In the past when I’ve written about pocketmoney a few people have comment that they don’t give their children pocketmoney because they give them money when they need it and buy them treats etc through the week.
I kind of understand that although I’m not sure what that teaches children about budgeting but it wouldn’t work for us because Miss Frugal especially would be constantly asking for money to do this and that and there’s no way I’d buy some of the things that she chooses to save up for with her money (a £15 MAC lipstick is her recent purchase).
Rocking her MAC lipstick 😉
We recently increased her pocketmoney to £10 a week which is similar to what most of her friends get each week and on top of that we pay for her phone and movie club each week. We also pay for anything essential for school and all clothes and shoes – anything else she needs to pay for herself!
The money is automatically transferred to her Go Henry account every Saturday morning and it’s up to her what she does with it from there. The Go Henry app is amazing as I have a parents app to go with it and I can see how much she has, where she’s spent and even how much she’s saving. I wrote about it in more detail here if you’re interested.
We don’t make her save a set amount but we do say that she needs to save for more expensive purchases as we don’t give her advances of her pocketmoney! There’s a section in the app where she can move money to a savings ‘pot’ and anything in there can’t be spent unless she goes in to the app and moves it back to her normal balance.
I think that by making her spend her own money on non-essentials, she considers her purchases more. A belief that’s been reinforced this morning by a text conversation we’ve just had….
I messaged her to let her know about a bargain I’d seen in Tesco and she messaged back immediately to tell me to buy the Sharpies but when I told her that she would need to buy them if she wanted them she messaged me to say that she didn’t want them after all.
Funny that!
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