Help. How to handle this situation from my daughter?

[Bamaman]

I long ago quit carrying any cash, and everyone in the family knows it. Whenever the youngsters hit me up for money, my set answer is "I carry no cash, and never will." If any cash outlay is warranted, I get cash back at the grocery store and give it to them. We spend a whole lot less petty cash when there's no money in the house to spend.

In my retirement, watching credit cards and ATM accounts is almost like a part time job. There are often unauthorized transactions charged to us that must be dealt with. My wife is frugal, but E-Commerce and ordering Amazon simply gets away from you.

Take the young lady off the credit card and put her on a cash basis.

 

[mystang52]

She seems like a good kid, maybe there was some peer pressure where she didn't know how to restrict her friends' purchases, and she wasn't given explicit limits. Lesson learned for both of you. My vote is to just move on, and definitely do not ask her to pay anything back.

 

[JoeWras]

Wow, life is getting complicated. "Return Gift"

It used to be you go to a wedding and get a matchbook in return. These days, you get a small quasi-useful gift and takeaway box full of goodies.

I didn't know it spread to kids birthday parties. Judging by the 8mm film of my 1 yr old B-day party, the return gift I saw was a lot of quality booze for the adults.

But anyway, when you look up the concept on the internet, it frequently is defined like this:

A Return gift is a wonderful token of appreciation to thank your guests for gracing the occasion and it also serves as a memento of your Birthday Party, making the selection of an appropriate return gift an extremely important task.
Essentially, a return gift is a token of appreciation.

The token memento in this case was a shopping spree at a high end outlet. Quite a token that is!

Lessons learned all around...

 

[athena53]

OP, agree with the posts above regarding setting a limit going forward. I can see the pressure from your daughter’s perspective. You mentioned that she’s quiet and didn’t have many friends. All she’s trying is to “fit in” and have her circle of friends. Teenage is a tough phase and my 2 cents would be to be to put yourself in her shoes while slowly educating her on the budget. Once she figures out her comfort zone in the circle, I am sure she will find her balance and voice to draw the boundaries. I would consider this incident as water under the bridge while keeping an eye on future spending trends.

This struck me, too- it's classic "people-pleasing" behavior, which has always been a bad habit of mine. Maybe she was uncomfortable saying "no". It's something she has to learn or there are people who will walk all over her. What motivated the friends to choose a high-end clothing store and then go wild? It makes me wonder what kind of friends they are.

 

[socca]

I had a summer internship at Ericsson AB in Stockholm when I was a kid (OK, around 19). Grandpa handed me a credit card before the internship and said "have fun". One long weekend just for fun I flew from Stockholm up to Kiruna, took the train over to Narvik, and then played around in the Lofoten Islands - all on grandpa's dime. Ahhh ... to be young again with an unlimited expense account! I couldn't tell if he was angry about my extravagance because he was naturally grouchy. Anyway, as others have said setting limits in advance is probably a good thing.

 

[Act2]

What a great opportunity to talk with your daughter about how unexpressed expectations can create issues! Financially and in dating relationships and friendships, one party can have one understanding while another can have an entirely different understanding and neither speaks up or confirms with the other. And then ….. things happen.

 

[SJhawkins]

She seems like a good kid, maybe there was some peer pressure where she didn't know how to restrict her friends' purchases, and she wasn't given explicit limits. Lesson learned for both of you. My vote is to just move on, and definitely do not ask her to pay anything back.

This,

Being a teen today is a tough gig. Think the end goal is to keep an open 2 way lane of respect and trust, sounds like you have that, as every parent knows this is not an easy task at times.

 

[ITTN]

You are probably right. It becomes a question of who has that type of cash lying around in the house to give to a teenager .

But watching you hand over bills to pay for something definitely makes a difference. When our 2 oldest kids were in grade school in the early 1990s, they wanted to buy a Nintendo game system with birthday gift money. DW and I took them to the store to pick out a system and had them hand over their money. The look on their faces was interesting. And they have taken better care of that Nintendo system than any other toy they had - it still works today.

Reminds me of a story about a guy I worked with, his wife wanted new flooring. She told him because he would be doing the installation himself she felt the $60 a square yard price wasn't bad. She went to work, he went to the bank. When she returned home she changed her mind when she saw that in the area she wanted the new flooring he had taped down 3 twenties at every square yard.

 

[JustCurious]

My teenaged daughter recently had a birthday. As a "treat", she was told to take her friends out to a movie, lunch and to get them "return gifts" afterward.

I think it was a mistake to tell her to buy gifts for her friends without giving her a spending limit.

 

[JustCurious]

Take the young lady off the credit card and put her on a cash basis.

A teenager with cash? She would be ostracized.

 

[PaunchyPirate]

I also have never heard of a "return gift" and after reading this thread, I still find it hard to believe there is such a thing. We don't do this where I come from.

OP, it sounds like you handled it by the actions in your second paragraph. Move on and perhaps remind her of her responsibilities for future spending on the card.

 

[Sue J]

I’ve never heard of a “return gift.” Is that like a party favor or goody bag? Thanks for coming to my party, here’s a little something to take home with you.

The OP didn’t give her age. If she is under 14 or so then she didn’t understand the concept of value - the movie, snacks, lunch vs the cost of the high end store purchases. If she is older than that I think her friends took advantage of her and Dad’s credit card.

I’m curious what the friends parents thought of the expensive gifts? Or are they older teenagers (out of high school?) whose parents may not see these things? If my school aged kid came home with a new expensive item I’d be asking questions.

I reread the original post. If she is buying textbooks it sounds like she is college age.

Time to get her off your credit card and she should open her own checking account with a debit card using her own funds. If she has a need like textbooks, etc you can transfer some money to her account ahead of time.

I understand wanting to protect your daughter from life’s bumps with access to your credit card. But she will learn much more from handling life’s bumps with her own money. In a true emergency you are a phone call or text away.

Those friends took advantage of her and her Dad. And I bet they giggled about it in the way home. Out of three young ladies, no one thought this was out of bounds?

 

[dixonge]

So people come to a party, bring you a gift, and then you in turn give *them* a gift 'in return' -- do I have this right?

This seems to devalue the thing being celebrated (a birthday, in this case) and make it just a gift exchange. And in this particular case, the return gift was 4-5X the value of the original gift!

IMHO, the OP needs to contact these girls' parents and have a come-to-jesus meeting.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

I looked up return gifts and it seem like most of the examples were what we would have called party or wedding "favors" - small, token gifts, like small plants or candles.

 

[Exchme]

This is on you. You should have set limits ahead of time, arming your daughter with a speech about, "My folks said you could pick your own gift, but keep it under $30". Since you set no limit and gave no guidance, you can't be too hard on her or even ask her to pay it back, that would be punishing her for your mistake.

That said, your daughter's "friends" had to realize the gift prices they picked out were inappropriately large. Also seems like there should have been a "my folks are going to kill me" moment when your daughter was using the card for high priced items; maybe she's trying too hard to fit in.

I don't like your daughter's friends very much and would keep an eye out as to whether taking advantage of your daughter is a pattern.

 

[pacergal]

jeez, with friends like that, who needs enemies?
Sounds like your daughter certainly was taken advantage of by her "friends".

I would write this off as lesson learned. Good for you and DD to sit down and discuss some finances along with limit setting.
I also agree it's time for her to get her own debit card and bank account with her part time job. You can always add funds to her account as needed for textbooks, etc. At the time of need. Otherwise, it's her budget, her dime that gets spent.

 

[Time2]

I might be tempted to bring the girls in and explain how they not only took advantage of your daughter but they took advantage of you, and you are pissed that they would do such a thing! Let them know what they did and how wrong it was.

 

[daylatedollarshort]

Kids need friends and shy kids especially need friends, even if they aren't the perfect friends. I wouldn't say anything to the other girls.

 

[JoeWras]

Kids need friends and shy kids especially need friends, even if they aren't the perfect friends. I wouldn't say anything to the other girls.

True now, true 50 years ago.

For us quiet types, we don't need mom blasting the friends or their parents.

Keep it in the family. Learn a lesson. This is not a big deal. It is a great way to learn a lot of things.

 

[ivinsfan]

I might be tempted to bring the girls in and explain how they not only took advantage of your daughter but they took advantage of you, and you are pissed that they would do such a thing! Let them know what they did and how wrong it was.

We don't know that actually happened do we. In fact OP never discussed a dollar amount with her DD so has a hand in this as well. Of the 3 parties involved none is innocent

 

[MarkiePippo]

Years ago a friend of mine gave her college age niece a credit card to cover emergencies. He did this because he himself had financial issues trying to stay in college. Well she goes and puts $500 on the card a few months in. He is surprised and wonders what could have been the emergency that cost $500. She says she just had to buy shoes! They were too cute to pass up. She no longer has the card.

 

[FLJim]

Wondering if "teen" daughter is 13 or 19? Six years difference also makes a big difference in how 13 vs. 19 girls "act". Early to mid-teens can't tell their friends NO. Eventually they (hopefully) will be honest and say/explain NO. SO many think 'no' means they will be ostracized.

 

[gayl]

Anna [16, very introverted with very few close friends] is an authorized user on my 2nd visa (limit 2k). She can use that for Door dash at home & digital pre-purchase tickets. Then she has a vanilla visa (reloadable prepay card) for when she goes to the movies with her friends. Usually has only about $100. That covers capacinos, snacks, and assorted small stuff. Problem solved

 

[Katsmeow]

The "return gifts" (which I've never heard of before) should probably have been nominal value below the cost of the gifts she received.

I do think you should have given her an upper limit for them. I'm sure you assumed they would be reasonably priced but you just can't assume things about kids and money.

As far as her being an authorized user I have had that experience with one of my kids. One kid when in college it was easier to add him as an authorized user since otherwise I was constantly having to transfer cash to him so he could buy X. Also if he used my credit card (versus me sending him cash) I could see that he was spending our money on the types of things that were authorized (to an extent anyway -- I could see where he spent although not the item).

I have set a limit on what he can spend. Look and see if you can do that. If not, put her on a card where you can do that.

That said, I think it is possible to learn boundaries and budgets without being an authorized user. You could theoretically give her $X and she could get a debit card and manage her own money and learn boundaries and budgets that way. How much does she learn about budgeting when she uses your credit card? Not much. Having a kid be an authorized user, IMO, is more about convenience for the parent and the child rather than the child learning much about money from it. Honestly, the credit card is just a fount of money for the child....

But -- if more convenient for her to be an authorized user, that is fine. Just be much more explicit about limits and try to set one on the card as well.

 

[meleana]

My teenaged daughter recently had a birthday. As a "treat", she was told to take her friends out to a movie, lunch and to get them "return gifts" afterward. I dropped her off at a local mall. Four hours later, I got a text alert from my bank for a total of $450. Lunch & movie for two friends and herself was around $100. The remaining $350 were "RETURN GIFTS", at $175 each. The girls all entered a high end clothing and make-up store and went on a shopping spree on my dime.

When I called her in utter panic, she says they wanted to pick their own return gifts and ran into the high end stores, picking up everything they wanted. My daughter did not think it was "bad", until I sat her down and gave her a stern lecture about how there's this thing called a "budget" and that $350 for return gifts was NOT being on a "budget". She says that she'll pay me back once she gets a job (she's hunting for a part-time job now). My point is not "pay back", but setting firm boundaries with other people - including family & friends - where money is concerned.

I really have NO idea how to handle this. She's been an authorized user on my card for 4 years now and I've never had this issue before. She's always been a responsible kid, only using the card to occasionally buy lunch and text books for her courses. She's also ALWAYS checked in with me with prices so this is really startling, on top of the fact that she was not assertive enough to speak up and SAY NO, insisting the "return gifts" not be more than what they each gave her --$25 or max $30.

How do I handle this? She's very quiet, not very social and has no other friends. I'm worried if I let this go now, these girls will start taking advantage of her every time they "hang out", especially now that they know that she has a credit card. I understand I can "revoke" her as an authorized user from my card but then she will not learn boundaries, budgeting on spending on friends etc.

Please help.

I never heard of this kind of thing. It’s her birthday but she buys them gifts? What the heck? Isn’t she the one supposed to receive gifts? What’s a return gift? I would never have allowed it in the first place.

I think before you to agree to things you need to work out the details ahead of time so there’s no misunderstanding.