Dirty washing? There’s a Fine for That

For parents, trying to make your kids be clean and keep up with the household chores is almost impossible. Teenagers don’t really have a burning desire to iron the clothes or mop the floors, but for one mum enough was enough, so she’s instilled a cleaning contract to keep her kids doing their bit.

Katrina Neathey is mum to Hayden, 19, Josh, 18 and Olivia, 13, so her kids are definitely old enough to help her out around the house or at least clean up after themselves, but for years Katrina has been running around after them, having to beg to get them to lift a finger.

After finding countless amounts of dirty washing, dishes, even off bottles of milk left around the home, her breaking point was finding her brand new $3900 carpet covered in mud. Her final resort was to turn to a cleaning contract for her kids.

The contract enlists the kids with the daily responsibilities of making their beds every morning, putting their dirty washing in the basket, putting away their clean clothes and not having food or soft drinks in their bedrooms.

The penalties if the kids fail to meet their contracts is a fine of $10 per rule broken for the boys, who both have apprenticeships and the loss of her phone for the day for Olivia.

A pretty fair and achievable list of jobs if you ask me, but others are in disagreement calling Katrina ‘silly’, ‘over the top’ and saying she’s ‘gone too far’, but for Katrina so far so good, her kids are following their contracts and finally giving mum the help that she needs.

What do you think? Do you think this is an excessive way to teach your kids to pick up after themselves, or do you think it’s a good idea that there’s repercussions for kids who are not doing what mum asks?