GoHenry review

GoHenry combines its debit card with an Allowance & Chores app, a savings product and financial education tools to create a quartet of money management features designed for kids between 6 and 18 years old.

While GoHenry’s offerings are robust, they do come at a price: A $4.99 monthly membership fee for each child, or a $9.98 monthly membership fee for families of up to four kids.

Rates and account details are accurate as of October 5, 2023.

Pros

Pros of GoHenry include no ATM fees and a number of parental controls:

• One-month free trial.
• No ATM fees.
• No foreign transaction fees.
• Individual spending limits for each child.
• Financial education app.
• Allowance-and-chores functionality.
• Parental controls.
• FDIC-insured accounts (up to $250,000).

Cons

Cons of GoHenry include membership fees and no availability of a credit card:

• $4.99 monthly membership fee for each child.
• $9.98 monthly membership fee for families of up to four kids.
• No rewards.
• No GoHenry-paid interest on savings.
• No credit card.
• No investment platform.

GoHenry basics

The core products offered by GoHenry are a debit card, allowance-and-chores feature and personal finance education toolkit.

Debit card

GoHenry is a financial technology company, not a bank, so it must rely on a banking partner to issue its debit card. GoHenry’s partner is Community Federal Savings Bank.

The GoHenry card can be used anywhere that accepts Mastercard, including e-commerce sites, stores and ATMs. It’s a prepaid card, meaning it’s loaded with a certain amount of money to spend. The card isn’t linked to a bank account.

The various restrictions that GoHenry puts on debit card purchases and ATM withdrawals helps inoculate kids from doing too much damage to their personal finances. (Parents who don’t want such limitations are better off using a traditional bank account).

DEBIT CARD
Maximum balance for primary account (including secondary accounts)	$6,000
Daily limit on dollar amount of cash withdrawals	$120
Daily limit on number of cash withdrawals	3
Daily limit on dollar amount of purchases	$2,500
Daily limit on number of purchases	10

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Allowance & Chores feature

The app lets parents send weekly allowance to their kids or pay them for household chores.

This has the benefit of not only digitizing allowances, which may fit the needs of certain parents, but also helping the child make a connection between work and pay. They can take pride in completing the task, receiving the monetary benefit and thereby continue to develop a sense of personal responsibility.

Additionally, they can needle their parents lest the latter forgets to make the allowance payment.

Money Missions tools

The Money Missions tool teaches bite-size money management lessons to kids through methods such as stories, videos and quizzes. Lessons are divided into three age groups — 6-11, 12-14 and 15-18 (coming soon). 

GoHenry says Money Missions meets national K-12 standards for personal finance education.

Parental Controls

A nifty feature of GoHenry is that a parent can determine where a child can use their debit card and how much they can spend.

A parent can choose whether to let a child use their card at stores, at ATMs and online. In addition, they can set weekly spending limits and single-transaction spending limits.

Furthermore, GoHenry blocks all purchases attempted at “over 18” merchants, such as gambling websites, adult entertainment websites and wholesalers of wine and beer.

A parent can tighten this age-related block by prohibiting transactions at restaurants, bars and convenience stores that sell age-restricted items — such as alcohol. But this means kids can’t buy anything from these merchants, even if they just want ice cream.

Parent-paid interest for savings

GoHenry enables parents to pay interest on their kids’ savings. You can choose the rate you want to pay and the app will automatically calculate and deposit the interest once per month. A parent can use an in-app interest calculator to calculate the interest rate and can change the rate at any time.

While this may help kids learn concepts like the time value of money, or give them a confidence boost when their balances rise — this feature is almost too cute by half and you’re better off setting up a savings account for your kid at a traditional financial institution.

Direct deposit for teens

Teens who are at least 14 years old can share account details with their employer so paychecks can be deposited directly into their GoHenry account.

Charitable donations

Through the app, a child can donate to the Boys & Girls Club of America or can set a savings goal for a favorite charity.

Giftlink

This feature allows parent-approved relatives and friends to send money to kids with GoHenry accounts.

About GoHenry

In 2023, GoHenry — founded 11 years earlier by a group of parents and friends in the United Kingdom — became part of the company that operates the Acorns savings and investing app. Officially, it’s now known as GoHenry by Acorns. GoHenry has 2 million subscribers.

How GoHenry stacks up

GoHenry vs. Greenlight

For the basic plan, Greenlight is $4.99 per month for up to five kids. Greenlight also pays up to 5% interest, depending on the plan you choose.

GoHenry vs. BusyKid

BusyKid is $4 per month (billed annually) for up to five kids. GoHenry stands out from BusyKid in part because GoHenry doesn’t charge ATM fees or foreign transaction fees, while BusyKid does (plus a bunch of other fees). However, BusyKid provides features that GoHenry doesn’t, such as an investment platform, and offers lower membership fees. 

If you’re in the market for a stripped-down service that’s light on fees, GoHenry may be a smart choice.

GoHenry vs. Chase First Banking℠

GoHenry doesn’t come close to matching Chase Bank in terms of size. Chase operates more than 4,700 branches and over 15,000 ATMs. Furthermore, the Chase First Banking account is a true bank account — with no monthly fee — while GoHenry is not connected to a bank account. 

However, Chase’s account (geared toward kids ages 6 to 17) comes with one big string attached: The primary account holder must have at least one of the five adult-only checking accounts at Chase. 

Don’t already have a Chase account? GoHenry supplies many of the same kid-friendly features as a Chase First Banking account, such as a debit card and allowance-and-chores functionality, without being required to maintain another account.

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)