Miserly friends

dktreesea

When I go out with friends we all pay for our own. A couple of my friends were sparrows in a previous life and don't eat much. Even to the point of my suggesting one day they share a main course because I knew there was no chance of either of them finishing one on their own. I wouldn't dream of splitting the bill and expecting them to pay part of my share.

theoretica

Are my friends and colleagues really unusual? The people I go out with seem to muddle along fine - larger groups split it up more or less evenly if we have had similar things with people who feel they had more putting in more, we usually have more than enough for the bill and tip and put the rest towards office biscuits or the pub. In the pub the coke drinkers buy fewer rounds than the wine drinkers and if someone needs a cheap month we don't grudge it as they even it out later or in other ways. If I am out for a day or weekend with a couple of friends we pay for different things and then take a tally if everyone is feeling happy or I buy the theatre tickets and a friend cooks dinner.

jaylee3

theoretica wrote: »

Are my friends and colleagues really unusual? The people I go out with seem to muddle along fine - larger groups split it up more or less evenly if we have had similar things with people who feel they had more putting in more, we usually have more than enough for the bill and tip and put the rest towards office biscuits or the pub. In the pub the coke drinkers buy fewer rounds than the wine drinkers and if someone needs a cheap month we don't grudge it as they even it out later or in other ways. If I am out for a day or weekend with a couple of friends we pay for different things and then take a tally if everyone is feeling happy or I buy the theatre tickets and a friend cooks dinner.

No not at all. My small group of friends in my office are all fine, and so are most people I know... it's just a select few...

And I am sure that most people on here have plenty of friends and family etc who are decent and reliable and who share. People are simply sharing stories of people they know/have known who are/were tight fisted misers.

timbo58

There are always going to be people that come into your circle of friends that will take the !!!! if you let them.

The trick is to only let them do it once.

A mate of mine (still a mate!) is so tight he squeaks, he'll never change, the thing is no one will 'do rounds' with him if we go out together as a group or split the bill as he'd only buy a round once and be in the bog the next time it's his turn until he knows someone else has got the round in.
So now, he's a standing joke -''we'll do rounds Fred (not his real name) -you get your own'' would be said quite clearly even before we got to the bar, even on a stag night.
He just shrugs, me? I'd be mortified if I thought anyone was going to say the same to me!

Loz01

The worst thing in the world is going for a meal, having something that equates to £8 and being asked to chip in "about £20" to cover it everyone else's wine (as a person who doesn't drink) Absolutely no way :rotfl: and I don't care if this makes me a tight wad :rotfl:

Gingernutty

I've remembered one.

I work in a place where staff can pay for a parking permit through the wages department. It's currently £15 - £20 per month depending on where you want to park.

One morning, Psycho Boss came in late, complaining loudly about the new policy of making everyone pay for parking, including the disabled.

Until then, any car displaying a blue badge was exempt.

It transpired that she wasn't complaining at the injustice of making the most financially hard-pressed people pay for parking when in many places they would get free parking.

No.

She was complaining that she was no longer able to get free parking by using a relative's blue badge.

Where was she going to park now? Her car was too nice to park in the street, she went on, it was bound to be damaged, robbed or stolen.

What was she going to do?

At that point, she was on a minimum of £37,000 per annum.

roobee13

I used to work with a girl who was so tight, when people brought in cakes/savouries for a birthday she would take so much she didn't have to buy or use up that days lunch!! She was so brazen about it as well. On a work night out the same girl leeched drinks off a poor guy all night (she had a fianc! at home!) that when the guy offered her his number as he thought she was interested she said 'you don't think I'd actually go out with you?' Awful, just awful.

Another guy I used to work with was famed for only coming on work do's where the company were paying - we used to get treated well an awful lot but a do we organised ourselves? Not interested. At one Christmas do he came round the tables to see who was drinking the red/white table wine and basically pocketed any bottles people hadn't used!!

I went on holiday with a friend once who I'd known 10 years. It wasn't til the holiday that I realised how tight she was. I paid for so many drinks, club entry, taxis etc and she never returned the favour. Safe to say we're not as close as we were!!

My worst experience of miserly-ness has to be my friends hen do that I organised. Her work friends refused to pay for their drinks and I ended up £80 out of pocket. Never again! I just felt sad for my friend who had no idea she worked with such mean-spirited people!!

I'm in agreement with the majority, a lot of us have to watch the pennies but there's such a difference between being careful and being tight (and trying to get people to fund you!)

Izadora

theoretica wrote: »

Are my friends and colleagues really unusual? The people I go out with seem to muddle along fine

I think the majority of people are like this, most of my friends are anyway, but the problem is that it only takes one tightwad to make things difficult. There's one person in our circle of friends who will take the pee as much as she can. We've pretty much worked out all of her tricks and know how to make sure things end up being fairly even but it's still annoying that you have to put in the extra effort to get someone to pay their way and there are times she doesn't get invited to things because none of us can be bothered to take on the hassle of getting money from her.

duchy

There's nothing worse than the everyone has put in and the bill is still short and the inquest around the table to work out where the shortage is -can ruin a lovely evening out.

I do remember my cousin organizing a meal for his brother visiting from overseas -and throwing a blue fit at the end of the evening because the kitty was short (it transpired the next day cousin hadn't read the bill properly and hadn't realized that as a group the service charge was added .... so as he had effectively "double tipped" he returned to the resturant the next day.........and asked for the tip back !!!!!!)

I tend to do what another poster mentioned doing and pay plus a bit over to try and avoid these kind of scenes.

aileth

My sister's ex was like this. He came with us for a short-break that we had prebooked. It was a cottage so effectively wasn't costing us any extra accommodation wise. They had only been dating for a month, he seemed excited by it and I thought it was a wonderful opportunity for him to 'impress' my parents per se.

It was a good five hour drive there. Not a single offer of petrol money. Stopped at services. Not a single offer of money towards the food we bought him.
When we got there, we did some shopping. He bought tonnes of sweets/snacks for himself but nothing toward the groceries.
Entrances fees, stood there expecting someone to buy him a ticket.
Went out for meals, ordered with utter disregard for cost, steak, speciality beer. Again, not a single offer for anything towards it.

The whole trip I think he bought one round at the grand total of about £15, and even then it was because my dad specifically asked him to, and when he did cough up my dad saw his wallet and he had WADS of £10-20 notes in there, must've been a good £200-300.

The clincher was when we were buying beer for that evening. He was stood in front of the beer cabinet and said, "I'll get some beer for (my husband)." I said, "Oh, would you like me to get it?" Offering politely, expecting a chivalrous, "Oh no no, it's my treat." His response? "Okay." I wasn't expecting it, had no cash on me. He actually gave me his card so I could transfer funds via my banking app to him, which didn't work, so he then made me walk across the road to get it out from a cash point! This was a £5 pack of beer! I handed him a £10 note from the cash point, and he then took an awfully long time finding me £5 'change' in his wallet.

We were all terribly peeved when we got back. My sister mentioned to him that he'd essentially got a free holiday, fed, watered etc, and it would've been nice if he could at least have taken us out for a meal as a thank you. Apparently he was really shocked that we had expected anything!

They broke up not surprisingly. He used to argue with her constantly about 'whose turn' it was to pay for meals out. She said they should just go Dutch on each meal, which he refused. He then started reeling off to her a list of where he had bought X, Y or Z for her or them, even things like cans of coke.