Handling Children And Chores
AdventureDad | July 27Having children do chores around the house and learn a little bit about finance is important. Many parents like to combine the two and reward kids financially for chores like a clean room, homework, mowing the lawn, and doing laundry. There is an online service, PAYjr, that offers to keep track of children’s chores, send regular status notifications, and award the kids money when tasks are completed.
Is this the way we should do things now and in the future? How do you handle chores in your family?
A quick summary of what PAYjr offers can be found on their site:
The PAYjr Chore & Allowance Management System allows parents to assign and monitor the progress of Chores which can be scheduled for completion on a weekly, monthly, or on a one-time basis. The Chores are assigned on a certain date and Email Alerts may be sent to the parent when the Chore needs approval, or when they are completed. The child may also receive Email Alerts when the Chore needs to be redone, or when there has been a Payment made.
What you do as a parent is to sign up, log in, and start picking chores with a due date and financial reward. Chores can be a one time event or daily stuff like setting the table for dinner. Alerts and approvals can be handled via email and a parent can at any time log in to see status of assigned chores. The setup is easy and straight forward.
This way of keeping track of chores might be a great idea for some. But I don’t think it’s a solution that fits my family for two reasons. First, I don’t think simple everyday chores should be big deal and certainly not connected to financial rewards. Second, handling chores this way seems impersonal, almost like a way of not having to interact with the kids personally.
PAYjr can of course also be used in keeping track of chores without any financial rewards. This might be a good idea for someone who isn’t organized, has a busy lifestyle, and/or prefers to manage tasks via computer.
I did not grow up in a strict family and chores were never an issue. In my family we never looked at everyday things as chores. It was never even discussed that my room shouldn’t be too messy, I should walk and feed the dog, clear my table, mow the yard, shovel now in the winter, and wash the car.
I can’t ever remember feeling my parents asking me to do something unreasonable at home. If anything, they could have been more strict. Doing laundry, ironing, and vacuuming the house was not something I really had to do before moving to my own place.
My parents started early with a small weekly or monthly allowance which could be spent any way I preferred. But I’m kind of glad they didn’t give me credit for chores done. Starting off early in this direction might have given me the wrong idea about work ethic and family values. I believe people in a family should help each other out and not expect a financial reward for stuff done around the house. That’s definitely something I’m teaching my kids.
Communication with children about chores via email might suit some but I prefer the old fashioned verbal way despite being a huge techie. I’m sure I will email them as they get older but not about seemingly obvious things like helping out in the kitchen or putting away the laundry. Most fathers spend WAY too little time with their children and I don’t think the email option will help.
One thing PAYjr does which I really like is introducing debit cards at an early age. I’m a huge supporter of letting my kids manage their own money early on. A debit card means lots of freedom and responsibility for the kids and no risk for parents.
Mistakes and silly purchases will be made but I think it’s a great way to learn. As you know, people in general have huge problems handling credit cards responsibly. Debit cards is a good way to learn some valuable (and cheap) life lessons about money before they become too costly.
I just wanted to make you aware of that fact that the PAYjr system supports managing chores whether they are attached to financial rewards or not. We’ve designed the system to work for parents regardless of how they manage chores. The system is also not designed to replace family communication; it is designed to facilitate the valuable conversations and is a tool to help parents to save time in the actual administration of chores and allowance. For instance, my wife no longer needs to write out a new chore chart each week, the PAYjr system stores chores so my wife can just print a new chart each week. We are also adding a savings program and a charity/giving program to the system in the near future to help teach kids those aspects of money management as well.
Please understand that we at PAYjr are simply trying to provide tools for parents to help with the topic of allowances and chores, and we are not trying to replace family values and communication with technology.
The other important thing we are trying to help with is giving teens hands-on experience with debit cards (not credit cards). Credit card debt continues to be a huge issue and we need to teach our teens to use plastic in a parentally controlled environment because it is inevitable that they will have plastic when they become young adults. You can learn more about our teen program at www.PAYjrVisaBuxx.com.
Thank you for write up.
Dave Jones
CEO of PAYjr
I just wanted to make you aware of that fact that the PAYjr system supports managing chores whether they are attached to financial rewards or not. We’ve designed the system to work for parents regardless of how they manage chores. The system is also not designed to replace family communication; it is designed to facilitate the valuable conversations and is a tool to help parents to save time in the actual administration of chores and allowance. For instance, my wife no longer needs to write out a new chore chart each week, the PAYjr system stores chores so my wife can just print a new chart each week. We are also adding a savings program and a charity/giving program to the system in the near future to help teach kids those aspects of money management as well.
Please understand that we at PAYjr are simply trying to provide tools for parents to help with the topic of allowances and chores, and we are not trying to replace family values and communication with technology.
The other important thing we are trying to help with is giving teens hands-on experience with debit cards (not credit cards). Credit card debt continues to be a huge issue and we need to teach our teens to use plastic in a parentally controlled environment because it is inevitable that they will have plastic when they become young adults. You can learn more about our teen program at www.PAYjrVisaBuxx.com.
Thank you for write up.
Dave Jones
CEO of PAYjr
We handle chores as a family obligation and make allowance a separate matter. The 2 things I’ve learned are 1) once every kid has learned to do each chore, I’m not in favor of rotating the chores unless the kids want to. That way, if the table isn’t set, and Drew always sets the table, I know who to yell for.
Second, as you pointed out, with the allowance, you have to hold your tongue when they buy something that seems weird and cheap to you as a parent. If it’s the kid’s $, it must be his decision how to spend it. I hold my tongue a lot.
I have 2 young boys. The computer thing doesn’t work in with our kids. We tried some charts, but the boys lost interest very quickly. Last year my sons teacher had an “appreciation station” in his classroom, where they get tokens to put into a treasure chest when they do any number of things. I know my son got so excited when he got a token and so I asked her where she got it and she gave me the site and I ordered it and it’s very flexible and works well with both our boys. They do what we ask them to and we’ve continued to add stuff to their list. I think seeing the treasure chest everyday is their reminder and we have a rule- if we have to ask or remind, you still have to do it, but no token. It’s pretty cool. Their site is www.theappreciationstation.com
I was brought up with the punishment method and I can tell you it’s nice not to yell. PS: We don’t rotate chores either, some people are just better at certain things. To me, that would be like rotating jobs at work, no thanks.