To ask if your 12/13 Yr old gets pocket money?

[AfPCheckYourFile]

Things are tight here and my DS does no chores and gets a lot of money in the form of activities, clothes, days out Roblox vouchers etc.

AIBU to ask if you pay your DC to do chores and if you do, how much and what for?

I think it's fair that as money is tight he earns his pocket money rather than gets whatever he wants when he wants it which isn't sustainable for us now at all.

Please share what your DC do for how much and if its successful or not!

TIA! AfP.

We don't link pocket money to chores either but I do expect help when asked for. It's usually forthcoming without complaint. But, some kids respond really well to payment for chores..
DD gets £10 a week, we pay for her phone and bus pass. I'll also buy clothes/shoes etc but she'll use her own money too. She saves most of her money but buys herself good quality art supplies and vintage clothing.

DD. gets pocket money since she is 5 but without any strings or having to earn it.

We believe that all people in the house have to do their bit to keep it tidy and deal with things. we don't like, emptying bins, cleaning, washing up etc.

DD's allowance obviously grew over the years and also the expectations what she should do with it. She is now nearly 15 and will get £50/month from her birthday next month. That needs to cover all luxeries like make up, gifts for friends, going to the cinema or meeting others at the coffee shop, saving for spending money for the holiday or for her hobbies (she is into cosplay).

We buy all required school items, all clothing which are necessary. She has to buy extras if she wants like a top she deems she can't live without, accessories, school items she has lost for the xth time (first and maybe second replacement is on us) or if she prefers something more fancy.

We also buy all normal toiletries, again if she wants a Lush bath bomb, that's her money.

not linked to chores because chores are what you do because you live in this house - you are not "paid" for them, and you don't have the option to choose not to do them!

At 12/13 the DC got £40 a month which covered phone/socialising/presents for friends and any other random items they fancied. They didn't get given money beyond that. We provided clothes etc but they sometimes bought more beyond basics. We also paid for activities and days out although they would have been limited if money had been tight.

@JaceLancs she said the age and that money is tight.

14 yr son gets £10 a week plus £10 giffgaff on his phone per month. He has to keep his room tidy and walk the dog. The older two girls have Saturday jobs. We have a cleaner twice a week so apart from clearing up after themselves in the kitchen they generally don’t get roped into domesticity altho the girls prefer to do their own washing.

We've never given our kids pocket money. We did try money for chores but this never worked.

From 12 they did paper rounds, with us until they were 13 and then in their own. From 16 they got proper PT jobs so have never needed pocket money.

IMO, working is far better for building work ethic/managing money.

2 dds, dd1 age 13 gets £40 a month
20 from me and 20 from dad paid to her go Henry account
Dd2 age 11
Just turned gets £30, she doesn't less chores and I buy her more things

For example dd1 loved to buy all her own clothes etc and dd2 will ask me to. So to even it up I'll give dd1 the odd £50 to do an online shien order.

They save their money as well but dd1 uses hers also to socialise
Dd2 would just waste hers (ie pay her big sister to do her chores for more than she gets paid) so I reduced her amount

Dd2 now saves hers since we give her less for ps games etc

Agree working is good for building work ethic. But giving your DC pocket money & having bank accounts in their name means they have a head start on managing money and financial literacy. It means before their first job they have learned how to save, price compare, do online banking, understand interest and so on.

Ds2 whose 12 gets £5 a week off us. £5 phone voucher a month. If he wants to cook one night a week I will pay him another £5.
He also has £20 a month from my parents go into his savings account that he can have at 18.

£25 a month (almost 14). Plus phone. I buy clothes, toiletries, bus pass etc. Mostly spent on bubble tea from what I can work out.

They had bank accounts from early on but we just never gave them anything to put in it 😂. Not regularly anyway but as you can imagine, they were never short of cash due to Xmas, birthdays and regular streams of gifts from relatives.

I guess it's different for everyone but in our case, genuine valuing of money came in when they were able to connect the hours worked with the cost of things. Only when they had an hourly rate or wage for time spent working, were they able to compare the cost of a phone (for example) with how much work was necessary to buy it. It was the biggest lesson they could've learnt.

Under the age of 12, money was a bit meaningless. For ours, it all came together once they started working.

12 year old gets £30 a month and her phone paid for.

She has to: clean the rabbits out at the weekend, feed her cat, clean her room -including stripping the bed, and lay the table every night.

10 year old gets £20 a month and her phone paid for. Same chores.

We pay for everything else, and if the 12 year old is going out with friends/has a club we just give her extra money.

The only expectations with their money is they have to remember people's birthdays (in the direct house) and father's day/mother's Day and buy a small gift and card (again, will top up if they want to get something extra/big, e.g. eldest wanted to get the youngest a plushy from her favourite show, but this was £15, and we set them a limit of £10)

At a quick estimate of the average from these replies is £29.85 so £30 a month. Different conditions and variables but roughly that's the average. That's interesting!

Where I live there is a serious shortage of jobs for teens under 16 thanks to increasing red tape and even for over 16 most jobs go to the students of the local college. Unless you know someone or work for family it's very hard to get a PT job.