You are a fool if you have a joint bank account.

Saturnalia

Back in the day when you were given your wages as cash, my mum was a stay-home mum and my dad worked long hours, and he would come home on payday and give his wage packet to my mum unopened, and she'd give him his spending money from it. My mum would go to town the next day, buy and pay what was needed and bank the rest.

I've never heard of any other couple doing this but it worked great for them. My dad always said that as my mum did all the shopping and managed the bills and bank account while he was at work, why should she have to ask him for the money to run the household? And as he never bought anything, he didn't need anything other than a bit of pocket money at any one time.

It always struck me as a really equalist way of running things and they did so for years. (Even after wages were paid straight into the bank, my dad is always impressed when he sees my sister and I using our debit cards - he doesn't know where his is, what his PIN is, or what to do with one!)

MissShoes

We're waiting to get one. But when we do our salaries won't be paid in there. We'll each pay a proportional amount of our wages (at the moment me 2/3 and him 1/3) to cover the household expenses. Limited risk involved.

DON79

You sound a bit bitter Tomatoe as though this has happened to you and you have learned a painful lesson perhaps.....

Anyway, although I would not have phrased it that way, I do agree that joint accounts are not necessarily a good idea. my OH and I have always had separate bank accounts, we just kept the same accounts we had before we married and I just transferred any bills money over to him or paid the bills set up on my account and he paid the ones set on his.

I am glad to have my own account as I know what money is mine to do with as I please once all the bills are paid. Plus I see my husband have a splurge and spend every month as soon as he gets paid and I know he would forget that some money was mine if we had a joint account together.

Besides that my husband did not want a joint account either having been stung by his ex wife spending all the money before the bills were paid!

So I do agree that separate accounts are best.

Tropez

Blobby8 wrote: »

Sounds great , but whats the advantage to seperate accounts, seriously I cant see one.

You could make the same argument against joint accounts - where is the advantage to them?

Whatever works for a couple is what is right.

tomatoe_2

DON79 wrote: »

You sound a bit bitter Tomatoe as though this has happened to you and you have learned a painful lesson perhaps.....

So I do agree that separate accounts are best.

No its not happened to me. I have never lost a bean to anyone else.

tomatoe_2

Saturnalia wrote: »

my dad worked long hours, and he would come home on payday and give his wage packet to my mum unopened!)

I worked in a factory once where we were paid cash in a brown envelope every thursday at 11am. At tea break at 11.15 all the under-the-thumb men used to go out to the car park where a hideous assortment of wives, prams and offspring were gathered waiting for the money to be instantly handed over.

It taught me some valuable lessons in life watching how that lot lived :rotfl:

Blobby8_2

Tropez wrote: »

You could make the same argument against joint accounts - where is the advantage to them?

Whatever works for a couple is what is right.

Joint accounts mean my wife knows every penny I spend & vice versa it sort of goes with sharing & honesty, rather than secrecy & selfishness. Not suggesting that is always the case, but it is possible.
We do have accounts in our own name to maximize ISA usage, she wouldnt know how to access them, she barely knows they exist.
We rarely talk about money, if she wants something above normal humdrum stuff she usually just says which card do I need to use? Which is her code for "is it OK, can we afford this?"

GracieP

margaretclare wrote: »

Yes, I agree. My DH was in Critical Care back in 2008, septicaemia, almost had a leg amputated, nearly died. I thought I was facing a second widowhood, which was my worst nightmare. It was a huge comfort not to have to worry about the normal bills getting paid - once set up, the whole thing runs like clockwork.

Every time we open the local paper there is some tragic story of a young person being suddenly taken ill or dying in a road accident. It happens out of the blue and can happen at any age.

My husband was 32 when he went into sudden liver and kidney failure and came very close to dying. The toxins in his system had caused swelling on his brain and even though he was never fully unconscious he wasn't lucid either, for quite a while. While we knew he was unwell at the time there were no indications that something so sudden and serious could happen. He was the only one earning at the time and if our accounts hadn't been joint I could have been completely screwed.

And we aren't the only ones of our friends in our age group to have experienced the sudden hospitalisation of one partner. It's not common but it isn't rare either. And looking at my extended family I can tell that as you get older it does start to become more common.

Tropez

Blobby8 wrote: »

Joint accounts mean my wife knows every penny I spend & vice versa it sort of goes with sharing & honesty, rather than secrecy & selfishness. Not suggesting that is always the case, but it is possible.
We do have accounts in our own name to maximize ISA usage, she wouldnt know how to access them, she barely knows they exist.
We rarely talk about money, if she wants something above normal humdrum stuff she usually just says which card do I need to use? Which is her code for "is it OK, can we afford this?"

Other than the joint account we have for paying bills we have separate accounts for everything else and we never talk about money aside from how much is in the joint to contribute to a holiday.

I understand what you're saying about sharing and honesty but I don't need to know what my partner is spending her money on.

There's no definite advantage or disadvantage to either separate or joint accounts, as I say, it is whatever works for the couple.

Rebecca01

Tropez wrote: »

You could make the same argument against joint accounts - where is the advantage to them?

Whatever works for a couple is what is right.

The advantage is that people like myself , SAHM or SAHD don't have to ask their partner for money as they have no other income, when your supposed to be a family.