How do I broach bill-splitting when dining out with friends?

richardw

Most mobile phones have a calculator, to help you add up your bit, and if paying with cash have a variety of coinage/notes on you so you can put your bit in without argument.

ceridwen

I guess another way to approach this would be to keep a mental "running tally" of how much one spends in a communal meal ("right - I've just spent £8, add another £4 - that makes it £12 to date" etc) throughout an evening and then put the exact "tally" worth of money on the saucer at the end of a meal (with x% extra if you want to add in a tip) and say "Thats mine then" and hand the saucer round the table to the next person. It would put the onus on the others to put in the exact amount they've spent too - as the saucer passed to their seat at the table.

I suppose ultimately - in O.P.'s circumstances - if I'd explained on two occasions that I'd only spent, say, £15 for what I'd had - but an equal division of the bill would have meant me handing over, say, £30 and those people persisted in embarrassing me by making me explain why before handing over the correct amount just to cover myself then I wouldnt bother to "keep company with them" anymore - as I would think "if they think that little of me and have that little consideration/empathy for someone else - then why would I want to bother with people like that anyway? I'll go and find nicer/fairer company to keep".

BitterAndTwisted

The only thing more annoying than having to split the bill equally between those on a strict budget and the self-indulgent is having a person at the table who whips out a calculator and pays their share (excluding tip) to the penny.

A vague friend-of-a-friend was a past-master it this: chose only one of the cheapest main courses, declared that funds were tighter than a duck's-a**e so could only pay for what she ordered, cleared her own serving dish not leaving a speck and spent the whole meal-time cadging little "tastes" of whatever anyone else had ordered. Waiting for the calculator to come out always provided a bit of amused anticipation and I daresay it was better for our mental health than fantasising clobbering her over the head with the damned thing.

I think once the OP has made their position clear at the start the friends will understand and accept them paying for only their own order rather than an equal percentage.

spaghetti_monster

I guess they don't call it going dutch for nothing...

Another thing that goes with the bluntness I suppose is not worrying too much what other people think of you. When I was younger I think I really worried about that.
Nowadays I'm older, I care less. Like others here I don't really have friends who would mind splitting the bill fairly - going dutch seems to be the norm. I'm not friends with anybody who would make me feel bad if I didn't subsidise them in a restaurant!

Soubrette

Definitely make it clear from the beginning, from my experience most people split the bill because they are lazy and can't be bothered to work it out and couldn't really care less if you want to work yours out.

But you have to be scrupulous in paying exactly what you owe - I had a colleague who first time we went out refused to pay for drinks as he hadn't been drinking (thereby getting his 3-4 soft drinks for free), on another occasion refused to pay the tip as he didn't believe in tips (as our party was over a certain amount of people there was an automatic gratuity charge, and for the final time he was invited out refused to pay for his meal as he did not like the taste of it but refused also to complain to the waiter.

He did not get invited out with us again.

Sou

terryw

Slightly off-topic here.

Some years ago I went for an Indian meal with a near acquaintance. He had never been for a an Indian meal before. When the bill came, I glanced at it and said "£10" (or whatever) that's £5 each. He immediately retaliated with, "Oh no, you ordered extras" . Which I had........a pompodom and a bombay duck . He laboriously worked it out to the exact figure, and with the cost of his curry king prawn, against my veg curry, the final split was £6/£4 in my favour. That'll teach him to be penny-pinching!

zippychick

PasturesNew wrote: »

What annoys me in these situations is when you've sat and had just the main meal and a jug of water ... while everybody else ordered starters, wine, king prawn everything plus extras they never ate, more wine, coffee, couple of brandies .... then when you point out you spent £8 so here's £10 ... they make out YOU are being tight, or unfair. It's the greedy !!!!!!!!!!s that are the tight/unfair ones.

I don't know how to solve it. I always pay for myself when I go out, even if I have to dig my heels in (because if I am sat there with just £10 in my pocket I can 't split the bill and magic up £20-25 out of thin air).... but they do make you feel like !!!!!!.

We need a phrase that says "It's FAIR that we all pay for what we had - so the freeloading b4stards among us don't get a chance to ponce by bullying others to pay for it ... "

I absolutely hate that! If i order steak or something, i always make a point of putting extra in but other people don't seem to think it matters if they have drank twice as much as you! personally another good option is to keep drinks off the menu, that way its only a food split, so its less likely to be completely exaggerated and disproportioned for most.

PasturesNew

ceridwen wrote: »

I think the phrase you want Pastures is "Lets all just go dutch". I presume people still use this phrase.

I think many people would interpret this as meaning "let's split the bill", it's not a common phrase. I didn't know it meant "pay for what you had", although I've never used the phrase.

laurad85

This really annoys me! when im out with a group of my partners friends there is one couple who never have any money. EVERY time we go out they order steaks and drink after drink then suggest we all split the bill, another words they get what they want and we all pay for it. The last time we went out my OH said no way were we splitting and we would pay for what we had but everybody started complaining-it seemed the rest of the party were happy to pay out and we were causing a fuss! i was really annoyed with everybody else for being too scared to say anything when to me its just common sense to pay for what you eat, and being a student at the time they all knew i had no money. Hopefully wont be eating with the said couple again if i get my way

lostinrates

I would have no issue with people saying at the beginning of the meal that they are on a budget and needed to keep to a main course or something (in fact I'd keep them company rather than have a full meal myself). I would find it a bit uncomfortable if they skirted the issue or left it to the end of the meal: if they are not hungry and I am for example it might colour my decision on what to order myself. I would always assume, unless discussed at the beginning, a meal was going to be spit evenly.

The worst meal out ever was a friends birthday party where someone joined with a girlfriend who spoke no English and I sat next to them as I did speak french, as they did. The couple said they weren't hungry and wouldn't have starters, and then asked to try mine (I'd never met them before, and the french girlfriend hadn't met anyone else in the party) and proceeded to polish it off. They also tried some of everyone elses. When the bill came they insistd they had had no starter and only a glass of wine each and refused to pay. (If I were the french girlfriend I would have run a mile from the guy at this point!). It became quite uncomfortable as they HAD had more wine and had they said at the beginning of the meal , for ecample they were strapped, I think we would have felt different (and more generous). As it happened because they were more insistant they would not pay than anyone else was that they should the evening threatened to be soured, so I endd up paying ''their'' share to keep my friends birhday a happy event (the wine was £15 quid a bottle and I'm fairly sure they had had at least a bottle between them, plus my starter!).

If you are on a budget, as its not ''standard'' manners now to do other than split the bill evenly, I'd shout out at the beginning and I would be surprised if anyone took offense, and infact will feel more comfortable knowing what the expectation is, especially if you are hesitating (and without meaning to making others uncomfortable)