OMFG just found out DS has spent £1700 on ipod game!!!

[splodge2001]

It's all in the title really. Still shaking, It's been going on since June> I hadn't noticed because the spending was masked by some unusual purchases over the last few months. Am livid! I've deleted 'Clash of Clans' banned the Ipod, grounded him, asked him to think of ways he can pay us back (he won't be able to). What the hell do I do? Can I get my money back. Do I report it as fraud? After all, I didn't allow it to happen. Help!

Tell him if he does it again you'll take the xbox away. Sorted.

"it's the fault, or naivety, or lack of tech savvy-ness of the parents for not putting in place the steps to ensure this doesn't happen. And there are steps that are easy to put in place"

That is totally untrue WannaBe. Total nonsense.
It may be in some cases. but in others, there is minimal parental fault.

' It's a bit like blaming the banks for the fact people get themselves into debt.'

No, it's not at all. Bank accounts are not (as far as I know) set up in order to ENCOURAGE you to get into debt with the use of little counterintuitive security loopholes, knowing your child is likely to be using your account.

They want you to borrow but only if you know you're doing it. And banks are very hot on passwords in a way that Google is certainly not. When did you last notice your bank giving you a 30 minute pin waiver at a cashpoint?

Splodge. Did you speak to Apple ???????

Is there a reason that you don't want to tell us whether your son had your password or restrictions pin? Obviously, you don't have to tell us but it would be really interesting to know.

So tell me how to stop in game purchases during Minecraft on the xbox? DS keeps spending 50p and I have no idea how to stop this; no 'help' button nothing. I have it set at teenage setting and linked to a card for the ongoing xbox live - when I tried to delete the card I couldn't as that would stop xbox live membership. I have been through every setting/account/privacy bit I can find (and in the process amended ratings/time on the xbox etc etc) but nothing at all to stop purchases. If I can't do that, what should I do?

You can easily stop in game purchases on minecraft by plugging out the xbox and confiscating it. If your DS has repeatedly been told to stop spending 50p's and hasn't stopped then he clearly doesn't deserve / isn't responsible enough to have the xbox.
The method is simple: go to the wall, remove the plug from the socket and hide the xbox / put it on ebay (ebay has the benefit of recouping some of your accumulated 50p's).

in some cases perhaps but not in the case of apple. there are steps to disable in-app purchases and to confirm in-app purchases if they are enabled. And this is an eleven year old who can be told in no uncertain terms that in-app purchases are not allowed.

I can't speak for the play store or xbox live, but if a child makes £1700 worth of purchases on an iPod then the blame does not lie with apple. Even more so if the purchases were made over an almost six month period.

But as I said what's done is done and presumably the lesson has been learned. If I were apple though I wouldn't offer a refund given it happened over such a long period of time. it's less likely to look like an oversight than a child who buys £££ worth of coins for some game in quick succession iyswim, so although I can certainly see the frustration I don't necessarily think that there should be any burden on apple to give refunds in such instances.

But I would come down like a ton of bricks on the child regardless of whether I got the money from apple or not, because the devious way which he went about it shows a clear lack of respect and there would be hell to pay.

We have x-box live, play store, amazon app store, itunes etc. I have one debit card account separate from the family account, that I use for them, that I pay a nominal amount into as and when and can transfer money online between my current account and the 'app' account as and when needed.

That way no-one can run up any bills, once it's gone, it's gone until I decide to pay more into it.

Might be worth thinking about if you have children using these kinds of devices.

I didn't punish ds at all. I took the thing away for a few days while we all calmed down as he had a major panic attack the night he did it.

He didn't intend to lie to me, or to buy something - he knew he needed a password normally so it was a huge shock to him when it just said 'purchase successful' when he clicked on it to see how much it would be. (I think he must have clicked twice by accident, or something)

he came to me in floods of tears.

So no punishment necessary. We needed time to figure out some better rules to include the new information I gained after it happened. But I think it was not his fault as it was not intentional.

I cannot speak for the OP though.

wannabe - They certainly haven't required you to link a credit card to an iTunes account since my DSs got their iPod touches, so at least since Xmas 2010. I do recall that it wasn't obvious that it was an option, though, when I was initially setting up their accounts. I went through the sign up process and got to a point where it appeared to want credit card details, so that was when I Googled "itunes without credit card" and numerous search results gave clear instructions. It should have been made a more obvious option, definitely, as I know lots of people still don't realise this is possible...

Nerfmother you cancel the X-box live, confiscate the X-box until your son can prove that he will obey your rules. Surely?

OP so you didn't actually look at your CC bill online? Just looked at the amount being debited from your current account? I am a bit at that.

Have you phoned Apple yet, what did they say?

You can buy x-box live vouchers, for either 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or 12. That way you still get the benefits of having x-box live but without the potential for extra spending on in-game purchases via a credit or debit card.

I still don't get this. This child is 11. My 3 year old sticks to the rules more vigilantly.

... That is great Georgie, you and your child never make mistakes.

Lots of people do occasionally do make mistakes though.

Then they learn from them ( hopefully)

ah no pato there is a vast difference though between a one-off purchase which your ds at the time didn't realise was going to happen and instantly told you about, (fearing the consequences) and a sustained series of purchases over a six month period amounting to thousands of £.

I suspect the reason the op is getting such a hard time isn't so much because her child made in-app purchases on an iPod, but because it happened over such a long period of time and for such a huge amount of money and she is seemingly so oblivious to the money being spent on her credit card that she failed to notice.

Had it been a small child making in-app purchases on a game over a day which amounted to that I imagine people would be a lot more sympathetic and saying that while she should have disabled in-app purchases, this was a hard lesson to learn and hopefully apple would be sympathetic. but I just can't see how you can be so blasé about money that you fail to notice an extra £300 plus going on a credit card every month and not noticing it. And really in those circumstances I don't see why Apple should even consider giving a refund.

I can just smell the smugness wafting over from some of the posters.

It might not be this particular situation that stings you, but this is only one of hundreds, if not thousands, that parents/children face most days.

Ours was getting DD (12 at the time) a phone and finding she'd been talking to some internet random. I/we take responsibility for not being as tech savvy as we thought we were setting up the parental controls, but everyone knows how fast technology changes from one year to the next, just look at how many social networking websites there are that are in fashion one minute then another comes along.

I try my hardest to keep a track on what DD's up to online (especially in light of what happened (had a thread about it at the time which was invaluable and got CEOP involved, who were as brilliant as the posters on MN were) but I've said no to DD having accounts on twitter, keek, snapchat, instagram, skype, and youtube when she's asked. She's on facebook but all the emails go through one of my accounts and she knows I have access and will look at what she's up to.

It's endless, and she's only 13! What's it going to be like in another year or two??

Saying no to the phone/internet/social sites isn't really an option, especially when teachers say they can mess about on their phones when they've finished their work in lessons! WTF? It's just a given that they're online.

I hope you do get the money back OP, and I'm glad there's more sympathy than condemnation on the thread, you definitely don't deserve any shit for what's happened.

Fiscal - it's not just the child that made the mistakes though. First theres being given access to the item (repeatedly) then there is a pass code to use the item, then there is downloading the game in the first place (at which time it should be as clear as day that there are in app purchases)... Then there is a password to access your bank account and make the payment. (I presume this child can read??)

Then there is the email that gets sent after every purchase confirming it. I know that they sometimes delay sending these and they send them in bulk, but this wasn't a day, this was SIX months. Then there is your bank account. There is of course, also the word No, in the first place.

Many, many ways to stop this from happening on the parents behalf and on the child's.

It is not even 1% apples fault. You shouldn't even be so bold as to ask for a refund. Six months... And 11 years old. Come on, don't be ridiculous.

I think most people were reasonable until she said she would slap someone

I just hope that this thread will help someone to prevent it from happening to them. I mean in my mind it's been broadcast quite enough and people should be savvy by now, but hopefully this might help at least one person.

fiscal spending £1700 on a credit card over six months, changing the email address that notifications go to etc isn't a mistake though is it? He is eleven not a baby. He didn't hit the purchase button as a one off, he continually purchased whatever it is you can spend £1700 on in this particular game, and went to the trouble of changing account details to cover his tracks, knowing he was in the wrong. My eleven year old plays on my iPad and knows my password. He knows though to ask before he wants to buy an app. If he bought something without my permission once he would be in trouble, if he ran up a £1700 debt over six months his feet wouldn't touch the ground. But I would also be asking myself how I could have been so unobservant as to not notice.

I'm still shocked how someone can miss aprox £283 a month coming out of their account.

As I've said the bills were actually mostly lower because I'd stopped using the card. I don't get paper statements and have very complicated accounts with 5 separate current accounts.

He only needed a pin for in-app purchases. Stupidly, I'd used my year of birth and he guessed it!

At 11 he knows well what is right and wrong, and must have known he would not be allowed. He is also old enough to understand the value of money, I have a boy of a similar age and I know he certainly would comprehend what he was doing under those circumstances. I do think its way too easy for anyone to buy in app stuff BUT its a parents responsibility to monitor that kind of thing and its not Apples fault you werent paying attention to your bills.

Well, the precedent seems to be that they don't refund that far back. You may get a month or two as a courtesy but probably not.

You clearly need to take better control of your finances though.

I thought inapp purchases were protected by a password not a pin? Never heard of having a pin on them. Learn something new..

They do have a password. Made up of case sensitive letters and numbers and over 6 characters or something like that... Pretty impossible to guess. Or he should work for NASA.

I know it is a massive lesson but hopefully this might highlight the need to get a better handle on your spending / money.

You've said you needed a loan (and a cc one was a drastic way to do it, so it must have been desperate). Hopefully, when the dust settles from this, you can take some positives from it and grasp the budgeting nettle.

Can I ask how you uncovered his spending?

Also - you know now and at least have stopped it getting any worse.