How much pocket money does your 12 year old get?

[Dancergirl]

Dd1 is 12 and coming to the end of Year 7. She gets £5/month pocket money, same as her sisters. I know it's probably not much but we planned to review it at some stage plus we sometimes give her a bit extra here and there.

She doesn't spend a lot of money - she likes to buy a few bits from Claires, Lush etc all the usual places. But she likes the cookies they sell at school and drinks from the vending machine. Usually she asks dh for a bit of money most mornings. So we think it's sensible to now increase her money but she has to buy everything non-essential out of it including snacks at school. But how much would be a reasonable amount? She says some of her friends get £20/month! Is that really the going rate??

[Tiredemma]

Ds1 also does a paperround ( one of the local weekly 'free' ones). With leaflets etc this gives pays between £50-55 per month which I then transfer into his own basic bank account as 'wages'. Some weeks he moans about having to do the paperound and dp ends up doing it . When that happens I deduct a weekly amount from him.

We pay his tesco mobile every month which is £15. Im trying to teach him to be responsible with money, when its gone, its gone. No 'subbing' from me through the month. Ill buy all of his 'essentials' but if he sees certain clothing items he 'desperately' wants then h has to use his 'wages'.

[uggmum]

My dd (13) gets £20 pm into her bank ac. She uses this when she goes out shopping with friends or general treats. Her account is with HSBC.

I usually pay for cinema trips and food when she is out.
I pay for her phone and all clothing/toiletries.

I also give her money for snacks/lunch/drinks at school.

[VivaLeBeaver]

£22 a month. I also top up her phone but she hardly uses that.

I buy quite a few clothes for her but if she wants extras she buys them.

[VivaLeBeaver]

Dd has an account with Barclays which seems good.

[absentmindeddooooodles]

Y mum always have us money when we wanted to go to the cinema etc. we were expected to help around the house and this worked well for all of us. She paid for clothes and toiletries but if we really wanted something we could save up birthday money or would get said item for birthday or Christmas. Having said that I worked as a waitress from 12 so generally had the few quid I needed for going out etc. I think when ds is older I'll do 20 a month as long as he helps with household stuff. Providing he looks after his things too. If he wants extra money for something he can so set jobs etc. I'm over thinking things...... He's only 2!!!

[BellaVita]

TSC, I found that strange too.

[Bumply]

My boys get £5 a week. Youngest (11) saves up for Lego and Xbox/pc games. Oldest (15) buys headphones and fancy mice for his pc. I started it (lesser amount) when they were little and used to beg for toys/magazines when we went shopping. They bought what they wanted/could afford, knew not to waste it on rubbish and learnt to save up several weeks for something they really want.
I then don't have to spend a fortune on them at Christmas/birthdays.
They're not interested in having phones and only the youngest goes to the cinema so I don't have a great deal I have to spend on them other than for essentials,

[Takver]

DD is 11 and gets £10 / month to cover everything (so eg when she goes on a school trip any pocket money she would want comes out of that, birthday presents for friends etc.) In practice it is more than enough so some goes into savings.

She also grows flowers and sells them by the bunch at the end of the driveway in summertime, but all that money she keeps separate and uses it to buy birdfood. Anyone with a large garden or allotment I can recommend it as an easy pocket money earner - she does a selection of annual flowers so they look pretty for us, and at 50p a bunch when she sells them they walk off the table :)

[Notmyidea]

dds have lloyds accounts for kids over 11. They have a debit card, access to phone banking, but no credit facility. They get a very small amount of interest. (saving for university we have separately which they have no knowledge of at this stage or access to. We're very pleased with it as a "learning exercise," lots of features but they can't get into trouble.
Regarding the sanitary protection; we established quite early on in puberty that dd was much less wasteful and extravagant with toiletries if she was paying. (she'd get dh and I to fork out for Impulse and fancy spot creams if we were paying. If she was Boots own became adequate! So we upped her pocket money and let her get on with it. Sanitary protection is an extension of that, although both girls are more comfortable quietly buying their own than having them tossed in the trolley on a supermarket trip with their dad along, too. They both started while still in junior school and are rather self concious about the whole thing.

[PareyMortas]

All of mine get £5 per week, they have chores to do to get it.

[WellHmmm]

My dc get 20p per year of life.
12 yr old gets £2.40 weekly,
9 yr old gets £1.80
Birthdays are exciting because they get a raise.
They know it's fair and doesn't change.
They do chores and we give them treats sometimes.

[WellHmmm]

They buy their friends presents, on £10 a month, takver ? What if there are 5 parties in a month. That's £2 a present and none for herself? How does that work?

[Takver]

WellHmmm - small school and people don't really do class parties - in practice it is maybe a birthday every couple of months tops, of which some are home made (not odd in our circle, big presents would be awkward anyway as people would then feel obliged to reciprocate). In practice dd never spends half her pocket money anyway. I'm sure this will change soon!

[cory]

£10/month in Yr 7 here, rising to £11 in Yr 8. But then he knows not to ask me for extra money for anything non-essential. No extra money for chores.

Traditional birthday parties with presents seem to have dried up by this age, so no longer an expense to worry about.

[GwendolineMaryLacey]

Goodness I was just debating giving my 5yo pocket money to combat the requests for magazines etc and was thinking £1 a week. Some of you don't give that to your 11yos.

Agree on the tampons too. Body spray is a frippery, surely tampons aren't

[chickydoo]

DS just 14 gets £10 a week
His Grandad also pays £15 a month in to his bank.
I top his phone up occasionally. Probably £10 every 2-3 months.

[AtiaoftheJulii]

My 12 year old ds gets, nominally, £25 per month, but the first 4 quid of that goes straight to WWF as he sponsors a tiger (this is something we have done with all our kids when they got to pocket money age). So £21 and he buys everything apart from clothes. He always has plenty of money - bought himself a Nexus 7 at Easter! - and buys birthday and Christmas presents from that too (3 sisters, parents, grandparents at Christmas), although we go halves on school birthday presents.

My older girls buy their own san pro - but I give them plenty of money with which to do so! They do also know that if they add some/razors/hair dye/etc to the weekly shop I won't refuse to buy it (but don't usually bother) and there are always pads in the bathroom for emergencies. I always bought my own tampons and feel like I possibly felt free to experiment with different types because of that. I don't see it's an issue if the girl has the money for it.

[DowntonTrout]

I'm sorry, I don't get the sanitary product thing either. Even though you have explained your reasoning, surely they just get added to the weekly/monthly shop. It's not something to encourage them to scrimp on, like other toiletries/ cosmetics. Especially with tampons, which could be dangerous if they're not changed often enough.

[somethingscary]

£1/month/year of age. We pay for phone (£5/month) & trips out with us & clothes.

[Dancergirl]

Thanks for all your replies. Quite a big range! But I suppose it depends on what you expect it to cover.

I was thinking I might give dd £10 per month. To include - non-essential drinks/snacks at school and then whatever she wants to spend or save. We pay for her phone - £7.50/month. I'm not sure about friends presents though - at the moment she doesn't go to a lot of birthday parties so would it be reasonable to expect her to pay for the occasional present out of her money?

[Dancergirl]

Also, forgot to add, I buy everyday toiletries - shampoo, conditioner etc - all my dds use the same one so I include it in the shopping. And yes I pay for her san pro!

[Dancergirl]

Also, forgot to add, I buy everyday toiletries - shampoo, conditioner etc - all my dds use the same one so I include it in the shopping. And yes I pay for her san pro!

[ConsiderablyBiggerBuns]

My DD(12) end of year 7 gets £20 a month and I also pay for a monthly phone contract at ~£10 a month. She only gets the cash on completion of a number of chores every month including looking after a variety of outdoor animals which involve her getting up very early in all weathers which she is very good about (and saves me some minutes in bed). She does, however, have to have tidied her bedroom at least once a month to get any of her pocket money (apart from the phone). She got her first pocket money for 2013 last month!