You know that you’re in trouble when your children think that MOM stands for ‘made of money’!If this happens to you, I suggest you take immediate action!The current economy is a challenging one for us all, and teaching our children the dynamics of money management is just as important, maybe even more so, than some of the other lessons they have to learn.There are some great online tools that can help and after looking at several, I’d have to say that ThreeJars emerged as my favourite (www.threejars.com). While each of the sites that I reviewed offers something a little different, I felt that ThreeJars provides users with the most comprehensive set of options that are truly free of charge.ThreeJars is just that, three virtual jars to help teach children how to manage their funds. The three jars are appropriately labelled as Save, Spend and Share and account deposits can be allocated in any way you desire using these jars as accounts.For example, I deposit $25 each week into my daughter’s account and the allocation of the funds is $15 to Save, $8 to Spend and $2 to Share.The Save jar is intended to be used as primary savings account, the Spend is obviously funds budgeted for use and the Share jar was intended to reinforce the importance of giving back to charitable organisations.The site allows you to deposit virtual funds into your child’s account either manually or by using a direct deposit option. The direct deposit option can be set to automatically deposit funds on a daily, bi-weekly or monthly basis and at this point you will enter the amount of the amount you’d like deposited.Additional tasks/paid jobs can also be added using the calendar function and will appear as a zero balance until they have been completed.The banker adds the task along with its associated value and the rest is up to the recipient. To encourage positive savings habits, you also have the ability to automatically apply and track a set interest rate on their Save jar.Both the banker and child can see a history of each jar and what percentage of their allowance (deposit) was used for each category. When ready to withdraw, they select a jar; enter the amount they want and the reason for the withdrawal. They are also able to view a jar balance from this screen and the application will not allow them to withdraw more than is available in any one jar.Once all information has been entered, the child will receive a message stating the request has been sent to the banker and to see them for funds. If by chance they decide to deposit funds, they can give the funds to the banker and they will deposit into the account.Account set up was straightforward and user credentials are created for the parent (banker) and child in an effortless process. Even when logged in as the banker you have the option to view your child’s account as they would see it by selecting the “see her/his page”, located below your child’s name in the far left hand corner of the screen. Multiple children can be managed under a single parent account to keep things manageable.Users have the flexibility to transfer funds among jars (accounts) and also have the ability to run reports that track spending over set period up to one year. This tool is sure to provide the necessary structure needed to make your children think twice before spending that extra dollar.We’d love to know what topics you’d be interested in learning more about, so e-mail us at TechBuzz@btc.bm