To think this daily essential should come out of joint money?

[Tropicalturnip]

Very trivial really but I need a vent as I surely don't think I WU!

Stocked up on deodorant the other day as the one I usually get is on offer. Also bought a fairly basic £7 face moisturiser because mine ran out ages ago and I've just been using the kids body lotion.

Anyway, DH checked the receipt today as it seemed an expensive shop and was peeved I'd spent on "a few personal items!" (For context it came to £19 and the shop was just short of £60).

We have separate accounts and a joint account for bills, kids, shopping and joint expenses. Our own spend comes from our own account, but we both tend to spend on the kids or the odd thing jointly from our own accounts from time to time too.

I have always included basic essentials including all toiletries on the big shop, never been an issue.

DH buys his deodorant from an independent shop online that is quite expensive but pays out of his personal account. Also money is a historical point of contention because he contributes more due to being the higher earner, so I think this has riled me up way more than it should!!

IABU pay for your own deo and moisturiser
IANBU it's a basic essential and should be included in the normal supermarket shopping

My husband worries about money needlessly at times, but he also knows neither of us are spendthrifts. That’s not a reason to guard his earnings from you.

After all our bills are paid and allocated and other expenses, savings, kids pocket money etc are all paid we have money left from wages that we split equally and transfer to our single current accounts. That money is our own personal spending money that we can do whatever we want to spend it on or save it etc. If we go to the cinema or out for a family meal we will either split it or take it from the main account. It works for us.

If my husband inspected my supermarket receipt that would be a complete turn off for me.

Same. All money from whatever source has always been ‘ours’.

I buy the biggest bottle of laundry detergent infrequently and it adds over £10 to the shopping. I can't imagine by husband not understanding that the shopping fluctuates and wanting to check the receipt.

I agree with you op, moisturiser especially any moisturiser you can get in Tesco is essential.

So do you have to keep all your receipts for him to inspect

You’re saying your husbands personal items like deodorant should come out of his money but yours are ok not to

either both do or both don’t

plus this is weird! And very petty. It’s a marriage so a partnership - no his and hers and you can’t have what’s mine

The fact that he's monitoring the grocery receipt would give me the biggest ick ever. Sorry. That's so controlling.

Could you afford the fancy deodorant from your personal spends or are they proportional too?

If you’re reading this and haven’t agreed joint finances for the love of god don’t agree to proportional or adding the same amount each if you’re planning a family. The gender pay gap is real, it gets more pronounced when you have dc, and mumsnet is full of women scrabbling round to pay childcare from their share whilst their partner is on his third golf holiday of the year.

I have a family member like this they keep all receipts all month then at the end of the month do an audit of person v joint and transfer the money to each other.

I don’t have time for that we just buy whatever on whatever card.

There’s so much wrong here.
Control..

All I can hope is you have the headspace for this because he does everything else!! Which I doubt

So yes, they are personal items, so I can see the logic in him being annoyed in theory.

But it's miles away from my relationship.

Like most things, have a talk to him. Have your own points but really listen to him as well because if he voluntarily picks up the bill for other stuff then I think its likely he has something on his mind, like maybe a fear of redundancy, lack of payrise etc.

And if he really listens to you, you might find he can see that your earning potential is limited by his work travel.

I respect other people have different ways to handle finances than me, and there's good reason people keep separate accounts sometimes. But I cannot understand how it's fair when a woman earns less due to part time work, but uses her "free" time to provide the family child care. Which is why in these circumstances I don't see how anything other than shared finances is fair. Ie all money is combined and then maybe each retains a separate account with an equal amount to spend on whatever they want.

There's no way I could live with a man who forensically goes through my receipts and begrudges me a £7 face cream!

I put £400 teeth whitening on the joint account this month! 😅

How are you not pooling your finances when you have kids together?

It's so sad that I can't be sure that you're joking.

This sort of post makes me glad we have one pot that’s our money. I could not be bothered with working out who pays for what

Our rule is that if you buy something the like personal toiletries during the supermarket shop it comes from joint account but toiletries from anywhere else is personal.
It means that a £5 shampoo is ok from joint but a £20 Philip Kingsley one is personal.

Having said that I threw a pair of jeans in the trolley at Tesco last week and that has come from joint account when clothes are usually personal.

Wtf?

I can confidently say, that if my DH went through my receipts and questioned deodorant and £7 moisturiser, then he would be on the way to being ex DH.

These are basic hygiene items, you didn’t go and purchase a YSL bag.
Call him out on his crappy behaviour OP.

Same. We pool our finances. We've been together 20 years so I trust him with my money, and he trusts me. We also have a similar attitude towards money and how much we want to spend vs save. It's so much easier.

How much time and mental energy do you both waste on accounting for every little thing? Living like this must be so draining.

Men generally eat more than women. I hope that is accounted for?

Me too.

I am truly astonished that long term relationships keep a tally like this.

I mean, some relationships last 40 or 50 years. It MUST add up in the end surely to God.

I have a few questions.

Do your housing costs and bills come out of this account? Could that be the the reason why he was concerned by the slightly higher receipt, because of making sure there was enough for bills to go out?

I've had a previous relationship where we both paid rent and bills money proportionally into an account where they were taken. But we didn't do shopping from that account at all so there was a clear line between money aside for bills and money for spending. We then had the rest of our money for ourselves.

We then had a separate budget which we both paid towards for shopping, which included food shop. Our food shop did include stuff like toilet roll, shampoo etc.

Also, what kind of arrangement do you want and what is his objection?

I see the proportional split come up here a lot and usually with a lot of support. Personally I think it works until you have children, when you would need to agree how money would work when one of you needs to care for a baby and miss work to do that.

Wait.. what?!