RoosterMoney review
This allowance app teaches your kids about saving and spending, but it’s not an actual bank account.
finder.com’s rating: 4.4 / 5.0
★★★★★
RoosterMoney is not a virtual bank account. It’s an allowance app designed to teach kids about earning, spending and saving money.Reward your child for their chores and add money for their allowance or special events using either fake currency or stars. Then use the app to teach them to save toward a goal or spend the money and stars they earn to give to charity or make purchases. But chore management tools and automatic withdrawals for purchases like subscriptions cost extra.
From $0 per month
Fee
N/A
APY
$0
Minimum deposit to open
Details
| APY | N/A |
|---|---|
| Fee | From $0 per month |
| Minimum deposit to open | $0 |
| Intro or bonus offer | 1 month free trial |
| ATMs | No access to ATMs |
Review by
Heather Petty
heather.petty@finder.comHeather Petty is a personal finance writer at Finder specializing in home loans, banking and insurance. After falling victim to a disreputable mortgage broker when buying her first home, she’s on a mission to help readers avoid similar experiences when managing their own finances. A self-proclaimed word nerd, her writing has been featured on MSN, Credit.com and MediaFeed.org, among others. Heather previously worked as a technical writer and editor for the casino systems industry and is an internationally published young adult mystery author. She holds a bachelor’s degree in English with a minor in journalism from the University of Nevada, Reno.
Expert review
RoosterMoney, like Bankaroo, is best for kids who want to learn how to manage their finances but aren’t yet ready to get an actual kids bank account or debit card. But compared to Bankaroo, RoosterMoney has better features to track your kids’ allowance on its free account and manage their chores on the paid version. On the other hand, Bankaroo doesn’t charge a thing if you want to add interest or match your child’s account balance to boost their savings.But if your kid is ready for a real bank account, you can compare the best debit cards for kids to help them take that next step.
How much does RoosterMoney cost?
RoosterMoney has a free and paid plan:| Plan | Price | Features |
|---|---|---|
| Virtual Tracker | Free |
|
| Rooster Plus | $18.99 a year or $2.99 a month | Everything in the free plan, including:
|
How do I open a RoosterMoney account?
Sign up for RoosterMoney in six steps:
- Go to the provider’s site and follow the steps to apply.
- From the provider website, select Get started for free.
- Enter your name, email and password to start an account.
- Select or enter what your kids call you.
- Choose your country and the currency you use.
- Select the features you’re interested in, loosely based on your children’s ages, or select I’m not sure yet.
- If you have a referral code, enter it and choose Create Account.
How do I add an account for my child?
Once you’ve signed up for a RoosterMoney account, you can add your child’s account in six steps:
- Select Add Child.
- Enter your child’s name and date of birth.
- Choose a photo or icon to represent your child.
- Select your child’s gender.
- Choose whether you want your child to use the app to earn money or stars, and select Next.
- Choose whether to set up a regular allowance and the frequency, and select Complete.
What are the benefits of a RoosterMoney account?
Rooster has many features to help your child learn about money, no matter their age. You can enjoy:
- Separate child accounts. You can create a separate account for each of your children, which they can either use on their own devices or sign into through the app on your device.
- Teaches budgeting. You can set up pots or categories for spending, saving and giving to teach your child how to budget their allowance dollars or stars. And if you have the Rooster Plus version, you can set automatic withdrawals for recurring expenditures like subscriptions.
- Encourages savings and giving. With the savings category, you can set a dollar or star amount with a picture of the savings goal, and your child can choose how much of their allowance to save toward that goal. Your child can also assign some of their allowance money to charities each week or month.
- No age restrictions. Although any child can use RoosterMoney, the suggested age range is 4-14 years old.
What should I look out for?
Keep the following potential drawbacks in mind before you download the app:
- Not a bank account. This app may eventually add a debit card option in the US, but it currently doesn’t work with real money.
- Requires binary gender choice. The app currently forces you to choose boy or girl for your child’s gender because the app uses he/she pronouns. RoosterMoney is aware that it’s currently excluding non-binary and gender-neutral kids and they have plans to change this requirement soon.
- App sends many emails. While app reviews are mostly good, many customers complain about the amount of emails they receive from RoosterMoney. You can opt out of the app’s newsletter and other update emails, but service and feedback requests still go out regularly.
- Doesn’t work offline. Users can open and navigate in the app offline, but you can only make additions or changes with an Internet or a cell network connection.
Is RoosterMoney safe for my child to use?
RoosterMoney complies with the US Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). It limits its data collection on minors who use the app to analytics for developers to make improvements. Your child’s data isn’t shared with third parties and can be completely wiped from the service at your request.RoosterMoney reviews and complaints
RoosterMoney is beloved on Trustpilot with an average rating of 4.8 out of 5 stars based on 683 reviews as of July 2021. These reviews are a mixture of US and UK users, who experience slightly different features of RoosterMoney depending on where they live.
Customers report that their kids respond well to the money tracker. Parents praise the app’s usability, including its chore management tool, and RoosterMoney’s proactive and helpful customer service. The negative reviews are mainly from UK users citing difficulties using the RoosterMoney debit, which is not currently available in the US.
Compare RoosterMoney with other kids accounts
Use the table to explore other kids debit card accounts and compare fees and key features.
How do I contact RoosterMoney customer service?
You can contact Rooster by email at hello@roostermoney.com or by using the online form or live chat on the website.
Frequently asked questions
What RoosterMoney debit cards are available for my child to use?
The RoosterMoney debit card is currently not available in the US. Only users in the UK have that option. But you can take a survey on the company website to show interest in bringing that feature to the US.
What currencies does RoosterMoney support?
The application supports over 51 currencies, but you can’t use multiple currencies within the same account.
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