Splitting the bill

[welsh dragon]

It's not fair if the others had more but the one had to pay for it.

When we all went out in a crowd, we all paid what we owed individually as some had starters, some had dessert and some didn't.

We never split the bill equally. That's totally wrong.

 

[Ming the Merciless]

Farrow and Ball, Dulux, Crown, Johnstones, Wickes own, Homebase colours...

😂🤣 bloody autocrat

 

[CanucksTraveller]

I'm glad I don't eat with bill inspectors, that delightful post-meal autopsy of percentages and pennies and "who had what" has to be the most soul sucking experience ever. I can't abide it and I don't go out with people who spoil a meal like that.
Bill of 200 quid between 4? Easy, chuck in 60 and be done with it. I don't care if someone had two wines to my one, or that someone had dessert and I didn't. Jeez. It's supposed to be fun, don't suck the life out of it.

If on the other hand you have friends who are going to treat a relaxed, social meal as a subsidised bender and a menu hoover of the most expensive items, then you need to get new friends. I won't eat with people like that either.

 

[cougie uk]

I'm glad I don't eat with bill inspectors, that post-meal autopsy of percentages and pennies and who had what has to be the most soul sucking experience ever. Bill of 200 quid between 4? Chuck in 60 and be done with it. I don't care if someone had two wines to my one, or that someone had dessert and I didn't. Jeez.

If you have friends who treat a relaxed, social meal as a subsidised bender and a menu hoover of the most expensive items, then you need to get new friends.

I think if your share of the drinks bill is more than the cost of the food and you've not had a drink - then you're being brought out to subsidize their drinking. It's not so much a meal as a piss up.

 

[Ridgeway]

I think the alcohol aspect of this is actually irrelevant, the same discrepancy could be found if some had starters & deserts and others didn't.

So is the real issue the financial discrepancy or what caused it ie i'm OK if you had a starter more than me but not happy if you drank wine when i only had water.....

 

[PK99]

Interesting set of responses.

Our approach on most occasions is to split the bill equally but if someone is not drinking we initiate the idea of an uneven split. Not to pennies but equitable round numbers. Food split is always even.

Going out to footie games around the country is an interesting one. Always a varying set of folks and numbers. But we have evolved a varying round system. You arrive and buy yourself a pint plus anyone who is empty. Different folks repeat that on arrival or when empty. Result is sometimes you buy more than you drink, sometime less - on average it works out.

In Vancouver, it has long been table service only and the bill often comes itemised by seating position. Equitable splitting is then easy.

There is a guy in the local crowd who we no longer see... in the curry house if it was going to be buy your own, he had one dish and rice. If it was split-the-bill he had a starter and mixed grill.
Going to the pub, let's say there were going to be six of us. If 3 arrived, he would buy the round. If all six arrived he would hang back and buy later as round size reduced. If it was a kitty, last man buying topped up by a pound or two, this guy was never last man buying. His behaviour was noticed, and remarked upon.

 

[Arrowfoot]

The Asians have a practice where one person picks up the tab and the next round another will do it. It explains why split bills are not common in Asia and seldom offered in establishments. Interestingly the one who pays the bill for a particular round does not pick the location or the food, it more of consensus.

 

[BrumJim]

I think the splitting bill vs paying what you ate is a different argument, and that one depends on who is in the group. I've been out for my birthday before, where some of my friends are short of cash and would have saved up for the occasion, limited their courses/drink and chosen the cheaper options from the menu, whereas others in the group wouldn't have even had a second thought about the cost. In those cases, it is only reasonable to expect diners to pay for what they ate.

However on the alcohol side, it is completely different, unless drinks were roughly equivalent. In this case it appears as though the alcohol was a bit more than the cost of the food. As noted above, its like asking a non-drinker to pay for a round in a pub.

 

[fossyant]

Going to the pub, let's say there were going to be six of us. If 3 arrived, he would buy the round. If all six arrived he would hang back and buy later as round size reduced. If it was a kitty, last man buying topped up by a pound or two, this guy was never last man buying. His behaviour was noticed, and remarked upon.

He's not my brother in law is he ?

 

[gbb]

Its all about how its approached, upfront and clear, no problem at all.
We faced this a few weeks ago with a group of maybe 20 people, split into 4 bills, one couple wanted to pay seperate, the best advice i can give is specify to the staff you want a seperate bill before you start, leave it till later, it gets very messy....as it did that night.

 

[neil_merseyside]

We joined a load of friends after the races along with a bloke we hardly knew, he eagerly jumped in on the big meal, and immediately ordered a 'surf and turf' (it was decidedly costly back then) and ordered a 'big' brandy as well. When it was decided we wouldn't be splitting the bill as we had some drivers and lightweight drinkers 'we'll each pay our own' he went white, he only just managed to change his brandy as it hadn't been poured, he swapped brandy for a shandy . Seems he'd got away with subsidies for a while before he was rumbled, and he wasn't short of a few bob either, big high powered job somewhere.

 

[RoubaixCube]

for me it honestly depends on the company and my friends wouldnt be that inconsiderate to hang each other out unfairly like that.

We split the bill for the meal with one or two drinks then anything outside of that will be on a separate bill if people want to keep the taps at the bar open.

Its like an unspoken rule among my circle but we are very close.

Be considerate, be respectful.

 

[Milkfloat]

With my friends we tend not to split the bill at all - one person just takes it. Next time around it will be someone else who picks it up, it generally works out even in the long run, or the long run is so long that nobody can work it out. If we go out in families we tend to just split the bill evenly by the number of families as otherwise someone could get left with a hefty bill if they took it on singularly.

 

[KnittyNorah]

Swings and roundabouts, next time she will be drinking and the pendulum will come back.

Not if she's given up booze for some reason. Many people do.
Do smokers expect their non-smoking friends to pay for their cigs on the grounds that they'll be the ones smoking fat cigars next week?

 

[twentysix by twentyfive]

I always claim poverty and offer to do the washing up