Windows 10: Child account balance not reflecting purchase

Added money to child’s account, the money was taken from card and i have microsoft receipt for payment but the child account is still showing 0 balance so where has the money gone? I added the money from my child’s profile within my family management profile

:)

 

Authorizing a child purchase results in being prompted to add money to the account despite enough credit for the purchase

September 2020... still the exact same problem, getting caught in a loop after adding funds.

As per SoggyStargazer suggestion:

1. Add the required funds.
2. Select Spending on the child account
3. Turn off 'Needs organizer approval to buy things'
4. Get the child to logout of their account
5. Get them to purchase whatever it is again, this time they should be able to spend the balance without requesting approval
6. Once done turn ON 'Needs organizer approval to buy things'

What is even more annoying is that you can't add the exact funds. My child wants to buy a £3.20 add on, yet I can only add a minimum of £10.

What happens to the remaining £6.80? I don't know, but it also states very clearly that you can get no refunds. Also sniffing around there seems to be no way to transfer balances from account to account within a family.

This is extremely bad.

 

Why does family safety prevent my childs account from purchasing games with the balance available on their account?

Hello BackwardMonster,



Greetings!



Thank you for posting in Microsoft Community.

Based on the description, you are having problem with making purchase of the child account using Microsoft account balance and unable to add payment instrument to the child account. Let us check and see on what we can do to help resolve your concern in a timely manner.

We would like to ask few questions to help us isolate the issue further.

1. Can you tell us what specific games you are trying to purchase? Is it an Xbox 360 backward compatible game?

2. Can you tell us exactly how much the account balance is and the price of the game?

3. What device are you trying to use to purchase the game? Have you tried different devices and still getting the same error?

4. When you add the funds to your child account, did you make it on the web or on the Xbox Family Settings app?

5. When you try to add the payment instrument to your child account, are you getting error code or error message?

The issue seems to be strange considering that there were different support who already tried to resolve the problem. If the suggested workaround provided below will not help, we will consult this to our internal support team for further assistance. For now, allow us to do the best we can.

1. Try adding funds to child account by following these methods below:

On the web:

• Sign in to the Microsoft Family Safety site with your account.
  
  Sign in to your Microsoft account
  
• Under the member whose account you want to manage, select More options > Spending.
  
• Under Microsoft account balance, select Add money.
  
• Select the desired amount of money, and then select Next.
  
• Follow the onscreen instructions to complete the transaction with a payment method you have on file or by selecting Add a way to pay.
  

On the Spending page, you can select How to add a card under Credit cards for instructions on adding a payment method to a member’s account. Note Make sure that you enable purchase notifications and approval if you decide to add a payment option directly to a member’s account.

On the Xbox Family Settings app:

• Launch the app on your mobile device.
  
• Select the member whose spending you want to manage on the home screen. Or select Settings, and then select the member’s account.
  
• Under Spending, select the Ask to buy tile.
  
• Under Microsoft account balance, select Add money.
  
• When the in-app browser loads, select the desired amount of money, and then select Next.
  
• Follow the onscreen instructions to complete the transaction with a payment method you have on file or by selecting Add a way to pay.
  

For your reference, see: Approve a family member’s purchases and funds | Xbox Support

• Add money to your Microsoft account - Microsoft Support
  

We look forward to your response. Kindly let us know, if there is any misunderstanding or clarifications of our description by sending us a reply.



Sincerely,

 

Better management of "child accounts" needed for purchases

Both myself and my daughter have Windows Phones, however I have set her account up as a child account. Normally I have the setting for "Purchases" disabled, however the process to buy apps on her account when needed is incredibly tedious.



1. Sign in as child on the zune.net website

2. Enable Purchases

3. Sign in as Parent to authorise the change

4. Wait *ages* for the change to take effect

5. Go back to the app store and buy the app (or wait if the change isn't in effect yet)

6. Once installed, repeat steps 1-4 to disable purchases again

7. Hope in the meantime your child hasn't taken the opportunity to buy lots of other stuff as well



It would be really great if a different system could be implemented. How about:

• Child tries to buy the app, a notification goes to the parent to "approve" the purchase, or;
• The parent is able to manage child accounts directly under their own zune.net account and can buy "on behalf of...". or;
• When the child tries to buy an app, it just prompts at that time for the parent to login to "sign for" and approve the purchase

I love the option to have and manage child accounts and the family security settings, but this particular process is really painful.



Regards,

Scott.