15 year old keeps getting parcels and I'm starting to wonder where the money’s coming from

[EarlyMorningTea0]

My 15 year old daughter has suddenly started getting little parcels delivered a few times a week. Nothing massive, just those small padded envelopes or little boxes. She always says its just bits she’s ordered.

Thing is I cant work out how she’s paying for any of it. She doesn’t have a job, gets normal pocket money from us and that definitely wouldn’t stretch to this many deliveries. We’ve not noticed money missing or anything odd with the bank accounts either.

I’ve asked her a couple of times and she just shrugs and says she’s got money. When I ask from where she says she’s been saving or sold a few things, but she’s never really had much worth selling as far as I know.

Part of me thinks she’s 15 and entitled to a bit of privacy, but another part of me thinks I’m her parent and if money is appearing from somewhere I should know about it. I dont want to accuse her of anything if theres a perfectly innocent explanation, but equally I dont want to ignore something that turns out to be a bigger issue.

AIBU if I insist she tells me exactly where the money is coming from?

If it was really, really dodgy, wouldn't she just be getting stuff sent to an inpost locker?

Again you need to be 18 to open a bank a/c unless an adult is guaranteeing it.

Does she actually have one ?

If you’re giving her cash for her pocket money how is she spending that online? Would she go to a bank to pay cash in?
My first job would be checking the bank account -
what goes in and what goes out.

It's not the stuff that's likely to be dodgy but where the money is coming from.

Again, you need to be 18 to set up a PO Box.

I would definitely want to find out in case she's doing anything unsafe/illegal

Is she even spending her own money, or does she have access to someone's card? Either given for who knows what reason or stolen?

You don’t need a P.O. Box to receive things in InPost locker.
Op already said dd has a bank account.

I’ve actually just sat down and had a frank conversation with my 16 year old today - in our case about a potential eating disorder . It turns out there is something else entirely going on . However I thoroughly recommend the frank conversation - good luck

I didn't know you could have a bank a/c at 16 - so that's something I've learned !

It seems that OP's daughter has a bank a/c that she (OP) might not be able to access. That seems rather unwise.

She does have a bank account but it’s one we set up years ago and I haven’t looked at it in ages. I don’t know if I’m even able to without her there, I’ll have to check.

Quite possibly dabbling in some trading, buying low selling high.

But equally, if the value of these things goes up. Then big red flags.

Could be free stuff, you can get loads of bits on those websites, sample perfumes and make up and the like. Or Temu, lots of stuff for £1s.

As she is 15 do you have any oversight on her phone or internet access?

We gave our eldest access to Vinted at a similar age, and gave things to sell (if they wanted to) and they were allowed to sell things of their own, with agreement, so we didn't have expensive things sold for a £5. This really helped them in terms of ownership over their own style and bit of responsibility.

On the other end if they do have open internet and phone access, it could be something more nefarious. I would be inclined to just be open, and say you don't want to cause upset, but you're a bit worried about where the money is coming from and you'd like to understand how she is affording these things.

I hope it's positive :-)

You can have a bank account at any age and now everything is online no need to withdraw money.

With £10/week she’d be able to get parcels coming in, especially if she’s buying from AliExpress etc.

However I’d still ask and make sure she’s telling you the truth. There’s other less great things she could be doing.

Banking app on her phone? Yes, definitely go through it - all money in and money out.

Ask how much it costs and work out if she could afford it. It could be an indicator of exploitation, it could also be very cheap items from temu/shien.

I would need to know too. Is it possible she is ordering from places like shein or temu with pocket money? Things are dirt cheap from there.

You should definately be asking questions or checking her bank balance.

Nobody said anything about setting up a PO box though.

No, but OP needs to investigate all options until she gets to the bottom of this.

The sooner she asks DD the better.

According to what I've read 11 is the minimum age for a Bank Account.

I have a 15 year old DD too so I understand about giving privacy and independence but in this situation I would be making my DD open a package in front of me and explaining exactly how she paid for whatever it is.
You need to make sure nothing dodgy is going on.
My DD sells old clothes etc on vinted and uses that money to buy stuff so could be an innocent explanation

You can have a bank account at any age, if your parent sets it up for you. The statements don't have to be addressed to the parent or anything like that.

Even as a kid in the 80s, I had a bank account at 10 and an ATM card at 14.

You're thinking of a current account. Plenty of bank accounts aren't current accounts. You can have, eg, a savings account at any age.

I’d want to know what’s in them and how she’s paying for them. If she only has a kid’s bank account that you opened for her years ago presumably she doesn’t have online banking?