For those of you with older kids at home, what do you do regarding dig money?
I’ve got an 18 year old and the agreement was that as long as he pitches in around the house (bins are his responsibility - emptying into the wheelie bins and putting out whichever one it is that week) and attends his college course then he can keep his money. He’s at college 2.5 days a week and then work for the rest, clearing around £900 a month.
The issue is he is always fucking “forgetting” to put the bins out. Even when I’ve bought him a fucking echo so he can set up reminders etc.
There’s myself, my wife and the 5 kids (10-18) so there’s a fuckton of rubbish. Missing it even once causes massive ballache. Thing is, he’s always forgetting.
Came to a head this morning because, once again, he forgot. This is after messaging me last night 15 minutes before he was due home asking to have someone stay, so I changed all my plans to accommodate. And the shit didn’t put the bins out again.
I feel like I’m going round in circles with him and it’s beginning to really affect me. Stressing to fuck over bins, what even is that!
Only thing I can think of is to start charging him dig money now. I’m sick bending over backwards for him not to pitch in with this one thing.
Does that seem reasonable? Or am I being a crabit bastard? What amounts are people taking from their weans etc here? Was thinking £100 since I easily spend more than that on keeping the lazy shit each month.
Edit to add - Dig Money meaning money he pays towards household expenses :)
He's old enough to be on his own, and almost to that point in his life. You've given him a considerable opportunity to get ahead in life and he doesn't recognize it because he's never had it anything but good.
Think about it this way, he's about to move out and probably get roommates. If he was in charge of that task for the household where he has roommates and then he causes them hardship every week, what do you think would happen? A good number of people would tell him he needs to move out and find somewhere else to live. You're not being unreasonable in your expectations of him. If you want to play hardball, tell him he needs to move out if he can't commit 6 minutes per week to help his entire family. You're giving him tons of help and it's wrong that he's just taking that and giving nothing in return.
If you're not going to play hardball (which is probably best) and he can't take care of the responsibility then he needs to pay someone else to do it. You don't want to do it. Right? Tell him to find a reliable business that offers that service and hire them. When he sees the financial cost of his laziness, he might decide he really needs to do it. The whole job takes like 3 minutes, twice a week, so it's preposterous that it's even an issue.
I liked another idea that another poster had of charging him $50 per week and then reducing his rent by that much if he does the job. But then you're still in the situation where you have to babysit him every week or he causes you hardship. These are the types of arrangements you make with 12 year olds, not 18 year olds. So make him pay someone else to do it.
The best solution is probably to just give him other jobs instead of this one. Make him mop the floors, or clean the bathroom, or something that doesn't cause everyone problems if he's a day late. He'll probably be wishing for the glory days of trash duty when he's scrubbing a toilet.