Is this a fair way to split finances?

[BittySpider]

It’s my Son and his partner so I know it’s realistically none of my business but had an convo with him today and wondering if I am being unfair thinking this is unreasonable?

My Son and his partner are getting married in the summer. The live together. The topic of finances came up today as we were discussing the wedding and we have offered them a few K towards it.

He told me that the way they have always split their finances is that they have a joint account both wages are paid into. All direct debits for bills come out of that account including house, bills, subscriptions etc. Food shop money also comes out of that. Then they both transfer themselves the exact same amount from the joint account on pay day and this is to cover all personal expensive such as their phones, petrol, coffees, clothes etc. He said they don’t take from the joint unless absolutely necesssary and if one of them runs out they might say to the other can I borrow a tenner and then on payday they will give it the other person back out of their personal allowance.

I asked about takeaways or date nights and he said one person will usually cover it out of their “pocket money” but they don’t take it out of the joint unless it was a special treat like an anniversary. All holidays and other joint costs come out of the joint but as they’re getting married all of wedding costs are being paid from the money building up in the joint account. He said if one of them had their car break down then they’d take money out of the joint to fix it too. He also said they both have their own personal savings accounts too but these are currently neglected due to paying for wedding.

FWIW my DIL earns much more than him. DS doesn’t earn much more than minimum wage. I know it’s none of my business so I won’t say anything but AIBU to think this is a bit tight? Personally I think bills should be split proportionately to what they earn. The amount that they take out each for pocket money isn’t a lot and he’d have a lot more left over if they split it differently.

They only have separate spending money, the rest is joint. My DH and I do this too. It means I can buy him birthday presents without him knowing etc.
But they are probably getting married because they love each other rather than any money driven intentions.

OP, you'd hate to be my MIL!

I don't work,due to being disabled. We get my DPs wages, universal credit (including LCWRA, as I can't work) and PIP.

Everything is paid in to MY account, including DPs wages!

I then sort all the bills. I transfer enoughto his account to cover the direct debits going out of his account. I transfer any other money he asks me to,if we have enough.

I use a savings account, in my name only, to transfer money to in order to cover payments throughout the month. Then I transfer the money back to my main account as needed.

DP does most of the shopping. He just takes my card to do so. In fact, I rarely have possession of my card. I do have it on my phone though.

It's obvious to nearly everyone on this thread apart from you, that if your son wasn't living with your DIL but was just supporting himself on his own minimum wage, he would not have the lifestyle that he currently has. He would probably only be able to afford a room in a house share and holidays, car payments/repairs and restaurant meals/takeaways could be completely unaffordable for him, never mind contributing to savings for the wedding.

How you can frame their financial set up as being disadvantageous to your son is unbelievable.

This is how me and my ex DH did things. I was always the higher earner. But splitting it proportionately would have meant I had more personal spends and he had less which would have disadvantaged us doing things as I would have had money for socialising and he wouldn’t. It was never really an issue. We did however use the joint account for anything we did together such as takeaways or meals out. The personal spends were things like clothes or doing stuff on our own or with own friendship group.

@Rosscameasdoody

Where did op say they both get £500 each or mention dils salary?

"they both have their own personal savings accounts too" direct quote from OP's original post.

But neither salary is being paid into either of those accounts - both salaries go into a joint account where their money is pooled and used for joint bills and expenses, and they each transfer the same amount of spending money for their personal use. I don’t see how this is separate finances.

She didn’t. There was a poster upthread who used these figures as a hypothetical example. I was pointing out that the original poster used £500 each as the personal spending money, not £1000 each, so the percentage figure of DiL’s contribution was actually higher.

First time I’ve seen a mum try and cocklodge on her son’s behalf.

@Rosscameasdoody Thanks makes sense. Thought I had missed it.

No lol just, no.
What film or series are you from lol
Your son has a great deal here.
Keep your nose out mate

And you can't have joint ISAs, if they have ISAs

Though perhaps some people are expecting them to liquidate a tax efficient method of saving in order to be 'together'

Honestly, there are some financial numbnuts on this site...

Oh your one of mothers 🙄

Why? It’s not the 60’s anymore

That sounds a healthy and trustful way to work.

How is it healthy or respectful for one grown adult - noting there are no shared kids - to be taking money from another, instead of accepting the spending capacity their own income affords them?

When it is agreed upon by both those adults.

Possibly so they can share a lifestyle together. For example, when one has a nurses salary and the other works in finance and has a 10x higher salary.

In your example someone would be on £30k and someone on £300k. It would be beyond tight if the finance person wasn’t treating the nurse to a dinner, a holiday, whatever, but it’s not reasonable to expect the high earner to hand over £150k to even things up!

'Reasonable' is whatever the people in question agree is reasonable.

Which may be different to what you personally find reasonable.

I am confused. Is it they both get paid into the joint account and then, after bills say there is £1k left
a) they both take the same amount out each after bills, eg £500 each. In this scenario your son benefits or
B) they split bills 50/50 and then take out their remainder, so your son gets, say, £200 and your dil £800? In this scenario I agree its unfair .

*amounts are for illustration purposes only.

It’s scenario A.

she may earn more but she's only taking out the same 'personal spends' as your Son so she's losing out. If she's putting more in to the joint account & only taking the same amount out as your Son then in effect she's paying more into the savings which they'll both benefit from when they pay for things out of the joint account.

Actually I wonder if this is a much more serious problem of mismatched spending patterns and she's a saver and he's a spender.

Seems perfectly fair to me and very sensible. If it works for them I don’t see a problem.

But they have the same
left over! They take the same
amount for “pocket money” and the rest (mostly her money) is in the joint account for emergencies/ holidays/ wedding etc. SHE is “giving up” more of her income than he is.