Back in February, my daughter Michelle got some money from family members for her 10th birthday. They each transferred the money to my wife’s bank account. We then created an account in Bomad called “Birthday money” and credited it to Michelle there:

In total, she got £196, which is about $250.

We took her to visit the Harry Potter theme park as a birthday surprise. She bought some pretty cool Harry Potter merch there:

She spent around £50. Although this is quite a bit, I was fine with it. I think the family would be happy to know that she really enjoyed spending the money like this.

Later she moved some of it to her debit card and spent it on candy, soft drinks, etc. That was around £13. No problem.

Then - and she did this without any prompting from me - she topped-up her Bitcoin savings account:

She first sent £25, then moved £10 back, then put another £20 into it. I think it’s because she was trying to hit the goal balance of £50 but her math was a bit off 😂. I bought the Bitcoin for her, then deducted the money from the account.

And I gave myself a pat on the back for raising such a financially responsible young lady.

But little did I know that things were about to go downhill in a big way. School started at the end of April and she managed to blow £90 over the next month! Every few days I would get a Bomad request on my phone asking me to do a small transfer to her debit card:

I know these small amounts get spent mostly on trinkets and junk food when she goes downtown with her friends. After the 5th or 6th request, I called her and asked her to slow down. She agreed, but I pressed further and told her that I might deny the next request. She fell silent and then responded defiantly “But it’s my money!”

She was right, so I backed off. She had agreed to slow down, that was enough.

But she didn’t really slow down, and I reluctantly processed a few more transfers for her, each one purportedly the last.

Things came to a bit of a head on Sunday afternoon when she wanted another £3.50, and proceeded to chase me for it:

I bet you’re thinking I said no. Well, I was very tempted to, but I recognised that we were in this mess because I’d failed to sit down with her and help her properly plan what she should do with her birthday money. My frustration wasn’t an excuse to be nasty. And it was only £3.50. So I did the transfer.

The sad conclusion is that of the original £196, she now has only £12 left. She didn’t save any of it, and only bought £35 worth of Bitcoin. I missed a very good opportunity to help her get her investments properly off the ground.

I’ll do better next time. I’ll still create a separate birthday account like this, but we’ll sit together very soon after and move the money to separate spending, saving and investment accounts. And then we’ll close the birthday money account, with no nibbling at it over time like this.

Lesson learned.

Last minute update

While I was finalizing this post, I received yet another transfer request for £5:

Having had some time to reflect, I decided to call her. I explained that she only had £12 left, and that her days of living high on the hog were numbered. She understood. She decided that she still wanted me to transfer the £5, but that she would save the remaining £7.

I was surprised. I expected her to want to spend the whole £12. I warned her that I would object if she tried to “unsave” this money, but she was undeterred. I couldn’t help but feeling proud of her once again.

I talked her through closing this pesky “Birthday money” account and now she’s back to living within the means of her weekly allowance:
 

All’s well that ends well 🙂