My husband and I have been using the BusyKid Allowance App for over a year now to help teach our kids more about money management. Since we’ve been using this kids’ allowance app for a while now, I figured now would be the perfect time to share my review.
In today’s review, I will be discussing how we use the BusyKid app for allowance as well as key features and my personal notes from a parent’s perspective.
This article was originally published on April 18, 2022, and has since been updated.
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BusyKid is an app for allowance that allows kids to check off certain tasks (as designated by their parents) to earn extra money throughout the week. These tasks are labeled as “chores” in the app, but you don’t necessarily have to include household chores in the lineup. Here are a few examples of tasks we allow our children to earn money for.
30-minute language lesson
Clean pet cages
Help with grocery shopping
Write a short story
Work on a business idea
The above are just a few examples of “jobs” we allow the kids to earn money for. There are many other tasks they can complete as well from cleaning jobs to self-improvement projects.
You can choose which day/weeks you’d like to pay your kids. We currently pay our girls every Friday if they’ve submitted their completed tasks for the week.
There is a very reasonable fee of $3.99/mo to use this app and you will have to select a funding source (checking account, debit or credit card) in order to get started.
‼️ Please note: There is NO transaction fee if you link a checking account. However, if you use a debit or credit card, there is a transaction fee. So just keep this in mind. ‼️
‼️ Another important note: BusyKid spend cards are NOT available to you if you live outside the US. ‼️
Our Fave Features
The BusyKid app has many useful features to help kids learn more about managing their own money. Here are some of our favorite features.
Activity feed
This feed allows us to track our kids’ activity in the app as well as how/where their Spend card is being used.
Bonus
We can give the kids “bonus” money whenever we want for any reason at all, and it can be automatically added to their Spend card.
Get Cash
We use this feature basically when the kids use us like an ATM and need cash immediately.
We give them the cash (or foot the bill for them in instances where they don’t have their card with them) and we simply move the money they “borrowed” from us from their BusyKid account back to our bank account.
Spend, Save, Share
We can allocate our chosen percentage of the girls’ earned money each week to automatically be placed into different pots. So a certain amount will be placed into the pot for spending, another amount will go into their pot for saving/investing and the rest will go into their pot for donating.
BusyPay
We just share the girls’ QR code in the app with others on their birthday and Christmas (or during other celebratory moments) so that these individuals can easily put money into the girls’ BusyKid accounts.
Spend Cards
Last but certainly not least, we absolutely LOVE that the girls have their very own debit cards to shop with! And just recently these cards were updated to include the chip. The girls always say they feel like one of the grown-ups when they’re out shopping with their own cards.
How it Helps My Kids Learn More About Managing Money
If you have been following Major League Mommy for a while, I am sure you have noticed that we are big on financial literacy. And what I love about BusyKid is that it has allowed us to teach our kids key money lessons in a very natural way.
Through this app, they have gotten started with investing in the stock market and have been donating money to charities of their choice.
The kids have learned that you can actually use the money you have to help solve other people’s problems. And they have developed a stronger work ethic because they see the benefits and rewards.
As a matter of fact, my girls have learned so much since using the BusyKid app, they actually decided to write their own children’s book and share the lessons they’ve learned with other kids! You can check out the book here.
Yay or Nay? Mom’s Thoughts
I definitely think the $3.99/mo is well worth the money to use this app! It has been proven to be extremely beneficial for my kids and I HIGHLY recommend it to other parents who want to start teaching their kids key money lessons early on.
You can learn more about the BusyKid money app here.
Briana Marie is a mental health and financial literacy advocate, and founder of Major League Mommy. In her spare time, Briana enjoys yoga, travel, and spending time with her Husband and two daughters.
