Most Indian Parents Worried About Children Shopping Online: Survey

At a time when e-commerce market is growing, a majority of parents worry that their children could be tempted to buy unnecessary products while shopping online, a survey has found.

Interestingly, ING Vyasa Bank's annual 'ING Zing' survey also found that 84 percent parents had shopped online themselves.

The findings are based on a survey of 4,067 parents with over 65 percent from metropolitan cities.

According to the survey, while most of the parents shop online, when it came to their children, 55 percent felt worried for different reasons with the most prominent worry being that the child could be tempted to buy items that are "not necessary".

They also strongly felt that children might fall prey to online scamsters.

Survey findings also showed that 49 percent of the parents would not encourage their children to shop online, while about one-third of the parents assist their children in buying a product after being identified or found by the child online.

Meant to capture the changing behavioural trends among parents and kids on money management, the survey also said that over 80 percent of the parents felt that their children follow their money habits.

"Even more discerning is the fact that children tend to pick up their parents' spending habits marginally more than their saving habits, at least among those who earn annually upwards of Rs. 8 lakh," the survey said.

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"...as your income levels go up, children tend to develop spending habits more while parents' tend to shore up their savings habits," it added.

In terms of pocket money, two-thirds of the parents were found to favour giving allowance to the child above the age of 10. Last year over 50 percent of parents were not in favour of giving out pocket money.

On average children below 10 years were found to have got either no allowance or less than Rs. 500 per month. Those between 15-18 years get below Rs. 1,000 per month.

Interestingly, a majority of parents felt that children only above 15 years should be allowed to operate a bank account independently.

"This should be seen in the current context where RBI had recently allowed banks to offer independent savings bank accounts to children above 10 years," the survey said.