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Meshel Laurie admits she feels to blame after her 9yr old son racked up a huge $1000 gaming debt.

Mum of two and local radio host, Meshel Laurie, shared on Sydney Morning Herald how her nine-year-old son spent $1000 on a Counterfeit Domino Crown and some MidSummer Horns for the virtual identity he’s created in an online gaming platform.

“Yep, I guess it’s our turn to be that family. The one with the big credit card bill thanks to the kid who figured out how to bypass parental sign-in procedures when using the card online but pleads complete ignorance when it comes to the pricing mechanism of his favourite site.”

Meshel confesses, “I was prepared to accept full responsibility, for not “being more present” as Instagram and utility company ads all keep reminding me I need to be. I’d given him permission to spend $15 on the site before racing off down the backyard to help my mother extract seven kittens from the chook pen (a long story for another day). Surely he’d been confused by the amounts on the screen, the poor little fella.”

But it seem he wasn’t confused at all. Meshel continues, “Was it an accident, mate?” I asked him gently, but before I could offer my theory, his shame-faced look to the floor gave him away. Then he came out with the rather odd non sequitur: “I was being lazy and I wanted to find out if you really do get emails every time someone uses the account.”

Meshel then admitted as any guilt ridden parent does, “I have to take responsibility for this mess. I allowed him to become obsessed with this terrible game because it kept him occupied. For months I tried to reason with him about the stupidity of spending money on it like I was talking to an adult, and then I was surprised when he didn’t seem to get how illogical it was.”

Has your child ever done anything similar to Meshel’s?

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  • Nine years old and she’s allowing him to purchase things online! No way! Not at nine. Not until it’s their own money they’re spending

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  • Oh my gosh. That is definitely one expensive lesson learned for both Mother & Son!

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  • My card is linked to my teenagers account, however she comes and asks me before she makes any purchases.

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  • OMG what! That is nuts.

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  • That’s crazy. What a shock for the parents. Probably lucky it was limited to $1,000 A bit more supervision needed.

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  • Sheesh what a shock, I suppose it was only (only!!!!) $1000, if her limit was quite a bit higher it could have been quite a bit worse.

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  • Wow~ didnt know the 9 yo nowadays can do this. I dun even remember what I was doing when I’m 9.

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  • Oh maaaaaan what a learning curve hey!

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  • I know a primary school girl who was told to steal her Mum’s cigarettes and at the same time was threatened what would happen if she didn’t. She was very quiet all weekend where she is usually such a chatterbox. She was staying with us for the weekend. We were very close then but she wouldn’t tell me. Eventually her younger sister told us. We told her Dad about it when he came to pick the girls up. He was horrified and was going to speak to the School Principal. I didn’t hear the outcome as we didn’t see him or his wife for a few weeks. She stayed home to do washing she could easily have done during the week.

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  • Thank heavens this wasn’t around when my kids were growing up – I’d have been bankrupted.

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  • Hopefully her son has learned from it and at least he was honest about it not being an accident.

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  • I am lucky my kids ask every time, for now at least!

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  • Oh my lord how did it happen my daughter knows better

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  • scary thing

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  • No – I’m sure they got up to things I wouldn’t have liked but credit cards and online gambling wasn’t around in my day. However my son I found out later used to take a pack of my cigarettes and sell them to kids from his school – cost to him NIL cost per cig to others 10c and if they wanted more than one the second was 20c. He was very entrepreneurial and made quite a bit of money. So who knows what he would have done in this digital age.

    Reply

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