Business Report: Digitizing your kids

In today’s world, smart phones are a must have, not only for professionals but for families as well. They are a part of everyday society and plug in to our modern lives. Now there are applications for everything and the idea of going paperless is catching on. That is why Current developed an application to help families distribute allowances and to teach kids how to budget. Current is a tool that teaches financial responsibility. It allows parents to track their kids spending activity easily from their smart phones and provides an opportunity to teach about how to go about earning from chores. Just create an account and attach it to your bank. From there, you can create accounts by utilizing debit cards and the digitizing begins. Get smart phone savvy and get Current for your family today!

We’ve all run into situations where we haven’t had cash for allowances, but, like many other things these days, there’s an app for that! Can you tell us a little bit about it?

Absolutely it’s called Current and as you mentioned, it’s an app based smart debit card for teenagers. The idea David, is that someone like me, a parent, is able to then teach their children’s financial responsibility and money management. It’s as easy as going to currency.com. I create an account, I attach it to my bank account, and from there I create accounts for my children. Once they have their accounts, they get a debit card in the mail. That’s an actual card and then they can head to the app and their app is broken down into three different wallets; spending, saving and giving.

This can help us with more than just payments…what else can we track with it?

One of the things that I love about Current is it gives me the opportunity to teach my children about how they go about earning money. So that allows me to either give them a weekly or bi-weekly allowance and I can set a specific amount or I can assign specific chores, specific tasks for which they would get paid if they wash the car — they get five dollars. When they earn that money, they’re more responsible about how they spend it. In our house, we’ve broken down the categories they’re allowed to spend up to 60 percent of what they have in their account, 30 percent is definitely for savings and 10 percent is forgiving.

One of the things that I think is fantastic, because my goal is not only to raise financially responsible children into adulthood, but also to create good citizens of the world. So, Current has it set up that the giving categories attached to two million different charities. So, all of your favorites are on there. Everything from wounded warrior’s projects to juvenile diabetes to the best friend society, which is a big one for my daughter because she loves animals. The second the kids had a $10 threshold in their given category they’re then able to turn around and donate that money to their favorite charity.

How else can we use this as a teaching tool?

I use it as a teaching tool because I think that the spending, saving and giving are the three tenants that I want them to learn in order to be financially responsible adults. But one of the things that’s fantastic about this particular app is a level of transparency that exists. If I hand my daughter a $20 bill, I have no idea what she does with it. If she goes to her softball game — she goes to the concession stand. Did she spend four dollars? Did she spend seven? But the second she uses her Current debit card, I get a notification on my phone that tells me not only how much she spent, but where she spent it. I’m here to tell you, if for some reason I do not like where she is spending her money it gives me an opportunity to either have that conversation or to block that retailer entirely.

Where can our viewers go for more information?

Current.com is the best place to go not only to sign up, but to get more information about the app. I do want to point out too for anyone who is interested if you’re curious about what the going rate for allowances is in a specific state you’re in, you can click on a link and it will tell you what people are paying, what the average is in California, New York, Georgia or Florida.

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Tags: DCypher Studios

About the Author

David Morales is the Executive Editor of The Hype magazine. A graduate of Eastern Michigan University, David has a background as an artist manager, writer, blogger, drummer, and in the human services industry. He is passionate about helping others, learning and has a deep empathy for the creative process. You can follow his social media @dcypherstudios