Household bills

[Handy83]

Just curious how parents where one of them works part time splits the bills. Is it still 50/50 or because one earns more than the other do they split it 75/25 to reflect the fact one person doesn't earn as much.

Once we had dc, we considered everything to be 'family money'.
If one is working PT, then presumably they are doing more of the childcare, and therefore contributing 'in kind' by saving the family a considerable amount of money?
All our income (both salaries and Child benefit - was before child tax credits) comes into the one account. All standing orders / direct debits credit card bills for cards used for petrol and food shop etc., and cash for those items that need cash come out of that acount. nce we could afford it, then savings - emergencies / holidays / longer term - also came out, and we each had a similar amount of personal spending money to do with whatever we wanted.
At various times we've earned different amounts / one and then the other has been higher earner / both have had spells of not earning, but we are one family with one lot of family money.

50% of each salary into a joint account worked for us, which covered all household expenses. If significant difference in income, then aim for a similar amount of fun money each.

Been married 21 yrs, eldest DC almost 20. Bought house together a few months before he was born, having sold both individual houses.

I have been PT since having kids, but I work just as hard as DH, doing all family admin, bulk of taxiing and sorting DC out, general childcare/school pick-ups etc when they were younger.

Opened joint account once we bought the house, and have had only joint accounts since. All money in, all bills out. I really find the 'splitting bills' concept hard to understand. We are a family unit, we have joint house, joint kids, etc, so why wouldn't all money be joint?

All savings are joint except for ISAs and pensions which have to be separate. Direct debits pay into ISAs each month, same amount.

We are lucky not to have to budget stringently, so both have credit cards and use them for personal spending as we wish (but we have similar attitudes to money, neither of us are massive spenders and we would agree big spends). Credit cards paid by DD from joint a/c, I keep an eye on them in case we need money moving back from savings eg one off car bills.

You arent just flatmates who have sex, you are ( or should be) a partnership. All money is family money.

we have one pot and we both attempt to piss in it.......

its a partnership and its family money in our eyes - over the years we've both been the higher and lower paid at various times.

sometimes we even have the pot, but not always

All money has always been joint money . We’ve been married 28 yrs and I’ve only ever worked very pt and gave up completely about 2 yrs ago . I manage all the finances and discuss large purchases .

The condersending "it's family money" really gets on my nerves. Great if it works but sometimes you have a partner who struggles with self control when it comes to spending. One pot does not work in these situations.

If both work full time then I think it's fair to contribute the same proportion of your wages to the pot and then have your own money. This also prevents people getting stuck financially in relationships as you maintain your financial independence.

If one gives up work to do childcare or goes part time for family reasons they should then contribute less to ensure they do not end up any less worse of than the other partner and how they would be had they not given up work. Obviously with less money to go around

We don't split bills. We have one account that all our income goes into. I take out a smallish amount each month which I put into my own account that I never closed from when I was a kid, and use for my stuff (like clothes, makeup, nights out and my small business purchases etc) this is mostly so I can keep track of my own spending. DH just uses our main account.
He earns a sh*t load more than I do. I work part time so that I can pick the kids up from school twice a week. We never do any 'big' spends without discussing it first.

It isn't condescending Kitty.
We have the situation where one person is a spender and the other a saver. The 'one pot' works well in this situation. We then have 'personal spending money' which both can do with as they wish, but it is shared out fairly out of what is left after bills are paid. Bills are joint responsibility.

We pay our own bills (phone, car insurance etc) ourselves, then the rest is divided. I think probably about 70 (him), 30% (me). I work part time, him full time.

We don’t have joint bank accounts, simply because we’re too lazy to go to the bank.

One pot, all money in it, pay bills and then equal spends. Why on Earth would you go Dutch when one has cut back hours or quit to do the childcare?

If you have sex or breed with a childish spendthrift that's a different issue.

Joint accounts and that comes from a position of being a SAHM for the last 5 years.

We have a joint account but again things like phones etc we pay our own. I pay for the car as he doesn't drive and it was my debt before we got together. The idea of each puts in 50% is a good one

All household expenses come out of one accohnt- so mortgage, bills, Nanny and family car. Then if anything else needs to come out that month (i.e. this month we have had to have heating engineers out and and a new cooker) that is put in the same pot. We have the same amount of "free cash" to spend as we like that month so we feel its fair.

We each contribute a proportion of the bills. So I bring in 40% of the household income, therefore I contribute 40% of the bills.

We have only just opened a joint account this year, as we now have a mortgage together, and have an agreed sum that covers mortgage, bills, childcare, child savings, and a bit of a buffer, and each contribute a proportion. Our salaries are paid into personal accounts, with transfers into the joint, and the rest of the money what there is of it is ours to save and spend as we see fit. Works for us, and feels fair - yes, he has more spending money than me but equally he earns more and it's not as if I go without.

We view all money as joint but prefer to keep most of it in our own names/accounts. But we each know what the other has in savings, and if one needed money and the other had it, we'd just hand it over.

Everything went into the joint account. We then got our "pocket money" transferred into our personal accounts to spend as we pleased.
Everything left in the joint acc at end of month was swept into a joint savings whic we tried to "forget" about so it became our emergency fund.

I pay for the car as he doesn't drive
Does he never benefit from the fact that you do?

I've got (male) friends who choose to drive extremely flash cars, and in that case I can see that expecting their DP to contribute to the costs of their vanity purchase doesn't make sense. But some kind of recognition of the value the car provides seems fair?

We used to have ‘one pot of family money’ it didn’t work. DH is mainly commission based and it was a flipping nightmare trying to work it out. He’s quite ‘fluid’ in his spending and I’m a budgeter to the penny.

I now pay all the bill etc and DH gives me a set amount each month. This works so much better and more importantly we’re both happy with this arrangement.

Joint account where all money goes in and bills paid. I do the accounts and pay us fun money in our individual accounts. It shouldn’t be a split of some specified ratio. It’s family money.

And as others say, I control the family account because I do budgets. DH has his own account which I pay from the family account. I have one too. Our personal spending is from the individual accounts. But that is money budgeted from joint income and we get equal share of fun money.

I work very part-time and DH earns a lot more than me. We have separate accounts but view all money as joint. He pays all the bills directly and tops up our individual accounts with spending money. It's not really an equal split, it just gets topped up when it runs low. Neither of us struggle with self-control when it comes to spending.

We have discussed finances and he has already said he will cover everything when or if I go to zero pay and again return to work part time. To answer the query about the car, yes he benefits a little but I do like cars and would always be looking for a new one. That said I do love the car I drive now so unless it becomes impractical (it's a 3 door car and they are really heavy doors) would not be looking to change again in the next few years. What I will find hard is the fact I have been financially independent since I was 13, I never got pocket money so worked and saved for things I wanted (any named clothes my mum refused to buy so had to buy them myself)