do chores around the house. If they live in the home, they contribute to it, doing the hoover in my eyes shouldn't be seen as helping out mum or dad but rather something that just needs done.

My 14 year old gets £14 a week, which will increase to £15 a week when he turns 15. I pay for his mobile phone, toiletries, essential clothes and I save £20 a week for him, which he will get when he turns 18. He uses his pocket money for non-essential clothing, eating out with his friends, vinyl and presents.

DD is 13 and I have just opened her first bank current account. I am transferring £10 per week in out of the £30 weekly maintenance that her father pays. She wants to save for a trip to DLP when she is 18 so lets see how that goes .

I have taught her the value of money, she knows that you have to work hard to have money, and that you can only spend it once.

I have told her that I won't be giving her money when we go shopping so it is down to her to budget and buy the books and clothes that she wants. I am lucky that she is not into fashion or makeup so won't be wasting it on expensive clothing.

I pay for her mobile out of the maintenance and it also pays for her music and drama lessons, and her school uniform. I will continue to pay for essential clothing and her basic wardrobe and shoes etc.

As she gets older I will give her more, with the intention of her having the whole £30 pw when she leaves school.

Where we live there isn't much to do and she isn't old enough yet to go to the nearest town with her friends , so she won't spend much on a day to day basis.

Chore wise, she has to do the dishwasher and take her laundry out to the utility room, and fold and put away the clean clothes.

This is an interesting thread. My eldest is 11 so not quite a teenager and he gets £20 a month in his go Henry account. I pay for his phone contract and all of his clothes obviously.

I used to get £400 a month as a teenager from my Dad. Just ridiculous. I wasted it on absolute crap.

@Sceptre86

In some ways what you are doing is good in that he has to make that money last a month and needs to budget. In reality I think it is a lot of money for a 15 year old for a month and I would probably have more control over where it was spent. So for example I would pay for extracurricular activities, bus fares, clothes, shoes etc and he would be expected to pay for his phone, meals out with friends, anything that I deem not a necessity basically.

My kids are only preschoolers so I have a long time before this is an issue for me but I do not believe in paying them to do chores around the house. If they live in the home, they contribute to it, doing the hoover in my eyes shouldn't be seen as helping out mum or dad but rather something that just needs done.

I'm sorry but I disagree with the last statement.

I don't see that I am paying my teens to do chores.

More that if they expect me to contribute to the funding of their social lives and non essential spending then they should also contribute to the running of the house. Whether that be pegging out some washing, running the hoover round, feeding cats etc. I don't agree with them thinking they get money for nothing and I don't think that's a great thing for them to learn.

@Sceptre86 I agree with you I also have an 8
Year old and neither of them have ever been paid to do chores.
However I don’t believe either of them need to do more than they already do to earn pocket money.
My DS works extremely hard at school and is doing well he also spends slot of time at extra curriculum / sports. He has a crap load of school work to do at home I wouldn’t want him getting a job on top ( he is 14 )
I would however take allowance away for instance if he was being later for school / skipping classes etc

DS 13 gets £5 a week for emptying the dishwasher and helping out the washing away. Beyond that if he wants more he has to earn it. I'm self employed and he comes to help me at £5 an hour. He also gets his birthday/Christmas/extra spends from grandparents. We pay for his phone, clothes and shoes, music subscription. He mostly spends his money on going to town or the occasional thing on Fortnite. He's only just starting to spend money on going out so we said we would review his amount if needed.

Mine are almost 13 and 10.

They get what they earn, basically.

If they do the chores asked of them, they get the full amount of £15 per month each. They can get more if they do more. They get less if they don’t do them.

Core chores: loading/unloading the dishwasher, keeping their bedrooms tidy, hanging up/putting away their clothes. Optional chores: hoovering, dusting, whatever else I can come up with off the top of my head.

However - none are into make up or hair stuff or fancy clothes (yet... thank fuck!), they mostly spend it on scrunchies (we have an unbelievable amount of them), and other little bits and bobs.

Eldest has a second hand iPhone 6 that I top up with £10 a month, middle child will get the same when she starts secondary.

Also, with the pandemic to consider - eldest isn’t going out and about with friends as she probably would have started doing (we live close to a small city centre), hence the “low” amount.

£40 a month.

£20 in savings and £20 on debit card.

I pay his swimming, anything he needs for swimming, phone, toiletries and clothes.

He pays for food out if he wants it or computer games etc. So basically it's for extras in life

Oh and my ds has set things he has to do around the house too.
It's not just free money!

My 14 yo gets 40 pocket money and 50 clothes pcm. I pay for his phone and xbox game pass and buy his pe kit for school (they don’t have a uniform).

Theses are not dependant on him doong any chores although I do expect him to keep his room clean and tidy and pick up after himself - bring pots down, dirty clothes in the laundry box, clean clothes away.

He doesn’t do any extra curricular activities (his choice). but if he did I would pay for that. He knows he could but doesn’t want to.

For a planned day out eg alton towers, I pay but any spending money comes from him. Shopping or out with friends he would pay, he hasn’t been doing much of this though and I am aware he may need more if he goes out more. For now most of his socialising is on xbox.

DD14 gets £5 a week direct to her bank account. To spend on what she wants, we pay phone, bus fares, clothes etc. She doesn't have any friends in the town where we live, they mostly live 30-40 mins drive away so she doesn't go out on her own much.
She spends it on sweets, the occasional book or t shirt, phone cases, make up, birthday presents for friends, that type of thing.

£40 from 14, rose to £60 at 16 and £120 from university age

My DS1 is 18 and gets £30 a month, DS2 is 14 and gets £25 a month paid to their bank accounts for which they have debit cards. I pay for their phone contracts, clothes etc. so it's mainly for frittering away on snacks and small items such as charging leads which they seem to get through rather a lot of! I think DS1 pays for a Spotify subscription out of his. If they're going out e.g. swimming or to the cinema I give them extra money to pay for that. Neither has complained or asked for more money so I assume they're satisfied with the amount they get.

Just seen your update of £350 a month but that has to pay for a lot.
DD only gets £5 a week but we pay for
£8 phone
£60 bus pass
£130 music lessons
£50 other extra curricular

The above comes to £250 then ad hoc clothes, shoes, non essential school trips, days out etc. So probably not dissimilar to your £350 all in, just that you've given the control to your DS.

If DD had the money direct to her, she would no doubt forget to organise paying for the bus pass filling in the forms, sending the photo off etc, paying the music teachers on time, logging in to the various websites to pay for other things. I'd have to add her card to parentpay for her to pay for school trips etc and give her my log in for it, so not really practical. The phone is on a family subscription so just comes on our phone bill each month. TBH I'd rather be in control of the admin for those things, she has enough school work to do without having to add life admin on top.

DS 13 gets £5 per week. It’s not linked to jobs but I have a disability so he does plenty to help around the house and he helps me. I pay £6 per month for his phone, which is contract only as he has my old iPhone, he gets Spotify and Netflix on my subscription etc and I buy all his clothes, toiletries and give him holiday spends etc. I think that’s plenty.

For instance If we went to say Thorpe
Park altogether he would pay his own way

So, if you go for a family day trip or out for dinner or to buy snacks on holiday, you would pay for you, DH and DS but your 14 year olds would then get their wallet out to pay their own share of the bill?!

My daughter was getting £150 per month between me and her dad, plus I also pay for her phone, haircuts basics in terms of clothes. She buys extra clothes and toiletries. But she's gone back to her part time job now so her allowance will be stopped. (She's nearly 18).

My 16 year old gets £25 a month , and i pay her phone x