allowance

Pluralallowances

Formsallowances, allowancing, allowanced

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A regular sum of money given to a family member, especially one's own child, to spend as they choose.

   Each Saturday the children received their weekly allowance from their father.

   He spent his entire monthly allowance on video games within a few days.

   Note

   Within the family, the allotted sum of the general meaning becomes a regular private income. Thackeray's Vanity Fair shows it reaching beyond children: Sir Pitt Crawley gives his brother "a handsome allowance," an adult's support from a relative. Today it most often means a child's pocket money, and it pairs naturally with weekly, monthly and handsome.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   An amount, portion, or share granted to someone, such as a reimbursement or a sum given for a specific purpose.

   New employees receive a relocation allowance to cover moving costs.

   The charity provides a small food allowance to families in need.

   Similarallotment, allocation, grant, stipend

3. 3
   nouncountable or uncountable

   A reduction or deduction made by taking mitigating circumstances into account.

   The judge made allowance for the defendant's difficult upbringing.

   Even after allowance for inflation, prices have risen sharply this decade.

   Similaradjustment

   Note

   Most of its life is spent in one construction: make allowance for, or make allowances for, followed by whatever deserves to be taken into account, such as a person's naivety, inflation or fraud. Macaulay writes "after making the largest allowance for fraud," which shows the noun accepting an adjective of degree. Without the for-phrase, the word drifts back toward an allotted sum.

4. 4
   noununcountable

   The act of permitting, granting, or conceding something.

   The new policy took effect with the allowance of senior management.

   Photography is permitted only by special allowance of the museum.

   Similarpermission, consent, authorization, approval

   Oppositeprohibition, refusal

   Note

   Of all its meanings, this one stays closest to the verb: Middle English allouance, from Old French alouance, and in English terms simply allow plus -ance. Shakespeare and Fletcher write of acting "without the King's will or the state's allowance," meaning sanction from above. In current prose the noun usually appears as "the allowance of" something, and permission is often the plainer choice.

5. 5
   nouncountable

   In engineering, a deliberate difference built into a design between a part's exact size and its nominal or theoretical size.

   The drawing specified an allowance of half a millimeter between the piston and cylinder.

   Designers calculate the allowance before deciding on machining tolerances.

   Note

   Engineers use the word for a difference built in on purpose, typically between parts meant to fit together. It is easily confused with tolerance. The allowance is decided on the drawing, while tolerance is the variation permitted when the part is actually made. Whether the planned allowance leaves a gap or an overlap determines what kind of fit the parts will have.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A deduction from the gross weight of goods, such as to discount the weight of the container or to follow a country's custom.

   Customs officials applied a standard allowance for the barrels before charging duty.

   The buyer demanded an allowance for the heavy sacks holding the grain.

   Similardeduction

   Note

   Commerce uses the word on the scales. Gross weight minus the allowance gives the weight actually being traded. The deduction may cover crates, barrels or sacks, or it may follow a trading custom that differs from country to country. Read without context, an allowance on goods could suggest a price discount. In this trade sense, what comes off is weight, not money.

7. 7
   nouncountable or uncountable

   The act of acknowledging or admitting something.

   The report includes an allowance of past errors by the committee.

   There was a grudging allowance of his rival's genuine talent.

   Similaracknowledgment, admission, concession, recognition

   Oppositedenial

8. 8
   verbtransitive

   To supply something in a fixed and limited quantity.

   Throughout the drought, tap water was allowanced to a few gallons per household each day.

   When the shipment was delayed, the clinic had to allowance its remaining vaccine doses.

   Similarration

   Note

   The object shifts here from the people to the supply itself: provisions, water or doses are allowanced, not the crew. This use sits comfortably in the passive, as in "our provisions were allowanced." Ration is the familiar modern equivalent, and it takes both kinds of object, covering this use as well as the rationing of people.

9. 9
   verbtransitive

   To put someone on a fixed allowance, especially of food and drink.

   The commander chose to allowance the troops once rations grew scarce.

   During the drought, officials allowance every household in the town.

   Similarration

   Note

   The noun turned verb: to allowance someone is to put them on a fixed ration. The forms are allowances, allowancing and allowanced. The object is the people being rationed, as in "the captain was obliged to allowance his crew." The verb therefore treats a whole company as the thing placed under limits, and provisions and drink are what it usually restricts.

10. 10
    nouncountable

    A permitted reduction in the weight that a racehorse is required to carry.

    An apprentice rider's allowance let the horse carry several pounds less than its rivals.

    The mare's allowance reduced the weight she carried in the handicap.

    Oppositepenalty

    Note

    Racing measures it in pounds: an apprentice jockey on the Flat starts with an allowance of 7 lb, so the horse carries that much less. Its opposite is the penalty, which adds weight. Allowance and penalty push the burden in opposite directions, and both are ways of adjusting what a horse must carry before the race is run.

11. 11
    nouncountable

    A permissible deviation in the weight and fineness of coins from the standard prescribed by law.

    Inspectors checked that each batch fell inside the legal allowance for fineness.

    The coins passed because their weight stayed within the permitted allowance.

    Similartolerance

    Note

    Minting uses the word for a margin of forgiveness. The law sets a standard of weight and fineness, and the allowance is how far a coin may stray from it and still pass, because exact conformity is too hard to secure. The older mint term for the same margin is the remedy. Unlike the engineer's allowance, this one is a concession to imperfection, not a design choice.

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