The FamZoo Blog

Suckered by a Semi-Sketchy Site — Now What?

2026-05-30T14:57:58.282-07:00

You see a promotion on social media.

You click through and make the purchase.

Then you have second thoughts about the site.

It’s semi-sketchy.

It’s not a clear-cut case of straight-up phishing fraud where your money vanishes into the ether without a trace. There’s an actual website with featured products, legal terms of service, and even a prominently displayed support contact.

So, what’s the sketchy part?

After your initial purchase, you start to notice other charges hitting your card that you don’t recognize. Some might be one-off charges for odd amounts. Others might look like recurring subscription charges. Even stranger, the charges may come from merchant names that are different from the original site, but somehow have a similar vibe.

We’re seeing this pattern more and more: online merchants that operate in a gray area of legitimacy.

They may sell real products or services, but they also lean heavily on dark e-commerce patterns that can lead to charges you never thought you approved. Common examples include expedited shipping charges, VIP memberships, “free trial” subscriptions, product protection plans, discount clubs, or other add-ons buried in fine print, pre-checked boxes, confusing checkout screens, or obscure terms.

The charges live in the murky middle: technically defended by the merchant, but presented in a way that no ordinary customer would describe as clear, fair, or obvious.

How do these sites stay in business?

If you research these companies, you’ll often find complaints about them on Reddit, consumer forums, Trustpilot, or the Better Business Bureau.

So why don’t they get shut down?

Our guess is that the legal terms and active support function are a big part of the playbook. Somewhere in the terms of service, checkout flow, confirmation email, or support page, the merchant can usually point to language that says you agreed to the charge. They also typically provide billing-support instructions, including a phone number or email address for refund requests.

That gives the merchant a response when customers, card networks, regulators, or complaint sites come calling:

“We disclosed it.”

“We have a cancellation policy.”

“We offer customer support.”

“We refund customers who contact us.”

We have called several of these gray-area companies ourselves while researching disputed charges. Often, the support operation is outsourced to a third party. In fact, we reached the same representative, “Rene”, at an outsourced support firm while researching charges from two different gray-area sites.

In both cases, Rene agreed to refund the disputed charges, and we confirmed that the funds were returned to the cards a few business days later.

That doesn’t make the pattern OK.

But it does suggest a practical first move: contact the merchant directly, document everything, and be ready to escalate if they do not resolve the issue quickly.

What should you do?

If you or a family member runs into unexpected charges from a gray-area merchant, here’s a good step-by-step response.

1. Lock the card immediately.

Lock the card as soon as you see suspicious, unexpected, or unrecognized charges. That helps prevent additional purchase attempts while you figure out what happened.

This is where real-time activity alerts are especially helpful. If you know about the first strange charge right away, you can lock the card before the pattern snowballs.

2. Identify the merchant behind the charge.

Look closely at the transaction description. The merchant descriptor often includes a website, support phone number, or clue about the billing company.

If the descriptor is unclear, copy and paste it into an online search along with keywords like refund, cancel, subscription, billing, or support.

Be careful with sponsored search results and lookalike sites. You want the legitimate billing-support contact for the merchant that charged you, not a scammer pretending to help with refunds.

3. Gather your evidence.

Before you call or email the merchant, collect the basics:

The transaction dates.
The transaction amounts.
The merchant descriptors shown in your card activity.
The original purchase confirmation, if you have it.
Any emails or text messages from the merchant.
Screenshots of the checkout page, support page, cancellation page, refund policy, or terms if you can still access them.
Notes about who made the original purchase and what they believed they were buying.

You’ll want enough information to explain the problem clearly and support a dispute later if the merchant refuses to cooperate.

4. Contact the merchant’s billing support.

Find the merchant’s official instructions for resolving billing issues. Then contact support. Calling and talking to a human is best.

Use a calm, firm script like this:

Hello, this is [NAME]. I’m calling about charges from [MERCHANT/BILLING DESCRIPTOR] on my card. I recognize the original purchase, but I do not recognize or believe I authorized the additional charges on [DATES] for [AMOUNTS]. I’d like you to refund those charges and cancel any subscription, membership, trial, shipping plan, VIP club, discount plan, or other recurring billing arrangement associated with this card. I’m calling to give you a chance to resolve this directly before I contact my card issuer about disputing the charges and requesting chargebacks.

That last phrase matters.

No need to yell. No need to bluff. No need to make threats.

But the word “disputing” — and, if necessary, “chargeback” — signals that you understand your next step if the merchant does not resolve the issue directly.

A chargeback is a consumer-protection process that allows a cardholder to dispute certain transactions through the card program. The merchant then has to respond through the card network process if it wants to defend the charge.

Merchants prefer to avoid chargebacks when they can resolve the issue directly. That is why a clear, calm refund request can work surprisingly well with gray-area merchants who are particularly keen on staying off the scrutiny radar.

5. Be careful about what information you provide.

The support representative may ask for information to locate the charge.

It is reasonable to provide:

The first and last name of the cardholder.
The transaction dates.
The transaction amounts.
The merchant descriptor.
The first 6 digits and last 4 digits of the card number.

Do not provide the full card number, security code, PIN, Social Security number, or account login credentials.

If the representative says they need any of those more sensitive items, stop and contact FamZoo instead.

6. Confirm cancellation and refund details.

Do not stop at “we’ll take care of it.”

Ask the support representative to confirm:

Which charges will be refunded.
The total refund amount.
Whether all subscriptions, memberships, trials, shipping plans, clubs, or recurring billing arrangements have been cancelled.
The expected timing of the refund.
The confirmation number, ticket number, or cancellation number.
Whether you will receive written confirmation by email.

Write down the date, time, representative’s name, and what they promised.

If you receive an email confirmation, save it.

7. Watch for the credit.

Refunds often take a few business days to post.

If the support representative promised a refund, monitor your card activity for the credit. While you wait, keep the card locked except when you need it for normal purchases.

8. Contact FamZoo.

If the merchant refuses to refund the charges, gives you the runaround, or the promised credit does not appear after a few business days, contact FamZoo and ask about disputing the charges.

Send us the transaction dates, amounts, merchant descriptors, and a brief explanation of what happened. Also share the steps you already took with the merchant, including any refund refusal, cancellation confirmation, or broken refund promise.

We’ll help review the situation and determine the next dispute steps.

9. Replace the card.

Finally, contact us to replace the card.

Even if the merchant refunds the money, you still have good reason not to trust them. You don’t know how carefully they handle card data, who their vendors are, or whether your card information could be misused later.

Replacing the card gives you a clean break.

Refunds to the original card number will still successfully post to the replacement card, as long as the new card is a strict replacement tied to the same underlying card account as opposed to a separate additional card. Ask us if you are unsure about the distinction.

Gray-area merchants thrive in the gap between “obviously legitimate” and “obviously fraudulent.”

They may sell real products. They may have legal terms. They may answer the phone. They may even issue refunds when challenged.

But if they rely on confusing checkout flows, buried subscriptions, surprise add-ons, and customers who give up easily, they are not merchants you want to trust with your card.

With a FamZoo card, your best defense is to catch the charge early with activity alerts, lock the card quickly, document what happened, press the merchant for a refund, and contact us for help with the next steps.

Share Your Stupid Money Story with the Kids

2026-04-29T16:54:00.000-07:00

Do you want your kids to feel comfortable coming to you when they make a money mistake?

Start with a confession, not a lecture.

Years ago, I told my kids about one of my dumbest money mistakes. I had been renting a small storage unit for a pile of old stuff that easily could have fit in my garage. Most of it probably should have been donated years earlier. By the end, that little unit was costing me $97 a month.

And every single month, when the charge hit my card, I had the same thought: “I need to cancel that.”

Then I did nothing.

Month after month after month.

I finally cleaned it out with help from my daughter and asked the front desk when I had first rented the unit.

Gulp.

I had been paying for pointless storage for 13 years.

My kids laughed at my idiocy. Fair enough.

But that conversation did something useful. It showed them that smart adults still do stupid things with money. It showed them that procrastination is expensive. And it showed them that in our family, money mistakes are safe to talk about before they snowball.

That’s the tip: if you want honest money conversations at home, skip the polished success story and tell the dumb one instead.

The recurring charge you ignored for years.
The subscription you forgot to cancel.
The purchase you regretted instantly.
The “great deal” that wasn’t. (Looking at you, 1984 Jeep Cherokee!)

Those stories do more than entertain your kids. They give them permission to bring you their own mistakes early, while the problems are still small enough to fix.

Tell one tonight.

Find Card Issues Faster with Transaction Search

2026-03-31T14:42:00.000-07:00

“Why isn’t my card working?”

“What was that attempted charge for?”

“Why do they keep charging my card?”

“How did that charge even happen?”

Most card issues aren’t random — they leave clues. If you know where to look, you can solve them in seconds. After helping families track down card issues for over 13 years, we’ve found three clues to be especially useful:

Decline reason — why it failed. FamZoo is unusual in its transparency — we show every declined purchase attempt in your transaction history, not just successful ones. Most financial apps don’t. A quick review of the latest decline reason is often all it takes to solve most card mysteries. There are many different reasons for declines, but the 10 most common ones are:
1. Purchase amount exceeds card balance.
2. Incorrect billing address.
3. Invalid card expiration date.
4. Using old replaced card.
5. Card is currently locked.
6. Security block applied after 3 incorrect PIN entries.
7. Merchant is a current fraud risk.
8. Incorrect PIN.
9. Incorrect card security code.
10. The card’s security chip counter needs resetting.
Decline amount — what they tried to charge. When a transaction is declined, the posted amount is zero, and there is no change to the available balance on the card. To find out the amount that a merchant attempted to charge, you must consult the decline amount. That amount often sheds light on what the attempted charge was for. Strings of declines for the same attempted amount often point to an unintended or unwanted subscription that needs your attention.
Entry mode — how the charge was attempted. The entry mode indicates how the purchase was made. It could be in person by dipping the chip, tapping a mobile wallet, or swiping the magnetic stripe. Or, it could be remotely by typing the card info into a website or app or using a stored payment method. The entry mode can often be very insightful when chasing down unexpected charges. Some examples of cases we’ve tracked down:
- A child’s card was stored on the family Amazon account leading to unexpected charges later. (Entry mode = Stored Payment Method.)
- A card was skimmed at a vending machine leading to subsequent unauthorized charges from a fraudster. (Entry mode = Magnetic Stripe Read.)
- The expedited delivery option was selected at checkout resulting in unexpected Prime subscription charges. (Entry mode = Online/App Entry followed by Stored Payment Method 30 days later.)

The decline reason, decline amount, and entry mode values have been available in FamZoo for a while. Until now, you had to dig to find them. Now they’re surfaced directly in search results—no extra clicks required.

No need to visit Actions ⟩ Select Columns to surface those critical columns anymore.

Try it now — it takes 10 seconds.

→ Sign into FamZoo.com on your computer.

→ Select Bank ⟩ Accounts.

→ Press Enter in the search box.

(If you’re in the FamZoo app, see this trick for getting to the Desktop UI from a mobile phone.)

You’ll see the following columns in the results: Date, Description/Memo, Type, Status, Amount, Decline Amount, Decline Message, Entry Mode, and Account.

Pro tip #1: Spot problems instantly. Visit the Accounts screen, type “declined” in the search box, and press Enter to quickly check for signs of card struggles across your family.

Pro tip #2: Click for the fix. Click on the Status value in the search results to see full transaction details — including the suggested remedy for resolving any decline issue. It’s the same set of details you see when you click a Pending, Settled, or Declined status button on the Transactions screen.

If you still can’t decipher a card mystery, contact us. We’ll help you get to the bottom of it.

Guiding Your Family to Better Money Habits Without Conflict

2026-02-28T14:21:00.000-08:00

A FamZoo parent recently asked:

“I seem to remember that there was a way to generate a chart of balances over time. Where can I find that? One of my kids is religious about saving. One spends almost everything they have. I’d like to show the balances to them.”

Specific answer:

You’ll find a chart of the monthly closing balances under Bank > Balance History.

You can select the desired account from the dropdown in the upper right.
You can adjust the duration from the dropdown in the left-hand sidebar.
You can click on a bar in the chart to navigate to the underlying transactions.

Broader answer:

Stepping back, there’s a bigger question and objective here: what does the transaction history say about my family’s money behaviors, and how can I nudge them toward good money habits going forward (without alienating them)?

That parenthetical is the hard part!

I’ve written before about strategies for conducting a diplomatic money audit with your child. See my guide to a diplomatic money audit. It can be challenging to keep things non-confrontational — especially with temperamental teens.

Fortunately, you don’t have to be the messenger. Let AI be the “bad guy”.

Try the following:

Select Bank > Transactions.
Select the desired card from the dropdown in the upper right.
Select Download in the left-hand sidebar to get to the Search Transactions screen.
Click Actions > Select Columns to display the desired columns. I recommend Date, Description/Memo, Type, Status, Amount, Decline Amount, and Decline Message.
Scan the data to make sure there isn’t anything you deem too sensitive to share with AI. Use the search controls to remove columns or rows with any identifying details.
Select Download in the upper right.
Select CSV for the report format and select the Download button.
Visit your favorite AI assistant. Choose the most capable reasoning mode available to you.
Attach the file and use a prompt like the following:

“Attached is a transaction history from a debit card in our family. What do you observe about the money behaviors given the history? What advice would you give to encourage good money habits?”

My guess is you’ll be impressed with the patterns it spots and the coaching ideas it suggests. I know I was. I tried the experiment with a stretch of transactions on one of my kids’ cards from back when they were in high school. It was surprisingly spot on. Check out the results in the addendum below.

Pro tip: Instead of delivering the results directly, let your family member follow the same recipe on their own. They can absorb the feedback in private, at their own pace — asking deeper questions, pushing back when needed (remember, sometimes AI is wrong!), and drawing their own conclusions along the way.

Let’s face it: feedback is easier to hear from a bot with infinite patience than a pestering parent.

Let me know how it goes with your family.

Addendum: An Example

As mentioned, I ran an experiment on one of the cards in my own family. Here’s what Google’s Gemini Pro model came up with:

Based on the transaction history, it looks like a robust financial education system is already in place! Here are some key observations about the teen’s money behaviors, followed by advice to further encourage good money habits.

Observations on Money Behaviors

The “Bucket” System is in Effect

The transaction history shows an allowance memo of: “Credited 60% of $15.00 per week.” This indicates a split allowance system—likely dividing funds into “Spend,” “Save,” and “Give” buckets. This is a phenomenal foundation, and the 60% ($9.00/week) going to the card serves as their discretionary spending.
Goal-Oriented Saving & Cost-Sharing

There are several large transfers in and out for specific tech goals. Memos like “For CPU purchase” ($184), “For laptop on ebay” ($376), and “Half of hard drive” (-$45) show that the teen is successfully saving up for big-ticket items. They are also learning to split costs or “co-pay” for expensive hardware, which teaches patience and the value of delayed gratification.
Routine Bill Management

The teen has a recurring automated debit of $10.00 each month for their “Share of Monthly Cell Plan.” This is an excellent real-world lesson in managing fixed expenses. They are learning that they must budget a portion of their income (about 25% of their monthly $36 allowance) for obligations before blowing it on fun.
Highly Digital & Tech-Focused Spending

Unsurprisingly for a teen, their discretionary spending is almost entirely digital. The bulk of purchases are on gaming platforms (Steam, EA Origin) and tech hardware (Newegg, eBay).
Generally Good Balance Management (with a few hiccups)

Out of 100+ transactions, there is only one decline for insufficient funds (a $5.00 charge for Google Domains). This means they aren’t treating the card like an endless pit and are checking their balance before they buy. However, there are three declines for “INCORRECT CARD SECURITY CODE ENTERED” (including a large $103.54 Newegg purchase).

Advice to Encourage Good Money Habits

Discuss Online Security and the CVV Code

Since there are multiple declined transactions for entering the wrong security code, this is a great coaching moment.
- Show them exactly where the 3-digit CVV is on the back of the card.
- Explain why it exists (to prove you have the physical card during an online purchase).
- Warn them that repeatedly entering incorrect security details can cause the bank to lock the card for suspected fraud. It’s also a good time to review general online safety, like not storing their debit card info on unverified websites.
Audit Digital Subscriptions

They make frequent small purchases on gaming platforms. Sit down together and audit these transactions to ensure they are buying standalone games/items rather than unknowingly paying for monthly subscriptions they no longer use. Teaching a teen how to “audit their digital footprint” is a vital modern money skill.
Level Up the Tech Goal-Setting

Because they clearly love building/upgrading computers (buying motherboards, CPUs, cases), teach them how to price-track. Introduce them to browser extensions or websites (like CamelCamelCamel for Amazon or PCPartPicker) to track historical prices. This will teach them how to be a savvy consumer and stretch their hard-earned tech dollars further by waiting for sales.
Keep the Allowance System and “Co-Pays” Going!

Whatever app or system you are currently using (it appears to be FamZoo or a similar family banking app), keep using it. The structure of matching funds or allowing them to move money from “Savings” to “Spending” when they’ve finally saved up for that $376 eBay laptop is working beautifully. They are building incredible financial muscle memory.

P.S.: the explainer diagram on this post was generated by Google’s (quirkily named) Nano Banana model.

How to Manage a Shared Family Budget

2026-01-30T15:33:00.000-08:00

Families have been using FamZoo cards as a simple, effective budgeting tool since 2013. Multiple cards are used to partition funds into separate subaccounts dedicated to specific purposes: everyday spending, saving for a goal, charitable giving, dining out, clothing, online gaming, family vacations, you name it.

This works beautifully when the funds in a subaccount are spent by a single family member. But how do you handle the case where multiple family members need to draw from the same budget bucket?

Over the years, families have developed a set of best practices for managing this scenario. Here’s how to apply them using a family-wide monthly budget for dining out. Note: I’ve arbitrarily chosen a monthly budgeting cycle for this Dining Out example. Choose any budgeting cycle — monthly, weekly, quarterly, annually, even daily or ad hoc — that fits the category and your family’s circumstances.

Create a shared budget subaccount. Order a “Dining Out” card under one of the parent family members — typically the registering parent. This card serves as the shared budget container, not a card that’s normally used directly for purchases.
Ensure everyone has a spending card. Make sure each family member participating in the shared budget has their own spending card.
Allocate the budget. At the beginning of the month, add the budgeted amount to the Dining Out subaccount. If desired, you can create a monthly “Dining Out” allowance to automate the transfer each month.
Draw down the budget. Before each dining purchase, transfer enough funds to cover the expected amount from the shared budget subaccount to a family member’s spending card. Any parent family member can make this transfer instantly in the app. Family members in the dependent role can issue a transfer request that must be approved by a parent before the shared funds are released. Important: To allow these requests, a parent must enable the “Allow Money Requests Between Members” option in the family settings.
Return any excess to the budget. If the amount drawn from the budget exceeds the final settled purchase amount, transfer the excess funds back to the shared budget subaccount. Or leave the excess as a spending bonus for coming in under budget. 🙂
Review the budget. At the end of each month, see where you stand. Use FamZoo’s powerful search, analysis, and reporting tools to see where the money went — and to inform family discussions. If there’s money still left in the shared subaccount, decide whether to let it roll over to next month’s spending, transfer it back to the primary funding card, or apply it to another subaccount — like the “Family Vacation” subaccount.

If you’re new to family budgeting, I recommend an incremental approach. Start simple with just one category of discretionary spending that your family finds most problematic. Once you get that spending under control with a shared budget subaccount, move on to the next.

Divide and conquer those dollars!

Find Your Family’s “Frictionless” Spending

2025-12-30T12:10:00.000-08:00

When you have to type your card information into a site or app — or make a payment in person with a swipe, dip, or tap — that little bit of friction creates a small “speed bump” to spending: a brief moment to reconsider whether the purchase is really worth it.

Friction is the enemy of mindless spending.

On the other hand, mindless spending thrives when all friction is removed.

So how do merchants remove spending friction?

By storing your card information as a convenient, automatic payment method.

The result?

Free trials turn into subscriptions you didn’t mean to start.
Subscription payments continue long after you’ve stopped using the service.
Small purchases for in-game items and downloaded media pile up.
E-commerce checkout becomes a little too easy.

That’s why one of the simplest ways to rein in mindless spending is to periodically identify all the places your card is stored on file with a merchant.

Fortunately, FamZoo makes this very simple.

How to Find Stored Payment Methods in FamZoo

Sign into FamZoo.
Go to the Accounts screen by selecting Bank > Accounts
Visit the Search Transactions screen by pressing Return in the search box at the top.
You’ll initially see all transactions.
- Parents see transactions across all family cards.
- Children see only transactions from their own cards.
Choose Actions > Select Columns.
Select Entry Mode, move it into the visible columns, and select Apply.
You’ll now see how each purchase was made in the Entry Mode column.
Click the Entry Mode column header and select Stored Payment Method under Filter...

Now you’ll see all of your frictionless purchases — transactions where merchants have your card info stored on file.

That unused Disney+ subscription you haven’t touched since Frozen came out.
The gym membership you never actually used. 😬
The DashPass subscription you don’t need because you rarely use DoorDash.
The Robux purchases for all those silly Roblox avatar outfits.

See charges you don’t want or don’t need? Visit the merchant’s site or app and remove your card as a stored payment method.

Put the brakes on your family’s mindless spending by keeping those little speed bumps in place.

Make Giving A Goal In Your Family

2025-11-29T15:50:00.000-08:00

Generous families make life better all around. Giving does good, and giving feels good.

Here’s a simple recipe to make philanthropy a habit in your family.

Add a dedicated giving subaccount. Start by ordering an additional card earmarked exclusively for charitable giving. Cleanly separating donation dollars into their own bucket — where they don’t compete with spending or saving — makes following through on donations much simpler.
Automate charitable withholding. Every payday, automatically deduct a portion of earnings into the charitable bucket. If the income source is:
- Allowance — edit the allowance and add the giving subaccount to the split allocation.
- Chore or odd job payments — use a split definition as the payment destination for chore rewards.
- Ad hoc credits — use the Split Credit action with a predefined split definition.
- Direct deposit — schedule an automatic transfer from the subaccount receiving the deposit to the giving subaccount.
Create a savings goal for the giving subaccount to signal when it’s time to donate the accumulated balance.
Monitor goal progress. When you’re signed into FamZoo, a progress bar for the giving goal appears right on the Accounts screen. Turn on activity alerts for the giving subaccount to get notified every time the balance grows. Weekly account summary emails provide another easy way to keep tabs on progress.
Choose a charity carefully. When the goal is reached, take a moment to review past donation transaction memos to remind yourself why you selected earlier causes and whether they still meet your standards. Update those memos with anything new you’ve learned.
For new causes, try a simple AI-assistant prompt like:

“I’d like to make a charitable donation to support <fill-in-the-blank>. Can you help me find a reputable organization?”
Make the donation. Use your giving subaccount’s card to complete payment to the charity. Most charities accept donations using a card online, in person, or through a digital wallet. Completing payment will automatically reset your giving goal progress and kick off a new accumulation cycle.
Memorialize the “why” in the memo. You’ll see the donation in the Transactions screen for the giving subaccount. Edit the Memo field of the transaction to capture a few notes about the charity and why you chose it.
Repeat from step 4 to make giving a regular habit.

With those simple steps, your family can put doing good — and feeling good — on autopilot.

Three Tricks To Get More Treats From Card Searches

2025-10-30T17:32:00.000-07:00

FamZoo’s built-in search and analysis tools for card activity are among the most powerful of any family card platform. They help parents become better money mentors. With FamZoo, parents can see all the card activity details they need — the what, when, how, and why behind any issues kids encounter with their cards.

Here are three quick tricks to help you uncover even more “search treats” hiding in plain sight:

See how they pay — Most kids don’t realize how they pay makes a huge difference in security.
Swiping a magnetic stripe? Easy target for skimmers.

Tapping or dipping? Much safer.

That’s why the Transaction Details screen shows the Entry Mode for every purchase — even declines — so families can spot risky payment habits and coach kids to adopt safer ones.

Here’s the trick: Want to see how your kids are paying across a whole batch of transactions?
- From the Accounts screen, search on “purchase”.
- On the Search Transactions screen, click the Actions button (to the right of the Search button).
- Choose Select Columns.
- Move Entry Mode from Do Not Display to Display in Report.
You’ll now see the entry mode for every purchase in your results.

Encourage your kids to tap and dip to give skimmers the slip.
Identify the purchase retry — Some merchants (notably Apple, Amazon, and Uber) use stand-alone settlement (also called forced-post) transactions to collect previously declined or missed payments. The amount collected can even cover multiple unpaid charges at once.
Because timing and totals can differ from the originals, families sometimes mistake these for unauthorized transactions.

To make them easier to spot, FamZoo labels them with a new transaction type: Purchase Retry.

Here’s the trick: Want confirm if an unexpected charge is really a retry?
- Search on the merchant’s name from the Transactions screen.
- Look for a Purchase Retry preceded by one or more declined purchase attempts.
Here’s a classic example:

If you see a retry you don’t recognize, sign in to your online account with that merchant and review your billing history. The total should match up with earlier missed payments.
Do the quick math — Mom: “Do you have any idea how much you’ve spent on Fortnite this month!?”
Teen: “Why, yes, Mom. As a matter of fact I do...”

Here’s the trick: Want to get a quick tally of recent Fortnite purchases?
- Search on “Fortnite” from the Transactions screen.
- Fill in a start date.
- Click Actions > Format > Aggregate.
- Choose “Sum” for the function and “Amount” for the column.
Now, you’ll see the grand total in the search results.

It’s a handy way for both parents and kids to see spending totals instantly — no mental math required.

Mom might be impressed with your snappy response time, but the actual answer? Not so much. You’re still in trouble.

Picking The Perfect Allowance Amount

2025-09-30T11:53:00.000-07:00

Another day, another allowance survey.

A 2025 Wells Fargo survey reports that the average weekly allowance parents pay kids is $37.

A 2025 StudyFinds survey says children receive about $119 per month on average.

A 2024 T. Rowe Price survey found the average weekly allowance across respondents was $19.39.

Hot take: allowance surveys are completely useless.

The amount of allowance Parent A pays their child is meaningless for Parent B.

Why?

Because what really matters is what each child is expected to purchase with that allowance.

Example:

Parent A expects their child to buy their clothing with Allowance A.
Parent B expects their child to just have a little pocket money for everyday incidentals with Allowance B.

Which allowance should be bigger — A or B?

Exactly.

It’s not the size of the allowance that matters. It’s the purchasing expectations.

Ignore the generic surveys. Ignore what other parents are doing.

Match your child’s allowance to your purchasing expectations.

There’s a fancy word for that: budgeting.

Boredom-Free Budgeting Practice for Kids

2025-08-31T11:23:00.000-07:00

Budgeting is a critical life skill. So, it behooves your child to learn some budgeting basics before leaving the nest. But, like any skill, budgeting takes practice to master.

Unfortunately, few things sound more boring to your kid than: “Let’s build a budget together!’

How do you beat back the yawns? A little AI, an interactive scoreboard, and a cash bonus opportunity.

Try this technique using ChatGPT, Google Sheets and FamZoo. (Of course, you can substitute your favorite AI chatbot, spreadsheet, and payment method.)

Note: I’m using back-to-school planning for this particular example, but you can apply the technique to any other multi-item budgeting scenario, like planning a summer trip, shopping for groceries, or funding a hobby.

Preview my sample Google Sheet by clicking here. Select Use Template to make your own editable copy.

Here’s how you and your child can work through it together:

Identify the candidate items. In Google Sheets, add a row for each item your child needs or wants — backpack, jeans, shoes, calculator, etc.
Use ChatGPT to generate the initial list or double-check you haven’t missed anything. Try a prompt like: “What does a typical middle schooler need for back to school?”
Source options for each item. Add a row beneath each item filling in its description, price, and whether the option is the current nominee for purchase.
Always include a free option first if possible — like reusing an item from last year or using a hand-me-down or simply making do without if it’s non-essential.

Then add purchase options across a range of prices. ChatGPT is perfect for this sourcing and product comparison stage. Try prompts like: “What are some backpack options at different price points for a back-to-school budget?”
Set the budget. Do an initial “parent pass” through the spreadsheet and check the option for each item that you feel delivers a reasonable result. If the Total Selected Amount feels right, enter that number in the Budget cell.
Dangle the bonus offer. Let your child know that if their purchases total up to less than the budget, they’ll get to pocket the savings as a bonus.
Viola! Suddenly, budgeting just got interesting!

This is where the Under/Over Budget line item in the spreadsheet comes into play. As your child checks and unchecks the boxes to make their selections, the totals at the bottom of the spreadsheet automatically update. When there’s a surplus, the Under/Over Budget amount is green. When they’re over budget, it’s red.
Decisions, decisions! Turn your child loose on the spreadsheet to wrestle with the trade-offs and see the bottom-line impact of every decision along the way.
“If I pick the Vans shoes, I’ll owe mom $9.45. If I settle for the less cool brand, I’ll pocket a $17.55 bonus. Hmmm.”

You may need to revisit the sourcing step during this phase to expand the options.

You may need to adjust the budget if you find the original wasn’t quite right.

Discuss the difference between frugal and cheap as well. Inform your child that if a cheap item breaks, they’ll be on the hook to replace it.
Make the purchases. Transfer the budget amount onto your child’s FamZoo card and let them shop (with your help if needed).
Encourage them to hunt for sales or coupons to boost their bonus.

Consider topping off the budget a bit to accommodate unforeseen expenses like sales tax.

When budgeting becomes bonus-hunting, building the skill becomes a game kids actually want to play.

For reference, here are the key spreadsheet features behind the interactive budget:

Checkbox cells — select Insert → Checkbox to format a cell as a clickable checkbox that toggles between TRUE and FALSE values.
SUMIF function — use =SUMIF(checkbox_range, TRUE, price_range) to add up only the checked items.
Conditional background color — select Format → Conditional formatting to turn the budget cell green when positive and red when negative.
Merge cells — Select cells and pick Format → Merge cells to create clean item section labels that span all columns.

Give Kids More Say Over Their Money

2025-07-30T18:13:00.000-07:00

In her July “5 Things To Try This Month” newsletter, Gretchin Rubin writes:

“A Happier with Gretchen Rubin podcast listener wrote in with a parenting hack: Offer a choice to children, even if it’s a small choice, such as going to bed at 7:30 or 7:34. Like everyone, kids want to feel some amount of control over their daily lives.”

That tiny bedtime choice may seem silly, but it taps into something profound: kids crave a sense of control.

Not only does a stronger sense of control make kids happier, I believe it leads to better learning outcomes and more effective habit formation as well.

With that in mind, what are some financial choices we can give our kids while still setting appropriate boundaries?

Here are seven examples:

Let kids choose what they buy with their money. Making an unfortunate purchase — like a cheaply made or seldom used item — can be a powerful and unforgettable lesson.
Appropriate boundaries include:
- Insufficient funds. Not enough money saved up? No dice. Wait.
- Forbidden category. Certain purchases are categorically off limits in most families for health, safety, legal, or moral reasons. You’ll know it when you see it.
- Grey area category. Certain purchases are debatable. Perhaps too extravagant. Perhaps age inappropriate.
  For grey cases, I like the written proposal technique: have your child submit a written rationale for why they should be permitted to make the purchase. Take their proposal under advisement before issuing your ruling. You’ll be surprised at some of the compelling arguments kids can conjure!
Let kids choose how to split their allowance, chore, job, or gift money percentage-wise between spending, saving, and giving. Parents typically dictate these percentages, but you’ll be surprised how thoughtful and generous kids can be with their split decisions after a little discussion. They can also tune their choices over time as they mature and circumstances change.
Appropriate boundaries include:
- Minimum split guidelines. An example: “The savings split must be at least 5%.”
Let kids choose which version or brand of a necessity (like clothing) you buy for them: bargain, basic, or premium.
- You fund the basic price.
- Anything over the basic amount comes out of their pocket.
- Anything under, they get to keep as a bonus.
Let kids choose between delivery versus pickup.
- If Doordash, Uber, you, or someone else hand delivers an item, your kid pays a delivery fee.
- If your kid goes to pick it up and it’s something for the family, let them earn a modest delivery tip.
Let kids choose their odd jobs and how much they get paid. Instead of listing out the odd jobs available around the house and setting the prices, tell your child to:
- Choose whatever odd job looks like it needs to be done around the house and proactively do it.
- Negotiate their price with you when completed.
It’s more of an entrepreneurial approach than the standard parent provided job chart.

Appropriate boundaries include:
- No price gouging: You have veto power on absurd prices! It’s a negotiation.
- No slipshod work: You’re the inspector. You set the standards.
Let kids choose whether to make lunch or buy lunch. Lunch made at home is much cheaper than eating out. Sit down with your kid and your favorite AI chat bot and calculate the average cost of each.
- If your child chooses to make lunch, give them a “brown bag bonus” — a modest portion of the cost savings calculated above.
- If your child chooses to buy lunch, only cover the cost of an average homemade lunch. They have to pay any amount over that themselves.
Let kids choose their own budget. Spending requests can be a big source of friction between parents and kids. You’ll be amazed at how much that friction dissipates when kids feel they have a real say in how their money is allocated. To keep it simple, pick a single category that your kid really cares about — like clothing or gaming.
Appropriate boundaries include:
- They must show their work. Have your kid fill out a budget worksheet with all of their line items and assumptions — like N pairs of jeans a year at an average price of $X.
- You must approve it. Review the worksheet. Have them refine any misguided or unreasonable assumptions until you arrive at a mutually agreeable figure. Note: It’s OK to fine tune the budget down the line if you both realize you missed something or circumstances change.
- No spending over the budget. Purchases that exceed the budget will just have to wait.

As in the examples above, try loosening your grip on the money reins a bit. See how your kid responds. It just might be a major money mentoring unlock.

Should A Summer Job Signal The End Of Allowance?

2025-06-26T17:47:00.000-07:00

I recently received the following thoughtful question from a FamZoo parent (slightly edited to ensure anonymity):

Hey Bill,

I wanted to follow up on some discussion I saw recently on FamZoo about navigating allowances as your kids get older. My teen just turned 15 and is about to start a first job beyond some regular tutoring done over the years.

I want to come up with an approach that doesn’t make it feel like my teen is being penalized by losing allowance because my teen is showing initiative to get a summer job. My teen currently gets $10 a week that is split across spend, share (charitable donation), and save categories each week.

Do you think the Family 401(k) match is sufficient to offset losing the spending money we had been providing? Any other ideas on how best to support my teen’s growing financial knowledge and independence in a way that feels additive and not like a penalty for earning additional income? Open to ideas or suggestions. (As an aside, we’ve always been of the mindset that doing chores is expected as a member of the household and allowance is a separate thing that teaches the kids financial literacy. You’re not getting paid to do chores as you don’t have the option to not do chores and forgo your allowance. We’ve also implemented an annual clothing budget that the kids control quite effectively.)

Thanks for indulging my running thoughts. Keep up the excellent work!

First off: the “right call” on things like allowance is completely dependent on each individual family’s circumstances and money values.

With that caveat in mind, I’ll share my personal thoughts on the matter which are undoubtedly a product of my own family’s unique circumstances...

I think it’s very hard for most young teens to place a current value on future Roth IRA earnings which they, ideally, will not leverage until they are in their 60s. To a young teen, that seems like an almost infinite time horizon!

As the teens get older, leave the nest, and find full time jobs, it gradually dawns on them just how valuable the Family 401(k) process has been. They’ll thank you profusely someday!

So, for a young teen, I’d be inclined to keep the modest allowance in place despite the job income and the Family 401(k) match — as long as that’s affordable for your family. I’d characterize the allowance (and the Roth IRA match) as a bit of a bonus for being an industrious teen with a job. I’d explain my thinking to my teen and perhaps even change the name of the allowance to reflect its new spirit — like “Weekly Work Bonus” or some such.

I’d also point out that any arrangement is subject to change whenever warranted.

I’d reconsider the “bonus” approach if I thought my teen was unappreciative of the arrangement, or if I noticed negative money behaviors or attitudes beginning to emerge. Fortunately, you can always tweak things along the way as circumstances evolve.

I hope at least some portion of that perspective is useful for your family’s situation.

P.S. While reviewing this article with my colleague, Chris, he offered the following: “Perhaps encourage (but not force) the teen to split the paycheck between spend, share, save too.” I think that’s an excellent suggestion. The save component could also serve as the source of funds for the teen’s portion of the Roth IRA contribution.

Who Is Struggling With Their Cards?

2025-05-31T15:46:00.000-07:00

FamZoo family members often struggle with their cards. Not surprising. Young kids are just learning the financial ropes and discovering the 11 important numbers they need to know. Teenagers inadvertently sign up for subscription services they can’t afford. Elderly family members have senior moments.

Are your family members struggling with their cards? When? Why? Where?

Unless you have activity alerts enabled, you may not know for sure. Even if you do, you may want to collect a handy summary report for a family finance meeting.

Here’s how to capture a quick struggle snapshot across the whole family:

Sign in to FamZoo as the parent. Note: family members in the child role can do everything mentioned below as well, but they’ll only see their own accounts and transactions.
In the Desktop UI, select Bank ⟩ Accounts to see the list of accounts in your family.
Click in the Search field along the top of the listing and press the Enter key. Or, click on Download in the left hand sidebar.

You’ll land on the Search Transactions screen. By default, the search results include all of the transactions across all of the accounts in your family.

Let’s narrow the search results to just declined transactions:

Click on the Status column heading.
Select Declined under Filter. If Declined is not an option, congratulations! Your family has never had a declined transaction! You’re done. The rest of us can keep reading... 😉

The search results will now show only declined transactions with the oldest ones appearing first.

Want to see the most recent declined transactions instead?

Click on the Date column heading.
Click on the down arrow button.

Now, you’ll see the most recent declined transactions first.

Want to narrow the results to a specific time frame?

Click on the Date column heading.
Choose one of the handy default ranges under Filter like Last Week, Last Month, or Last Year.
Alternatively, if you want a very precise date range, you can fill in the Start Date and End Date fields in the section above the results.

Want to know all of the precise details about a declined transaction? The reason for the decline? The remedy? The merchant category? How the card was entered? The security level of the entry mode? The attempted transaction amount? Just click on the Declined link in the Status column for the transaction. Up pops the Transaction Detail dialog with all the specifics.

Would you like to see the reason for each decline along with the attempted purchase amount displayed right there in the search results without having to click on each individual transaction?

Click on the Actions button to the right of the Search button above the search results.
Choose the Select Columns menu entry.
Select Decline Message in the Do Not Display box and click on the right arrow button to move it over to the Display in Report box.
Do the same for Decline Amount.
To change the display order of a column, select it in the Display in Report box, and use the arrow buttons on the right to move it relative to the other displayed columns.
To hide an undesired column, like Amount which is always zero for a declined transaction, select it in the Display in Report box, and click the left arrow button to move it to the Do Not Display box.
Click the Apply button.

Now the decline reasons and amounts are conveniently visible at a glance in the search results.

Would you like to see the declines grouped neatly into separate sections for each card in the family?

Click on the Account column heading.
Click on the Control Break button. (It has four stacked horizontal lines — a long line followed by three short lines beneath it.)

Now, you can easily see at a glance who is struggling with their cards and who isn’t.

Would you like to download a nice PDF version of the report to print, save, or email to the family?

Click on the Download link to the right above the search results.
Select PDF for the report format.
Click the Download button.

Now, you’re ready to hold that family financial coaching meeting. Review the struggle snapshot report with family members, and get things back on track.

3 Clever Ways To Use Transfer Requests

2025-04-30T12:51:00.000-07:00

Who holds the purse strings in a FamZoo family?

Short answer: parents (with lots of lobbying from the kids).

When it comes to money oversight, family members in the parent role are “all powerful”. They can see all of the cards in the family, manage all of the automated money movement rules, and transfer funds instantly between any of the cards.

On the other hand, family members in the child role have restricted powers. They can only see their own cards and can’t move money between cards without parental approval.

Children can seek money movement approval by launching a money transfer request. Here’s how a typical exchange works between a family member in the child role, “Junior”, and a family member in the parent role, “Mom”:

Junior signs into FamZoo and selects the Request Transfer action.
Junior fills out a form to describe the details of the plea: the approving parent (Mom), the From account, the To account, the desired amount, a description, and an optional memo for additional justification, commentary, pleading, flattery, etc.
Upon Junior’s submittal of the form, Mom receives a notification with a link to Junior’s request.
Mom selects the link to review the request details and render judgement.
Mom can approve, partially approve, or deny the request. Mom can optionally include a comment or rebuke for posterity.
Upon Mom’s submission of the review form, the approved amount (if any) moves between the cards.
At any time, Mom and Junior can each review a running history of pending and completed requests on the Money Requests screen.
If, in a rare moment of self reflection, Junior recognizes a pending transfer to be misguided, he can rescind it by selecting the Delete button in the Money Requests screen. Unlikely, but a mom can dream...

With the above flow in mind, here are three classic transfer request scenarios we see in FamZoo families:

Slower, Smarter, Safer Spending — Little Johnny tends to spend too much money on in-game purchases. Grandma gets a little confused in the evenings and overspends at sketchy websites.
The solution? A little friction in the spending process.
- Set your dependent family member up in the child role with two cards: a spending card and a non-spending card.
- Retain possession of the non-spending card.
- Maintain a low balance on the spending card while holding the bulk of the dependent’s funds on the non-spending card.
- Have your dependent issue a transfer request whenever they need additional spending funds to complete a purchase.
The end result: no hair-trigger purchases, more thoughtful conversations about spending, less fraud.
Sibling Payback — Suzy bought pizza for herself and her little brother, Johnny. Johnny owes Suzy for his share. Biff bet Buffy $5 that he could jam 20 grapes in his mouth. Buffy owes Biff $5.
How can the siblings pay each other back?

If mom enables the Allow Transfers Between Family Members setting, one sibling can choose another sibling’s account as a destination for a transfer request. Mom remains the referee in the transaction and can approve it if everything looks legit, or deny it if she wants to discourage idiotic family bets.

👉 To change the Allow Transfers Between Family Members setting, see here.
Controlled Outside Contributions — Uncle Joe wants to kick in spending funds for Suzy while she’s away at college. Your ex wants to cover some of Johnny’s spending over the summer. Grandma wants to shower the grandkids with absurd amounts of shopping funds on a random basis.
How do you enable the flow of funds from extended family members while retaining full control over the internal family purse strings?
- Order a card for your extended family member putting them in the child role.
- Let them load their card independently using any of our reload options.
- Enable the Allow Transfers Between Family Members setting.
- Have the extended family member initiate transfer requests as desired. Note that the recipient can initiate the transfer request, too: “Uncle Joe, I ‘need’ some extra funds for Spring Break! Love, Suzy.”
You’ll be able to moderate the flow of funds and curtail any amounts that are over the top.
Spring Break request? “Nope. Love, Mom.” Declined.

30 Family Finance Tips For Financial Literacy Month

2025-03-31T14:43:00.000-07:00

April

1

Start a “Family 401(k)”. This is my all-time favorite family finance hack for teens with W-2 income from a summer or part-time job. It combines a Roth IRA with annual family matching. The arrangement encourages getting a job, forces a long-term investing mindset, and can be truly life changing decades later thanks to the magical power of compounding.

👉 More info
April

2

Use AI to decipher unexpected charges. As your kids learn the financial ropes with their first debit cards, the chances are near 100% that you’re going to stumble across charges you don’t recognize. When you do, try consulting an AI model from a trusted provider to track them down. The models are getting better and better at decoding cryptic charges and suggesting how to handle them.

👉 More info

April

3

Use the safest card entry mode to minimize fraud. Most kids don’t know that how they pay with their cards — the “card entry mode” — matters when it comes to protecting funds from fraudsters. For example, swiping the card’s magnetic stripe through a point of sale device exposes the card information to potential skimming devices. Dipping the card into a chip reader or using mobile Tap to Pay doesn’t. Teach kids these 6 different entry modes and their relative security levels.

👉 More info
April

4

Tune your kid’s allowance to make it a better teaching tool. If your child isn’t learning anything from their allowance, it’s time for a tune-up. A well tuned allowance tracks a budget, forces trade-offs, allows mistakes, enforces consequences, prompts ongoing discussion, and even saves you money. Yes, you heard that last one right!

👉 More info
April

5

Teach kids how not to be phished. Unfortunately, advanced AI technologies and social media are escalating the frequency and sophistication of phishing attacks. Your kids are in the crosshairs. Make sure they’re well versed in prevention, detection, and resolution.

👉 More info
April

6

Give your kid a spot bonus. Ever received a spot bonus at work? It feels pretty darn awesome to be recognized for a job well done. It’s the same for kids. Catch your child doing something good today. Then reward them with a bonus and a kind word.

👉 More info
April

7

Keep a sharper eye on card activity. Today’s best payment cards have excellent tools for monitoring card activity. Monitoring your kid’s card activity doesn’t make you a helicopter parent. Done right, it makes you a better money mentor, protects funds, and encourages transparency.

👉 More info
April

8

Pay kids to brown bag lunch. Brown bagging lunch saves about $8 a pop. For a full school week, that’s $40. Real money. With those savings, you can afford to cough up a little bonus as an incentive. Alternatively, tell the kids they have to use their allowance to buy lunch at school, but lunch fixings are free at home. Brown bagging lunch may be less “cool” from a teen’s perspective, but it’s healthier and it’s cheaper.

👉 More info
April

9

Use a two card system for smarter, safer teen spending. Impulse spending, peer pressure, phishing attacks, sketchy sites, dark patterns. There’s no shortage of scary things lurking out there in the financial jungle conspiring to consume the funds on your teen’s card. With this “Spend Now, Spend Later” system, two cards are safer (and more frugal) than one.

👉 More info
April

10

Give your kid a payday loan. Wait, what? Payday loans for kids? Never! Hear me out. Loans can be a valuable educational experience for kids to get under their belt. An allowance advance can be a good thing as long as it’s carefully tracked and repaid (with or without interest). Here’s how to set it up.

👉 More info
April

11

Tell kids what they need to know before calling in about their cards. A typical kid doesn’t realize they’ll need to prove they’re the cardholder when calling the 800 number on the back of their card. That’s standard security protocol. The card PIN, your date of birth, and the last four of your SSN are common identifying ingredients. Giving the wrong info or just hanging up can lead to a blocked card account and lots of frustration.

👉 More info
April

12

Review your 529 statements with your teen. How much does your teen know about the 529 account you opened for college savings? Nothing? Or, maybe you’ve mentioned it once or twice, but you aren’t sure it really registered. That’s the norm. Pretty dry stuff for a teenager. Here’s a radical suggestion. Review your 529 statements with your teen. And do it every quarter. Yes, your initial sessions will be received with eyeball rolls, yawns, or worse. But keep up the good fight. Through your consistent and repetitive efforts, your teen will gradually learn these six critical things.

👉 More info
April

13

Conduct an annual financial review with your child. If delivered diplomatically, a gentle audit will nudge your kid toward better fiscal habits in the year ahead. To set the right tone for a candid exchange, I like to break the ice by confessing one or two boneheaded financial mistakes of my own. Like when I wasted a gazillion dollars on an unnecessary storage locker — for 13 years! Hey, we all make financial mistakes, right? As you browse through your kid’s transactions from the past year together, here are several specific things to look for and discuss.

👉 More info
April

14

Teach teens budgeting with a clothing expense account. Parents often ask me how to teach teens budgeting basics. My favorite approach takes a page from the envelope budgeting system playbook, but with a digital twist. In the traditional envelope system, each category of spending has its own labeled envelope stuffed with the budgeted allocation of cash for the month. Purchases must be funded with the cash from the appropriate envelope. So, all clothing purchases come out of the envelope labeled “clothing”. Super simple. For the digital twist, replace the cash-stuffed envelope with an automatically loaded debit card. So, all clothing purchases come out of the card labeled “clothing”. Still super simple. And it works in today’s online world where cash is no longer welcome. When introducing teens to budgeting, I recommend keeping things narrowly focused. No need to overwhelm. Start by choosing just one envelope outside of everyday spending. Clothing is typically an excellent choice for teens. Here’s how to get your system up and running.

👉 More info
April

15

Mine declines for valuable money lessons. Most card providers sugar coat their transaction histories. If you open up their apps, you’ll only see the successful or pending transactions listed — no failed ones. Not so with FamZoo. We show everything: successful transactions, unsuccessful attempts, and even fraudulent hits. It’s the good, the bad, and the ugly. Why show the latter two? We believe a valuable lesson lurks in every failed transaction. You can spot a failed transaction in the history by looking for a red DECLINED lozenge just beneath the transaction’s date in the left hand column. Click or tap on the lozenge to reveal the details behind the failure. Here’s a sampling of five common failures and some important lessons to be gleaned.

👉 More info
April

16

Deliver parent-paid interest to teach youngsters the power of compounding. Traditional savings accounts are real yawners for kids. A few pennies at the end of the year. Woo-hoo! On the other hand, a parent-paid interest system lets kids experience the power of compounding using compelling amounts and short timeframes that they can truly appreciate. $1.06 this week. $1.25 the next. Nice! It’s an effective, hands-on way to instill an early saving and investing habit that persists beyond childhood. Here’s how it works.

👉 More info
April

17

Help kids recognize faux fraud. Things aren’t always as they initially appear — like unauthorized transactions on your kids cards. With over a decade of researching fraudulent transactions under our belt, we’ve compiled a list of classic faux fraud flavors — transactions that look like fraud, but aren’t. Check out the five most common patterns we see and tips for identifying them.

👉 More info
April

18

Fine kids with fake overdraft fees. The best youth debit cards do not charge overdraft fees. For such cards, an attempt to spend more than the balance just harmlessly fails rather than racking up a $30 bank fee. That’s great for the family pocket book, but not so great for Junior’s financial habits. Being cavalier about having insufficient funds as a kid can lead to big problems down the road. Imposing parent-initiated fees help nip bad behavior at the bud without hurting the family budget.

👉 More info
April

19

Know the common mistakes kids inevitably make with debit cards. Ow! Hot! Sometimes kids just have to learn what not to do the hard way. Think of it as touching the financial hot stove. Better a minor burn now than going down in flames later. That said, it’s smart for parents to know the most common mistakes ahead of time and mitigate the damage. Here are the top ten.

👉 More info
April

20

Set up the 4 bucket system for your teen. You’re looking for just the right financial setup for your teen. Not too simplistic: learning is the goal. You want your teen to master critical money management skills before leaving the nest. Not too sophisticated: no need to boil the ocean here. Don’t create a monster your teen hates and you can’t manage. This 4 bucket system is just right. Your teen will learn how to handle a card responsibly, monitor for unexpected charges, give every dollar a mission, pay themselves first, harness the power of compound interest, stick to a budget, and appreciate the value of a dollar.

👉 More info
April

21

Make teens pass the No Decline Challenge before graduating to a checking account. There will be obvious signs your teen wasn’t ready for a checking account: the $30 overdraft fee, the bounced check, the $10 monthly service fee for dipping below the minimum balance. Jumping from a piggy bank to a checking account is like jumping from a tricycle to a motorcycle. How do you know when your teen is ready for checking? When they can pass this test with their prepaid card.

👉 More info
April

22

Automate teen payroll deductions to boost summer savings. Summer paychecks have a way of melting away like ice cream in the hot sun. iTunes here, Starbucks there. By the time fall rolls around — poof! The summer earnings are gone. Time for a little “pay yourself first” parental intervention. Here’s how to set it up and how to get your teen’s buy-in.

👉 More info
April

23

Take your swear jar to the cloud. The swear jar is a time honored family tradition for breaking bad habits. Letting loose with a four letter word around the house used to mean coughing up some coins for the family jar. But now, like everything else payment related, families are taking the penalty pot online. See how.

👉 More info
April

24

Offer kids odd jobs for extra bucks. Linking the concepts of money and work is healthy, but paying kids to complete everyday household chores is controversial. “No one ever paid me to make my bed!” muttered half the parents out there. There is one thing most parents agree on when it comes to paying kids around the house: odd jobs are cool. Parents rarely raise an eyebrow when it comes to offering occasional extra paid opportunities for tasks that are out of the ordinary or, better yet, unpleasant. Here are several options to consider.

👉 More info
April

25

Coach kids on how to guard their cards. There’s a critical money lesson many parents overlook. It’s one of the very first lessons every card-toting child should learn: how to protect their money. Sadly, kids need to know that where there’s money, there’s fraud risk. Here are the classic ways cards are compromised and six suggestions for protecting them.

👉 More info
April

26

Teach kids these 11 important card numbers. As parents, it’s hard to remember what it was like to make that first debit card purchase way back when. What’s routine for us seasoned veterans can be a complete mystery to the uninitiated. There are actually quite a few numbers on (and off) the card that your child must understand to transact successfully and safely. What are those critical numbers? When do you need them? Where do you find them? How do you take care of them? Here’s a handy list.

👉 More info
April

27

Make reimbursement deals with your kids. Reimbursement deals are a powerful behavioral technique. They can incentivize desired behaviors, drive healthier account balances, raise awareness about how much real life costs, and encourage more parent-child money discussions. Here’s how to roll them out.

👉 More info
April

28

Let kids pick the split. Splitting funds between accounts earmarked for specific purposes is a valuable personal finance habit to learn. For kids, the classic trio of accounts is spending, saving, and giving. When it comes to splitting allowance, chore payments, or birthday money between the buckets, what percentages should parents dictate? Maybe none! Consider letting your kids decide instead. Here’s how to tee up that conversation for best results.

👉 More info
April

29

Require a written proposal for questionable purchases. “Why can’t I buy it? It’s my money!” What parent hasn’t heard that refrain? If “it” is cigarettes, that’s a short conversation. If “it” is some harmless, yet ill-advised item — well, that’s how kids learn to spend their money wisely. But what if “it” is in that gray area for a youngster of your child’s age? Maybe some form of entertainment that you find borderline at best. Then what? Try this written proposal technique.

👉 More info
April

30

Think long term when choosing your child’s brokerage firm. When selecting a company to use for your child’s first investments, think long term. Roll the clock forward a decade or two and think about where they’ll want those investments to live when they’re adults. It’s undoubtedly with an established brokerage firm like Schwab, Fidelity, E*TRADE, UBS, TD Ameritrade, Vanguard, or even a relative newcomer like Robinhood. It isn’t with a youth prepaid card provider that offers investing to a niche audience or as a bolt-on feature with extra fees. So don’t start there. At best, it will be a hassle to move your holdings. At worst, you’ll incur unexpected fees when the fledgling FinTech pivots to a new business model or you try to transfer your shares to a mainstream brokerage later. So when your teen is ready to invest, just pull the funds from their prepaid card into an account at an established brokerage firm with an ACH transfer. Here’s where to find the routing and account numbers you’ll need.

👉 More info

Use AI to Clarify What Kids Buy

2025-02-28T17:10:00.000-08:00

AI models are getting better and better at decoding the cryptic charges on your kid’s card.

If you receive a card activity alert or see an entry in a card’s transaction history with a description you don’t recognize, try consulting an AI model from a trusted provider to track it down.

🔒 If you suspect fraud, be sure to lock the card while you investigate.

Case in point: A FamZoo parent recently asked me if I had any insight into this obscure purchase description: “8006837392 USA”.

I turned to ChatGPT for help using the following simple prompt:

What is the following charge on my card? “8006837392 USA”

ChatGPT responded with:

The charge labeled “8006837392 USA” on your statement is associated with Mint Mobile, a prepaid wireless service provider in the United States. The phone number (800) 683-7392 is Mint Mobile’s customer service line.

Possible Reasons for the Charge:

Plan Renewal: Mint Mobile offers prepaid plans in 3, 6, or 12-month increments. If you have an existing subscription, this charge could be for the renewal of your selected plan.
New Plan Purchase: If you’ve recently signed up for Mint Mobile services, this charge may correspond to the initial payment for your chosen plan.
Add-ons or Extras: Purchases such as international calling credits or additional data beyond your plan's allowance could result in additional charges.

What to Do Next:

Review Your Mint Mobile Account:
- Log in to your account on the Mint Mobile website or app to check your billing history and see if the charge matches any recent transactions.
Contact Mint Mobile Customer Support:
- Phone: Call (800) 683-7392 between 5 a.m. and 7 p.m. PST, 7 days a week, to speak directly with a customer service representative.
- Chat: Visit the Mint Mobile Help Center and use the chat feature to connect with support.

If you don’t recall authorizing this charge or believe it may be an error, it’s important to contact Mint Mobile directly for clarification. Additionally, monitoring your financial statements regularly can help you stay on top of any unexpected charges.

Mystery solved. Potential action plan in place.

I’ve been using ChatGPT for quite some time to track down obscure transaction descriptions. The quality of the responses has improved substantially with each successive model. Tip: Supplying additional relevant details in your prompt, like the amount of the purchase, can yield even more impressive results.

So, the next time you see an unexpected charge, sit down with your child and give AI a try together.

⭐ Extra credit ⭐

Download some of your family’s transactions, filter out any info you deem sensitive, feed the filtered transaction set to your favorite AI model, and ask away. The leading AI models have amazing ad hoc analysis capabilities.

What insights can you glean? Do those insights spur any important family discussions?

If you’re comfortable sharing, I’d love to hear about your experience in the comments.

Seeing How Kids Pay Keeps Fraud at Bay

2025-01-31T08:28:00.000-08:00

Many kids do not know that how they pay with their cards matters when it comes to protecting funds from fraud. For example, swiping the card’s magnetic stripe through a point of sale device exposes the card information to potential skimming devices. Dipping the card into a chip reader or using mobile Tap to Pay doesn’t.

FamZoo has a unique feature that encourages kids to pay more securely. For each transaction (whether successful or not), we show the “card entry mode” on the Transaction Details screen. The entry mode indicates how the payment was made (or attempted in the case of a decline).

Entry modes include magnetic stripe read, mobile Tap to Pay, chip card read, online or in-app entry, stored payment method, etc. We include details about the entry mode's relative security so we can nudge kids toward the safest transacting habits. Expanding the entry mode line reveals details about how the card information is transmitted and how vulnerable it is to fraud.

Here’s a rundown of the most common entry modes:

Manual Key Entry — The card information was manually entered, likely by the merchant in a store.
☆☆☆☆☆ Weakest Security
Card information manually provided to a merchant is vulnerable to copying or insecure storage.
Magnetic Stripe Read — The card information was read off the magnetic stripe by a point of sale device.
★☆☆☆☆ Weak Security
Card information read off the magnetic stripe is vulnerable to card skimming devices. Gas pumps, ATMs, vending machines, and other self-checkout machines are some of the most common targets.
Online/App Entry — The card information was typed into a web site or app.
★★☆☆☆ Medium/Weak Security
Card information keyed in online or in an app is vulnerable to phishing attacks or merchant data breaches.
Stored Payment Method — The card information has been retained by the merchant and was retrieved from a stored payment profile.
★★★☆☆ Medium Security
When properly secured by the merchant, stored card information can reduce risk. Without adequate protections, it remains vulnerable to data breaches.
Chip Card Read — The card information was read from the card’s EMV chip by inserting it into the chip reader of a point of sale device.
★★★★☆ Very Strong Security
EMV chip cards generate unique tokens for each transaction, significantly reducing the risk of fraud. Card information is read securely and generally not vulnerable to card skimming devices.
Mobile Tap — The payment was made using contactless payment technology like Apple Pay, Google Pay, or Samsung Pay.
★★★★★ Strongest Security
Card information is protected by tokenization which does not transmit actual card numbers to the merchant. Payment devices are often also protected by biometric authentication.

One of the best things about mobile Tap to Pay is that kids don’t have to pull out the physical card to complete the purchase. The most secure cards are the ones that never see the light of day.

Encourage your kids to tap and dip to give skimmers the slip!

👉 To find the card entry mode information for a transaction, see here.

6 Traits of a Well-Tuned Allowance

2024-12-31T15:18:00.000-08:00

Do allowances spoil kids?

No, parents do. Allowances are just the misused vehicle of choice.

Applied correctly, allowances don’t spoil. They teach kids to be responsible and thoughtful with money.

If you’re seeing otherwise, your allowance approach needs a tune-up.

A well-tuned allowance:

Tracks a budget. Why guess at the right amount? Sit down with your child. List the things the allowance should cover. Put it in concrete terms. Calculate the right amount accordingly.
Little knick-knacks for youngsters? Set the allowance to the price of a favorite regular treat plus a smallish fraction of a modest toy purchase — enough to require plenty of patient saving to close the deal.

Clothing for a teen? Put your teen in charge of a budget proposal for the season or year. Review and revise to negotiate the final amount.

👉 Consider using the premium price rule: allowance covers the bargain price. Anything above is on your child.
Forces trade-offs When is an allowance too much? When you don’t see your child grappling with tough financial choices. As Oprah says, “You can have it all, just not all at once.”
Allows mistakes. Aside from a few obvious ground rules (no beer or cigarettes!), let your kids make the purchase decisions. A bad purchase is a learning opportunity. My now adult daughter still remembers torching her annual clothing budget on that Neiman Marcus chiffon gown for high school prom. Total times worn: one.
👉 Pro tip: make kids submit written proposals for questionable purchases.
Enforces consequences. Going cold turkey on clothing for the remainder of the school year is what made my daughter’s ill-advised gown decision so memorable. A bail-out from mom and dad would have erased the memory. (A semi-formal loan might be an acceptable alternative though.) A budget-based allowance is an up-front agreement. Stick to it.
Prompts ongoing discussion. There’s a middle ground between authoritarian and laissez-faire allowance policies. Kids certainly need and deserve your experienced counsel, but try discussing rather than dictating. (Of course, you get the last word! 😉)
Saves you money! Yes, you read that right. A well crafted allowance plan doesn’t create extra family spending. It pays for things you would have purchased anyway. Even better, it constrains spending. It transforms ad hoc, emotional spending on kids into controlled, mindful spending by kids. That’s a recipe for saving. And learning.

If you think your allowance policy is spoiling your kid, don’t junk it.

Just tune it up.

👉 To create an allowance, see the steps here.

Teach Kids How to Sniff Out Card Phishing Scams

2024-11-30T15:25:00.003-08:00

Have you coached your kids to be on the lookout for sketchy calls, text messages, emails, and sites?

Unfortunately, advanced AI technologies are escalating the frequency and sophistication of phishing attacks. Your kid’s cards are in the crosshairs.

This classic example of a phishing text landed on my phone just the other day:

“Attention: your package has safely arrived at our storage station. We regret to inform you it has been there for over 24 hours due to a delivery problem. Our personnel tried delivery, but the address label was compromised during transit. To proceed, please follow the link below to update your address information within the next hour: https://sketchyurl Your package will be delivered within 12 hours once you have updated your address.”

It’s a variation of the “Fake USPS” scam that has been lighting up cell phones across the country. The embedded link leads to an official looking site where cardholders unwittingly cough up their card info to perform “verification” or pay for a bogus package delivery. Fraudulent charges soon follow.

We noticed a pattern earlier this year in which young cardholders who had fallen for the fake delivery scam would see a declined attempt from “DAISY SMS WHITE PLAINS USA” in their transaction history. That attempt would be followed by attempts from a variety of different merchants as the fraudsters hammered away at the funds on the card.

To keep your kid’s funds safe from phishing fraudsters:

Educate your kids about the classic tells of a phishing scam:
- Unfamiliar sender or site. Phishing attacks often originate from unknown numbers or email addresses and sites that have very subtle differences from legitimate ones, so it’s easy to be fooled at a glance.
- Urgency. Phishing attacks usually demand immediate attention and proclaim dire consequences for inaction (“your account will be deactivated!”) or unrealistic rewards for action (“you’ll win a $1,000 gift card!”).
- Requests for sensitive information or payment. Phishing attacks may demand payment to others or solicit sensitive personal or financial information.
- Attachments. Phishing attacks may prompt you to open up an attached file that silently installs malware on your device.
Ask first. Agree on a communication policy before your child supplies card info to anyone new. A brief conversation with mom or dad will catch 99.9% of all phishing attempts.
Monitor card activity for unexpected transactions in case something still slips through your family’s phishing filter. Turn on real-time card activity alerts to catch them as quickly as possible. Do not assume a card is safe just because an unrecognized transaction declines. It’s often just the precursor to subsequent card draining transactions.
👉 How to turn on card activity alerts.

👉 How to see declined purchase attempts.
Lock the card immediately at the first whiff of a phishing attack to protect the funds while you investigate further with your family. If it turns out to be a red herring like a harmless decline from a trusted merchant, you can unlock the card.
👉 How to lock and unlock a card.
Replace the card if you believe the card info may have been phished.
👉 How to order a replacement card.

If something smells phishy on your child’s card, contact us. We’ll help you get to the bottom of it.

4 Ways To Deliver A Spot Bonus

2024-10-31T11:31:00.001-07:00

Have you ever received a spot bonus at work?

Boy, does that feel awesome to get some bottom line recognition for a job well done!

No doubt, your kid would love that feeling too.

In fact, I see spot bonus transactions all the time on FamZoo cards.

Check out this sampling of spot bonus reasons pulled from anonymous transaction data:

“Bonus for helping me make lunch. Thanks!”
“For cleaning up the kitchen by yourself. Nice job!”
“Caught using the same cup!”
“Good piano session!”
“Bonus for a Great Wednesday Folder!”
“Good week of class.”
“Study hard bonus — thank you.”
“Excellent report card. You make me so proud.”
“Great job on staying within your shopping budget!”
“Being super awesome at Karate.”
“Good rule-following during sleepover.”
“For helping around the house without being asked. 🙂”
“Studying 4 days, keeping room picked up, no troubs in school. Thanks bud!”
“Great job accepting a ‘no’.”
“Great job keeping your room clean every night for 2 weeks in a row!”
“Bonus for being helpful and having a positive attitude.”
“Helping when no one else did.”
“Thanks for helping blow the driveway.”
“Helping paint and clean up jobsite.”
“Helping Grandpa.”
“Helping at church.”
“Help with groceries.”
“Helped with making Curry Chicken.”
“Doing the dishes with your sister.”
“For finding the last 2 ornaments.”

Spur any ideas for your kid? If not, there’s always the unconditional parental love bonus like this one:

“I love you!❤️ -Mom”

Here are four ways to deliver a spot bonus to your kid’s FamZoo card:

Credit — select the plus icon (+) next to your kid’s card on the Accounts screen. Fill in the amount and a message. Select the Credit Account button. Done!
Split Credit — Select the Split Credit action on the Accounts screen (look in the menu on the app or in the left hand sidebar on the web). Select the family member. Complete and submit the form just like above, but this time you can split the bonus percentage-wise between a child’s multiple accounts — like 50/50 between spending and saving.
Money request bonus — when you receive a money request notification from your kid, like:
$5: “I mowed the lawn.”

you can throw in a bonus by approving an amount greater than requested:

$6: “I approve 6. Mama said you did great!”

See how money requests work here.
Reimbursement bonus — when you receive a reimbursement request notification from your kid, like:
$15: “Cost of a non-fancy haircut.”

you can throw in a bonus by approving an amount greater than requested:

$20: “Now that’s a good,son! So impressed, I’ll kick in an extra 5.”

See how reimbursements work here.

Kids who have activity alerts turned on will see their bonuses immediately.

Note: If you don’t like the idea of a monetary spot bonus, try a non-monetary one: staying up an extra hour on the weekend, an extra hour of computer or gaming time, a sleepover with friends, an ice cream cone, a movie, or whatever privilege or treat your kid treasures.

The words accompanying your spot bonus make a big difference too.

My favorite good-vibe-inducing keyword is “proud’, as in: “I’m proud of you.” I’ve found it’s a sentiment that warms the heart of even the most jaded teen.

So, catch your kids doing something good today. Then reward them with a bonus and a kind word.

How And Why To Keep A Close Eye On What Kids Buy

2024-09-30T15:44:00.000-07:00

FamZoo comes with several builtin tools to help parents pay close attention to card activity within the family.

Transaction History — when signed into FamZoo, family members can browse the full history of all transactions on a card. Just click or tap on the balance of the desired card to see its history.
The scope of visibility depends upon the family member’s role. Kids just see the transactions on their own cards, while parents can see all transactions on all cards in the family.

The entries are sorted from newest to oldest. The history includes completed transactions, pending transactions, and even declined transactions.

Having visibility on all declined transactions is unique to FamZoo and very powerful.

Why? We believe every failed transaction is a potential learning opportunity. Select the red DECLINED lozenge next to an unsuccessful transaction to reveal the Transaction Details screen. You’ll see why the transaction failed (insufficient funds, incorrect PIN, invalid security code, blocked merchant, etc.). Beneath the reason, you’ll find a suggestion on how to remedy the situation.

You’ll also see the “card entry mode” which indicates how the payment was attempted. Learn more about card entry modes here.
Weekly Activity Reports — each week, family members receive an email from FamZoo that summarizes transaction activity for the previous 7 days. Kids just see their own activity, while parents see activity for the whole family. The reports are a handy way to quickly detect interesting patterns or unexpected transactions that bear further discussion — like too many trips to Starbucks or 20 declined iTunes transactions in a row! 🤔
Activity Alerts — FamZoo can send real-time activity alerts to family members via text or email for all transaction attempts on a card — including failed ones. The alert includes the amount, the last 4 of the card, the merchant description, and the remaining balance. When a transaction is declined, the alert includes a brief description of the reason. Alerts can be directed to the parents, the child, or both (recommended).
👉 If there is one monitoring tool to use to maximize awareness, this is the one!

So, why should parents keep a close eye on child card activity? Isn’t that just helicopter parenting? Nah. Here are three reasons why it’s good parenting when done right:

Education — your kids are just learning the financial ropes. They don’t know what they don’t know. The fancy term for that phenomenon is the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
Your kids won’t know to ask (or want to ask) for your help. And you won’t know how and when to mentor your kids if you don’t know what they’re up to with their money. Observing their card activity allows you to provide thoughtful, just-in-time coaching as needed.
Protection — mistakes are an inevitable part of the learning process, whether it’s sharing the card with a friend, falling for a phishing attack, losing the card at school, or getting suckered into an unwanted subscription (looking at you, Amazon Prime 👀).
Minimize the damage. If you see an unexpected transaction, lock the card right away to secure its funds. After discussing with your child, you can take the appropriate next step which might include canceling a recurring charge, seeking a refund from a merchant, or reporting an unauthorized transaction and getting a replacement card.
Transparency — transparency among family members is a good personal finance habit. It improves decision making, builds trust, and reinforces habits that are consistent with your family’s values.
As Ron Lieber says in one of my favorite books about money and kids: “Every conversation about money is also about values.”

That’s a big payoff for parents just paying little attention.

Bonus Kids for Brown Bagging Lunch

2024-08-31T12:43:00.000-07:00

I just calculated the average purchase amount at Chipotle in the last 30 days across all FamZoo cards. It came to $15.05. That’s a solid chunk of change for a meal. On a sobering inflationary side note, it was only around $7 when I made the same calculation back in May, 2016.

Here are the average purchase amounts for some of the most popular fast food destinations among FamZoo cardholders (sorted by decreasing popularity):

McDonald’s	$9.39
Chick-fil-A	$14.78
Chipotle	$15.05
Taco Bell	$13.70
Wendy’s	$11.49
Burger King	$11.30
Subway	$13.32
Panera Bread	$14.53
Panda Express	$13.95

In contrast, ChatGPT concludes that a typical homemade lunch ranges from $2.35 to $8.00. The range is broad because so many different factors come into play: quality of ingredients, prices by location, and meal complexity. Some sage advice courtesy of the bot brain: reduce costs further by buying in bulk and using leftovers. To simplify our back-to-school math, let’s peg the price of a typical brown bag lunch at a generous $5 even.

Eyeballing the FamZoo stats above, I think it is fair to ballpark an average fast-food lunch excursion at about $13.

Given those assumptions, brown bagging lunch saves about $8 a pop. For a full school week, that’s $40. Real money. It’s healthier. It’s cheaper. But, it’s more work and less “cool” from a typical teen perspective.

So, how do you get your kid on board and even pitching in?

Incentives.

Surely you can afford to share some of that $8 windfall with your kid to motivate a frugal, healthy habit.

So, why not pay your kid a bonus buck or two to brown bag it for school lunch? Maybe one buck if you pack it and two bucks if they do.

That’s $10 a week in potential extra earnings. Roll out the FamZoo Savings Planner tool to show the kids how those brown bag lunch bonuses could compound over time — especially if they’re raking in some sweet parent-paid compound interest along the way.

Not keen on doling out bonuses? John Lanza over at The Money Mammals shared an alternate strategy:

“We told [the kids] they’d have to use their allowance to buy lunch at school, whereas we’d provide them fixings to make their own lunches. They chose the latter.”

Less allowance spent on lunch means more money in their pockets for other stuff — or, better yet, for saving.

As in all things FamZoo, choose the approach that fits your family best.

Either way, the family will save money, the kids will eat better, and the incentives (or disincentives) will align to make the good habit stick.

Start a Spend Now, Spend Later System for Smarter, Safer Spending

2024-07-31T15:47:00.000-07:00

Impulse spending, peer pressure, phishing attacks, sketchy sites, dark patterns. There's no shortage of scary things lurking out there in the financial jungle conspiring to consume the funds on your child's card.

How can you minimize the risk?

Get your child a second spending card!

Question: How in the world can two spending cards be safer than one?

Answer: when they’re part of a Spend Now, Spend Later System.

One card is a Spend Now card used for purchases. Normally, it’s empty.
The other card is a Spend Later card that is never used in the wild. It’s a safe holding tank for future spending.
Transfer the appropriate amount from the Spend Later card to the Spend Now card just in time for purchases.

As long as the Spend Later card never sees the light of day, its funds will be fully protected from impulse purchases, card skimmers, merchant data breaches, phishing attacks, and other bad habits or nefarious actors.

If bad actors do get a hold of the Spend Now card or its numbers, they’ll be disappointed to find its balance sitting at zero. You'll see their futile attempts as harmless declines in the transaction history. Lock the card and order a replacement at the first sign of any shenanigans.

Setting Up The System

Here’s how to get your Spend Now, Spend Later System up and running quickly:

Order a second card to serve as the Spend Later holding tank by following the steps here. When it arrives, activate it, update the PIN, and keep it in a safe place so your kid doesn’t accidentally use it.
Redirect any allowance payments, chore payments, or direct deposits that were going to the Spend Now card to go to the new Spend Later card instead. That will make it easy to keep the Spend Now card near zero between purchases.
Turn on activity alerts for both cards by following the steps here. That’s the best way to stay on top of any purchase attempts in real time.
Show your child how to issue a transfer request to move money from Spend Later to Spend Now before a purchase. You'll receive a text message for each request. With a few taps, you can approve, partially approve, or deny each transfer request. The latter is handy for tamping down impulse or peer pressure driven buys. Just putting a little friction in the buying process will help your kid slow down and consider purchases more carefully.

As an incentive for participating in this safer, albeit slower, spending scheme without complaining and as a reward for any newfound frugality, consider showering your child with some parent-paid compound interest on the Spend Later card.

It’s a rare opportunity to increase potential upside by reducing risk.

How to Give Your Child an Allowance Advance, Responsibly.

2024-06-28T18:59:00.000-07:00

Will you let your child practice paying the piper?

A mom recently wrote in:

“I frequently loan my kids some money against their weekly allowance or chore money for the following week. Can I use [FamZoo] to keep track of what they owe me?”

You might be thinking: “Wait, what? Payday loans for kids? Never!”

Not me. I think loans can be a valuable educational experience for kids to get under their belt.

Of course, it’s your call. Do what feels right for your family.

But, if you do grant Junior an advance, make sure you track it. Nothing good is learned when parental loans go unpaid. Fortunately, FamZoo's IOU accounts are perfect for tracking them and enforcing accountability.

The Setup

Here’s how to set up an IOU account to track any outstanding advances to Junior’s spending card:

Select Create IOU Account under Bank > Accounts.
Choose the family member (Junior in this example) from the drop down and select Next.
Fill in a descriptive account name, like “Advances from Mom/Dad”.
Optional: if you want Junior to feel the heat for dragging out any repayment, fill in a loan interest rate to be applied to the outstanding balance after a certain date. You can cap the interest amount assessed if desired. You’re the shark... err umm, I mean bank... so, you set the rules.
This is the perfect time to explain the pitfalls of payday loans to Junior.

If the message doesn’t stick up front, a few interest penalty payments will drive the point home later.
Select the Create Account button at the bottom of the form.

Now Junior will see an “Advances from Mom/Dad” IOU account next to their spending card account on the Accounts listing screen. A negative balance represents the current amount owed for any advances including interest (if any).

Issuing an Advance

An advance can be issued with a single transfer operation.

On the Accounts screen, you’ll find the Transfer link in the left hand sidebar (or in the menu in the upper right on mobile).

To issue a $10 advance to Junior, simply transfer $10 from Junior’s “Advances from Mom/Dad” IOU account to Junior’s spending card. Give the transfer a meaningful description like “Advance from Mom”.

The following two things occur as a result:

The balance of Junior’s “Advances from Mom/Dad” IOU account shows -$10.00 (assuming it was at $0.00 to start with).
$10 flows from your parent funding card to Junior’s spending card.

This is all based on the unique behavior of transfers between IOU accounts and card accounts described here.

Repaying an Advance

To recover the advance in the future, do the opposite transfer when Junior has enough funds on hand — like after allowance hits. Transfer $10 back from Junior’s spending card to Junior’s “Advances from Mom/Dad” IOU account (or more if interest penalties accrued in the meantime). Give the transfer a meaningful description like “Repay Advance from Mom”.

The following two things occur behind the scenes:

The balance of Junior’s “Advances from Mom/Dad” IOU account returns to $0.00.
$10 (plus interest if any) flows from Junior’s spending card back to your parent funding card.

The debt has been erased, and the transaction histories clearly document the exchange for posterity.

Junior now understands the piper must be paid.

Three Things Cardholders Need to Know Before Calling In

2024-05-31T17:17:00.000-07:00

There are a few essential things you and your family members need to know before calling in to address issues with your FamZoo cards. Not knowing them could lead to unnecessary frustration and even unexpected card account blocks. Knowing them ensures a smoother customer service experience.

Family members need to know:

Who the cardholder is. It may not be who you think it is.
How to prove their identity. Many teens don’t know this.
Who they’re calling. It may not be who you think it is.

Who’s the real cardholder?

The real cardholder is the person whose name is printed first on the face of the card in the lower left corner. When a card includes a custom label, there will be two lines of text in the lower left corner: the first (top) line contains the cardholder name and the second (bottom) line contains the custom label.

A child under 13 is never the real cardholder. The parent or guardian is — even though the pre-teen’s name may appear in the custom label line beneath the cardholder’s name as described here.

Teens and young adults are typically the real cardholders for their cards, unless you have explicitly ordered them "on behalf of" cards with a parent or guardian as the cardholder as described here.

How do you prove you’re you?

Sometimes, you may have to prove you are indeed the cardholder. For example, when calling the 800 number on the back of your card, you’re automatically prompted for the 16 digit number on the face of the card as well as the 4 digit PIN. If those numbers are unknown or entered incorrectly, you can select 0 to speak with a customer service representative. In such cases, you’ll be asked for additional information to prove you are the cardholder — typically your date of birth and the last 4 digits of your Social Security Number.

So, be sure that each real cardholder in the family knows their PIN and SSN before calling the 800 number.

Who are you really calling?

FamZoo, right?

Well, not if you call the 24x7 800 number printed on the back of your FamZoo card. In that case, you’ll be greeted by “Card Services” staffed by Transcard.

Who is Transcard?

Transcard is FamZoo’s card processing partner. We’ve been working closely with them to deliver FamZoo cards to families since 2013. Transcard provides the underlying core card processing services for individual FamZoo cards, ranging from card manufacturing to authorizing transactions to audited financial account management to the 24x7 phone support via the 800 number mentioned above. Meanwhile, FamZoo groups the individual cards into a family unit and provides the educational family finance experience through our mobile app and the famzoo.com web site.

Why does this matter to your family?

Transcard treats every card account as a separate entity owned by a single cardholder. As a result, their security policies are designed around the individual. FamZoo, on the other hand, knows your family structure and who is assigned to which card. Our security policies are designed around the whole family.

That difference explains the following frustrating scenarios when calling the 800 number:

A teen has a FamZoo card held in their name. Mom or Dad calls the 800 number on their teen's behalf to deal with a problem on the card. Transcard's Card Services staff insists on speaking with the teen cardholder. That's their individual card security policy. Unlike FamZoo, Transcard doesn't have any way of verifying that the caller is indeed the teen's Mom or Dad. Furthermore, since an unverified person called in about the card, their individual-centric security policy dictates that they lock the card to keep its funds secure until the actual cardholder calls in.
A teen has a FamZoo card held in their name. The teen calls the 800 number, doesn't know their card number or PIN, and ends up speaking to a Card Services representative. The teen does not know their SSN and is therefore unable to verify their identity. The card is locked until they can call back with the right information.
A pre-teen has a FamZoo card held in their parent's name. The pre-teen calls the 800 number to inquire about a problem on the card. Card Services insists on speaking with the parent who is the actual cardholder. Transcard doesn't have any way to verify that the caller is connected to the parent cardholder, no matter what is printed in the custom label line of the card. They lock the card until the parent calls in.

Not good. 😬

How to avoid problems.

What’s the easiest way to avoid the frustrations above?

It’s simple: Contact FamZoo customer service first. The best way to do that is to sign into FamZoo, select the Contact Us link, and fill in the form with a short description of your issue. The FamZoo support team receives an immediate notification with the request details, knows who you are, and knows your family structure. As long as it’s during normal “awake” hours Pacific time, we’ll get back to you within 45 minutes. We’re typically pretty quick with our responses — even on weekends.

If the problem is urgent and it’s off hours or we can’t respond right away, then calling the 24x7 800 number to speak with Transcard’s Card Services is your best option. Remember, to ensure a smooth experience, be sure the actual cardholder is on the call equipped with their SSN info just in case verification is needed. If it’s an issue Transcard can’t handle, they’ll roll the call over to us at FamZoo. If we can’t pick up right away, be sure to leave a message with your phone number, email, and a brief description of the problem. We’ll research the problem and call you back as soon as we can.

Suggestions for parents:

Review these 11 critical card numbers with your kids.
Show kids how to sign into FamZoo and locate the Contact Us link. It’s located in the upper right corner of the screen (or in the upper right menu on mobile).
Important note: we always CC the registering parent in our responses to kids. We don’t communicate with kids without including a parent or guardian in the loop.
Coach your pre-teen to make sure the adult cardholder is present on any call to the 800 number.
Make sure your teen memorizes their SSN.
Sit down with your child and try a test call to the 800 number on speaker so they know exactly what to expect and how to navigate the automated prompt system. Challenge them to successfully retrieve their card balance.

Finally, if you ever have a bad customer service experience at FamZoo, I want to hear about it. You know where to find me. Just hit the Contact Us link.