Is this fair - contribution to household

[Dobbycraft]

We've had the arrangement for a while and I've always been happy with it, but a family member seemed shocked and thought it was unfair and now I'm questioning it.

We put £3200 in to the joint account each month to cover the mortgage, all household bills, food and family expenses and any left over goes in to family savings. (Neither of us have ever wanted to put it all in to one pot, we like having personal money)

Person A:
Works full time, take home pay varies between £3000-£3500 per month.
Puts £2200 in to the joint account each month.

Person B:
Works 3 days (plus 2 days at home with a toddler) take home pay is around £1350.
Puts £1000 in to the joint account each month.

Is this pretty fair considering neither person is wanting to put it all in one pot?

Too many ‘all depends’. What does person A do with their extra spare cash? Does person B have enough?
Fair would be to take say 500 each for personal money then put the rest in the shared pot.

If you are happy with it, it is irrelevant what we think. I don’t have a joint account with my husband so in mn terms, this is unreasonable.
The lower earner is putting a larger % of their wages in but they contribute (financially) less than half what their partner does. Swings and roundabouts.

I think person A should put in a bit more and person B a bit less. Person A makes just slightly less than 3x what person B makes, so they should put about 3x more, right now they’re only putting just over 2x. This would leave person B with a more equitable amount of personal spending each month.

Personally I think person is being shafted. But if they're happy with it so be it.

Sorry that should say person B is being shafted.

Doesn’t seem very fair

Why on earth do you tell people your business? If it suits you both it doesn't matter what anyone else thinks. If you're person B and you don't have enough spending money, talk to person A!

Person B earns should deduct the 2 days childcare costs they are saving the family. Otherwise they're working 5 days ( or possibly more?) for £350 a month while person A has £800 -1300. Not fair.

Interesting.

Person B does feel like they have enough money each month. Sometimes they use it all, sometimes they put £300 in to savings if they've had a particularly boring month! They've also managed to save about £10k in the last 5 years or so.

Person A spends more each month, they have more expensive hobbies/interests. They also have a similar amount of savings.

Personal savings will likely be mostly pooled at some point in the future for house/family things.

Pre babies we both worked full time and put 80% of wages in to the joint account (that still left person A with more as their full time pay was higher) and this arrangement is just under 75% for both of us if you use A's basic wage.

To the person who asked why we would discuss it with anyone, it's a close family member who we are very comfortable with and talk to about everything. Didn't even cross my mind that it was odd.

My take is that £3200 is a huge amount of family expenses for a family of 3 without ft childcare! How much of that is going into savings each month?

Also person B isn't technically saving any childcare costs as they would be able to use free hours to cover Thursday and Friday if they went back to work full time. They just want to spend time with their child

Usually around £400

Where does little ones costs come from? New clothes, activities, lunches out? Ime it's usually the lower wage parent with less disposable income financing the child's life so their ACTUAL personal money is even less

Any spending for them comes out of the joint account apart from the odd thing here and there

If everyone is happy then I don't think it's anyone else's business. Assume that you are married and have equal rights to savings and any other assets?

Yes, we are. The person questioning it is from a very much one pot marriage and just assumed that's what everyone did so was quite shocked

Ideally should be a percentage of incomes but same here, it's split almost into half and I earn 1000 less a month than DH. Bone of contention, I could work full time but erm no I can't anymore as I became flexible to fit around his job to be able to take DC with SEN to school and back?

I think there’s a lot of ‘it depends’ in writing it’s not fair, person B should get more.
But if person A works a stressful job 50 hours a week and person B works 15 hours a week in a stress free job then person A should have more.

£4350 in the pot
£3200 for bills (ridiculous imo!)

£1150 left

if you work similar level of job where work stays at work and similar hours when you include childcare/house keeping then it should be £575 a month each. If person A brings home another £500 that should be 50/50 as well.

Is an equal amount being contributed into both pension pots?

How is £3200 ridiculous for bills? Our mortgage is £1500, council tax nearly £300, gas and electric £200+ that's £2k without wrap around care, any clubs and activities, commuting, groceries, running a car (we only have one and own it outright) , insurances, phones/broadband, house maintenance (so far on the last year we've had to repair the chimney, replace both bay windows, dishwasher blew up).
We easily spend that.

I guess it's do you think it's fair one person had perhaps a £1000 to indulge on hobbies and personal spending and the other has £350?
I'd want us both to have similar amounts of personal money but it's what ever works for your family 😊

But to answer your question OP no it's not fair, you are a partnership and contribute equally to a family, you should both have the same amount of disposable income

£3200 isn't just bills it's mortgage, bills, food, take aways, meals out, expenses for 2 dogs, expenses for a toddler, their weekly classes, clothes etc, things like birthday and Christmas presents. Basically anything that isn't just for us. I only use my account for things like my clothes, make up, if I go out with friends etc.

Pension pot isn't equal, 16% of our gross pay each per month, so that's higher for A as the higher earner. We obviously hope to still be married when we retire and I'm sure will re-assess the situation at some point before then (at least 30 years away!)

We don't have any childcare costs so you could say that person B is choosing to work less as we could use funded hours for those 2 days, although their days off are often more stressful than their days at work!

Yes I agree I don't think it's ridiculous for all family spending! We do usually save some of it as well