How much monthly allowance do you give your teenager?

[mismomary]

Our eldest DD is 17 and in sixth form. Last year we started her on a monthly allowance but it's not working. She's really down about money, says she hasn't enough to buy Christmas presents for friends or clothes. We give her £80pm and pay for phone, gym, and basic toiletries. (Rule is if Tesco stock it she can have it). Clothes I buy the basics.

She's been trying to get a job but struggling, has applied to local pubs and supermarkets etc.

I'm starting to think we have got this allowance totally wrong and she should be on more like £200pm or more. We can easily afford this but don't want to be over generous as want her to learn to budget and value money etc But perhaps we've gone too far the other way.

I'd be grateful to know what you give. Maybe we are way off!!

Dd is predicted AAB in a levels and has volunteering in her cv etc yet couldn’t get interviews applying online when she was 15/16. We ended up helping her write a letter to go with her cv and she went and handed it in in person to a couple of places, planning to do more the following weekend but the first place called get and offered her a trial. She’s worked there for 2 years now on weekends. Her cv was no different online but she wasn’t getting anywhere. It’s a very different environment to when I was a teen and working at 14.

Our 16 year old has £100 a month spending money and £60 a month dinner money, he does have a part time job but it is a zero hours contract so doesn't work every week, he has the option to work for the family business for extra pay if he wants to. We pay for his phone, the gym is free, we pay for his haircut and most of his clothes but he will buy his own if he is out shopping, he buys presents etc out of his own money. He is currently saving for driving lessons so we are happy to help out where we can in the meantime.

You are aware that it's not really exam results they're interested in when applying for part time jobs, right?

Which is why i said plus volunteering on her cv. A 15 year old isn’t going to have a lot on their cv but a child getting good grades is part of the picture. Do you always try to be so condescending or just on this thread?

Seeing as you can afford it I'd up it to £150 a month.

My 15 year old gets £50 a month but phone & gym are paid for & i buy toiletries & clothes. Expensive items are biryhday and christmas (she wants a lulu lemon jacket but currently wears cheaper primark sets to the gym) or she can save. Make up she buys from that & it she wants her nails done (out wirh christmas / birthday) she pays as i’m not wasting £25 a month on that. Have thought recently probably need to up it but will probably just go to £60 after Christmas and £70 at 16. It’s hard though i never got that much as a teen but they also go out and have more access to things that we didn’t do they spend more 🤷‍♀️ i also had a cash in hand waitressing job at 15 & proper paid job in a supermarket at 16 so i’m hoping at 16 she’ll find something to be earning her own a bit

Getting jobs for under 18s is difficult round here as well, especially if they have out of school commitments eg sports to work round. Not many jobs available if you can’t work Saturdays due to matches etc. Most supermarkets want flexibility to work early stocking shifts and you can’t do that if under 18. We’re lucky here that a lot of seasonal jobs in the summer but Oct to Easter is really hard to find anything.

19yo DD got a debit card with parental control when she was underage.
We kept going with that.
She has €20 per week, no questions asked, for coffees etc. and a cushion of €100 for emergencies or one-off expenses. Plus €10 emergency cash in her phone case. Christmas and birthday money go on the card, too.
We review her expenses via the app on Sundays and I top it up.
It’s a good way of having freedom to spend but accountability once a week.

DC (lower sixth) get £60 per month, but annual travel pass, phone, basic clothing, normal bathroom toiletries, packed lunch covered by us. So the monthly allowance is really for discretionary clothes/gift shopping, socialising e.g. cinema, bubble tea or burgers out with friends. They don't get paid for chores - just expected to muck in as fully-functional residents of the household, so they do their share of laundry, cleaning, cooking. We haven't suggested a job, they are taking 4 A-levels and doing other extra-curricular stuff which leaves them very little spare time.

There really aren’t in some areas…

yes, I’m very passive aggressive when I find people rude and obnoxious. It’s definitely my go to. Glad you picked up on that - it was intentional.

Have you sat with her and asked where the 80 quid goes? Does it cover her bus fare ?

I can see that 20 quid for a teen would be gone very quickly in a week - is she buying snacks/ cinema/ going out with mates?

Don’t be a soft touch, of course they will happily take it if you provide it! It’s the necessary realisation that in order to get the things you want in life you have to make the money to pay for them.
Now is the perfect opportunity to get seasonal work for Christmas, lots of temporary waitressing work at hotels and babysitting opportunities. I know lots of Year 12 students landing their first jobs now.

I misread this - £80 a month is low. £50 a week is more reasonable- chores makes sense though

Mine gets £10 a week. I pay for phone, food, gym, bus pass, clothes. I've been tempted to increase but he isn't bothering to look for a job and I think it would do him good to have some work experience.

£50 p/m but pay for gym, phone, music, all college related expenses, hair, most toiletries, most clothes, driving and often contribute to fun. Life is expensive though and their time is now; budgeting lessons are all around and I’d rather they had fun living their life than earn their money at home. They have just got a job and i don’t plan to reduce anything, I’d prefer her to have more to spend and save.

My dd is 17 and gets £240 a month but that has to pay for packed lunches, travel other than college and trips out etc. She would say I am very generous at Christmas but in reality I buy her things in the sales and during Black Friday that she needs for the rest of the year regardless, but at huge discounts. This last month or two I’ve got her 3 different colours pairs of air Jordan 4 trainers ( her special interest ) reduced from £640 to £360 and 2pairs of Ed hardy jeans and 3 Ed hardy tops for £120 and some urban outfitters jeans and 3 jumpers for £100. That’s her entire winter wardrobe and she will wear the jeans all through the year and next winter too.

My two are younger (14 & 12) but they only get £5 a week, so roughly £20 a month or just over. However we pay for pretty much everything for them - lunch is provided at school, we buy their uniform and clothes, pay for sports clubs, kit & training, I give them a bit of money for food if they go out with friends at the weekend or in the holidays, and we pay for their phone contracts. We also live in the middle of nowhere with no public transport so we drive them everywhere (or friends come to us). I have been thinking we might need to increase the amount but the trouble is one child is a saver and has hundreds of pounds in his piggy bank from birthdays and christmases, as well as hundreds on his card (which is where I add their £5 a week). Whereas the other child spends money straight away, so if I increased it for both of them he would just spend it and the other one would build up even more capital!

Mine aren’t particularly social so £20 a month for gaming and extra clothes. Plus they get money and vouchers for birthdays etc. We pay phones, clothes, cinema and extras if they go out. Once they are old enough for a job I will be encouraging that. I will give more for bus/food once college age but currently transport is free and I provide their lunches.

DS got £30 a week ten years ago when at sixth form and we paid for car insurance and let him use car once a week and we took train to work. It wasn’t quite enough but encouraged him to get a job. We paid for bus tickets weekly too until he started work. To be fair when he got a job in upper sixth I still paid him the money, until he was 21 as could afford it and just helped him out. He got a night time shift job at supermarket and would do Friday and Saturday nights and worked really hard. I think if you can bump it up a bit it would help her (but I paid on the basis that he did some chores and also did his own washing and to be fair he did do that, and he cooked tea once a week too),

Dd (15) gets £80 pm but extras like buying xmas presents at xmas markets or dinner with friends/boyfriend i would just pay for separately.

My youngest is just 18 and has never had more than £20 per month plus her phone paid for. She never went without but as a low income single parent that's all I could afford. She got her first little job at fourteen. What I have done is teach her to fish by paying for her to do the NPLQ and take her to her job until she had her motorbike. I paid for her first CBT and the first two years if insurance ( which is probably the same as the extra fuel I used). I will pay half of this years insurance as i feel that she should no be penalised for working hard. I will help out as much as I can for her first car etc. She earns on average £1k a month as she takes extra hours and is also training to be a swim teacher. She gets good grades at college too and dances a few hours a week still.
She wants to be a paramedic via the apprentiship route and will ideally train locally whilst living at home on the basis of not costing me anything so she is able to save for the future.
Sorry for waffle but I am so very proud of her, but what I am trying to say that by investing in her she the most independant young person I know.

My 14 year old gets 30 euros a month, which she works for by doing chores. But I do pay for extras when needed e.g. train ticket if she's travelling to the city, a tenner for food when she's eating out with her volleyball team after games (they eat at burger places so a tenner covers her meal alright) and give her the opportunity to earn more money by doing extra work (usually babysitting her little brother, and in the holidays she wants to do summer school with him for extra money). She mostly spends her money on clothes from Vinted (I buy most of her clothes but she buys extras herself), treats, and presents for friends, and its enough for that.
Its hard for teenagers to get jobs these days so can't just tell them to get a job if they want more money, so offering to pay them for working at home is a good compromise. My DD tried and failed to get a summer job last summer, she's going to try again next year but might fail again.

My 18yr old gets nothing. He is in uni but has a part-time job where he probably earns about £700 a month. He needs no money from us! We don't pay for his phone or anything like that either. Or clothes.

My 16yr old gets £80 a month, but that will be stopping as she's just secured her first steady weekend job too. She'll probably earn £250 a month from it, pkus she babysits twice a month for a family who pay her £60 each time. We will continue to pay for her phone and things like school trips, but otherwise she will manage her money for socialising, clothes, make up etc.

My 14yr old gets £50, but as of Jan she'll get £80. We probably indulge her more with the odd tenner as she has no way of earning outside us, but we make her do jobs for it.