In my family, we use Bomad quite regularly during shopping trips. The kids drop some items into the cart, typically a soft drink or a chocolate bar, and after I’ve paid I quickly run through the receipt and deduct the items in Bomad.

It saves a lot of nagging. I really don’t want to play judge and arbitrarily decide whether they can have a chocolate bar on a particular day according to my mood. That’s what their allowance is for. 

I do, however, push back when they want to buy too much junk food. If they insist, I tell them they should have brought their own money with them. Almost always they will have forgotten, which is another advantage of the Bomad system.

Of course I don’t Bomad everything. Michelle asked me at the store the other day if she could get Fruit Loops for breakfast. Not a breakfast food I would endorse. I could see that she was dreading the answer “You’ll have to Bomad it”. I decided to let it slip through 🙂

It also helps if you and your spouse are on the same page about what kids should pay for themselves. Julia is generally more lenient. Last week I spotted some cookies in the cart as we checked out. She told me that they were “for the house”. 

"Nonsense!" I responded. I knew that Andrew was behind it and that he would scarf them in one sitting that night. I reminded her that we give them a pretty big allowance, so she relented. She’s pretty much on board with the system these days, but I suspect there's still some mischief that goes on behind my back.

. I’ve put the receipt in my pocket with the intention of doing it later - very easy to forget. And it’s also hard to remember which child bought what.

Flipping it around

In few days ago in Dubai, Michelle wanted to spend some of her local cash at the supermarket before we left. I tagged along because I wanted to buy an avocado.

While we were standing in the checkout queue, I asked her if she would Bomad the avocado for me. She refused at first, but when it came time to pay, she offered. I think she got a kick out of the reversal, and keeping me on edge 🙂 

I checked afterwards to see if she understood what it all meant. I asked “Didn’t you get ripped off when you paid for my avo?”. “No,” came the reply, “you added it back into my Bomad”. Nice. She gets it.