Kids spending money on in - game purchases

 Kids as we know nowadays spend a lot of money on games, it might be under the parents will or without.For example there was an article where a 16 year old kid from punjab had spent about 16 lakh rupees from his father's bank account without his knowledge and in my opinion I would say it is pure addiction to PUBG. I don't play PUBG and the most I have spent on games is 400  rupees which I think is the most any minor is allowed to spend

I think to stop this, parents should not have their account details saved in any gadget, so the child can't access it and the other thing is parents should learn to say no to their child or else it will keep on going and it will never stop. Parents should set limits and what not so even if the kids cross or if they don't stick to it they know they have to stop and eventually will.

Other things parents  have to do is to explain what is wrong or right about spending money on game. If the child is playing on a PS4 or Nintendo they can set money limits by restricting the money spent in the console since both the consoles are very child friendly.

 

The bigger problem right now is since kids are in lockdown and schools are closed kids are focused more on video games than anything else to keep themselves occupied.This again leads to kids spending huge amounts of money for in-game purchases. Studies also show even if the parental lock is available only 1 in 5 parents use it. 

There is another option available called family suite which you have to pay for. Using this you can monitor your child’s activity and suppose they want to buy a game microsoft will ask you whether or not to allow it. You will also get all the apps like word,powerpoint etc.The family suite by microsoft gives you one TB storage in one drive so you can share files with your whole family.You can also set boundaries for the websites your child can visit.You can also see where your family members are so you can basically track them for safety issues.

Internet and Screen Addiction in Kids

Internet addiction is a big problem these days for kids. Addiction is a major issue in many countries especially for kids. Now, kids are addicted even more because of the unprecedented lockdown for months due to Covid-19 in all countries.

Kids are often addicted to Mobile phones and Tabs constantly watching YouTube, playing video games and many more.

A few suggestions from me being a 12 year old kid that may help both kids and parents during the lockdown are :

1. Kids should attend any online classes of their interest which may range from learning new hobbies, new languages and can become proficient in their areas of interest.

2. Parents allocating work like household chores including managing the monthly purchase of groceries. Rewarding the kids appropriately will help prevent restlessness and idling away and also  they will learn to do the chore responsibly.

3. Another important aspect is implementing BREAKS. Having breaks after every 1 hour to slow down definitely helps and yes the breaks should be at least 30mins long.

4. Parents sit down with the kids and plan their day around the kid’s day and set specific timings for different tasks.

5. Last but not least is using parental lock to restrict their hours and what they are watching. This can also be used to monitor your kids in a daily basis

As we all are aware, it is very hard to control kids especially from the age of 6-18.If the addiction is not stopped at a young age there are many problems that will occur in the future. We all understand that it takes a long time to make good habits permanent, and it is also easier to do it at a young age. We have to remember to implement this process every single day to  stop addiction. We also know it will be very hard to control later on.

The internet is a very dangerous place especially for kids since when  they play games or use social media they can easily be convinced by strangers to chat or play with them which is another reason for addiction. It is a reason because they keep playing with strangers since they are very nice or good at the game.

The main issue is kids can be convinced or rather manipulated.

To conclude, I hope this has been helpful in some ways. These are my short and brief solutions. We will discuss more in detail in my next blog which will be about different problems kids are facing nowadays.