Splitting bills in restaurants / drinking rounds

Will52

My father and his girlfriend have an odd attitude to money, claiming to be skint while going on 5 holidays a year and buying a £400k house in cash. They are the tightest people I know. That's up to them, but they don't show the same respect for money in their dealings with others. This has come to be particularly annoying in relation to going out with them to restaurants and pubs etc.

I've always been a fairly generous person (although, living in London, the associated costs, service charge etc, has curtailed this a bit) and, for example, at Christmas, I paid for everyone's meal, including my father's and GF's. This was far from cheap. After 4 years, this has yet to be reciprocated. They come to London to visit, we tag along, and they know how expensive everything is for us, but they never, not once, put their hands in their pockets.

When we go to restaurants, her default is to say 'let's just split everything equally' even though they have wine etc and starters. For a few years, I've grinned and beared it because I don't want to cause a fuss. But, recently, two things happened that really changed my attitude on this.

First, in a restaurant, I had only one main course and a beer, and she again did her let's split the bill act, wanting me to pay £38 for a £15 main course and a £6 beer. So i said no, we should each pay our own part (they of course had wine and all sorts of stuff). To which she seemed to take offence and went on the defence. Unfortunately, no one backed me up. I relented. Then, we went to a place recently, where my wife and I had some more expensive food and drink. So, I tested the water, "let's split equally as we usually do", I said. This time, though, she wasn't happy with that, she wanted to split this per person as we had had more. I was gobsmacked. I live in London, pay £2.5k per month in rent, I'm certainly not rich when it comes to disposable income, I'm saving to buy a place, why should I pick up the tab for everyone else's culinary decisions?!

I've come to realise that she's a chancer, a grifter. She is one of those women who just sits there and expects my Dad to shell out for everything, doesn't even go to the bar, not once, to get a round. So, to pubs. Quite often, my wife doesn't drink much, so what ends up happening is we drink rounds, but not the 3 of us, 'per couple'. So they will buy a round and expect the next round to be us, or more to the point, me. His GF, of course, drinks wine at £12 a glass in London, whereas I usually just go for a beer. She never stops to think that you can't expect others to constantly pick up the tab for you. So my round - expected to be every 2 out of 3 rounds - is around £28. And my Dad, once fairly generous, has fallen under her spell.

I'm not close enough to my Dad to really vent my annoyance. Am I right to be annoyed? What can I do about it? It always seems that the most well-off are always the ones benefiting financially from the less well-off. A microcosm of society, I suppose. Apologies for such a long post!

Penguin_

Will52 said:

My father and his girlfriend have an odd attitude to money, claiming to be skint while going on 5 holidays a year and buying a £400k house in cash. They are the tightest people I know. That's up to them, but they don't show the same respect for money in their dealings with others. This has come to be particularly annoying in relation to going out with them to restaurants and pubs etc.

I've always been a fairly generous person (although, living in London, the associated costs, service charge etc, has curtailed this a bit) and, for example, at Christmas, I paid for everyone's meal, including my father's and GF's. This was far from cheap. After 4 years, this has yet to be reciprocated. They come to London to visit, we tag along, and they know how expensive everything is for us, but they never, not once, put their hands in their pockets.

When we go to restaurants, her default is to say 'let's just split everything equally' even though they have wine etc and starters. For a few years, I've grinned and beared it because I don't want to cause a fuss. But, recently, two things happened that really changed my attitude on this.

First, in a restaurant, I had only one main course and a beer, and she again did her let's split the bill act, wanting me to pay £38 for a £15 main course and a £6 beer. So i said no, we should each pay our own part (they of course had wine and all sorts of stuff). To which she seemed to take offence and went on the defence. Unfortunately, no one backed me up. I relented. Then, we went to a place recently, where my wife and I had some more expensive food and drink. So, I tested the water, "let's split equally as we usually do", I said. This time, though, she wasn't happy with that, she wanted to split this per person as we had had more. I was gobsmacked. I live in London, pay £2.5k per month in rent, I'm certainly not rich when it comes to disposable income, I'm saving to buy a place, why should I pick up the tab for everyone else's culinary decisions?!

I've come to realise that she's a chancer, a grifter. She is one of those women who just sits there and expects my Dad to shell out for everything, doesn't even go to the bar, not once, to get a round. So, to pubs. Quite often, my wife doesn't drink much, so what ends up happening is we drink rounds, but not the 3 of us, 'per couple'. So they will buy a round and expect the next round to be us, or more to the point, me. His GF, of course, drinks wine at £12 a glass in London, whereas I usually just go for a beer. She never stops to think that you can't expect others to constantly pick up the tab for you. So my round - expected to be every 2 out of 3 rounds - is around £28. And my Dad, once fairly generous, has fallen under her spell.

I'm not close enough to my Dad to really vent my annoyance. Am I right to be annoyed? What can I do about it? It always seems that the most well-off are always the ones benefiting financially from the less well-off. A microcosm of society, I suppose. Apologies for such a long post!

Order separately? You would have your own bill then when it comes to paying.

sheramber

Pay for your own and tell the others they can do what they want. 

If anybody takes offence that is their problem, not yours. 

Refuse an invitation to go out with them saying sorry, I can’t afford that at present.

Or, stipulate before you go that you will be paying only for your own ( and wife’s?) share. 

Take control, before you go out, if necessary. You 

ButterCheese

There are a number of issues here which in no particular order:

Your Dad should be standing up for himself/you, instead of letting his GF take advantage of your good nature.

You should clearly state next time that you can't afford to split bills etc and will just pay for what you eat/drink.

If she takes offense, so what?  That's her problem, not yours.

You don't want to make a fuss?  It's not making a fuss, it's being reasonable.  She is the one causing a fuss my taking the P

You state that you aren't close enough to your Dad to talk about it - he must know this too.  But he chooses to let you suppliment their eating and drinking habits.

If I were you, I know it's hard, but I would absolutely state (in a text if easier) that "yes a meal would be nice, but money is tight at the moment so we'll just pay for ourselves".  If your Dad or his GF have any problem with this then in my opinion they are not worth your time.  My family are comfortably-off but also very careful with money.  But they would not dream of doing this.  Nor would I to them.

e.g. I borrowed my dad's wheelbarrow once, it was knackered and had been fixed 5 times with silicone sealer, nuts and bolts.  Whilst using it, the tyre blew out.  As a thank you for borring it, and for his time helping me, I bought him a new one for £60.  They've just sold their farm for £2M but that's not the point, we respect each other and always pay our way out of principle

oldernonethewiser

Only you can decide what you want to do about it.

Has venting on here helped in anyway?

It might have made you realise that is a big enough problem for you to stand up for yourself and do something or it might just be an inconvenience in the great scheme of things. 

heatherw_01

All you can do is say "I want to order separately" when they ask what you want to order.
That way you pay for what you way.

You can also just say to the server when the bill comes that you want to pay for what you ordered.
You don't need to be "backed up", you can just do that. The server will do that.
Then they can split the bill between the rest of them if they want.

You just do what you want to do.

I personally always say to the server "I am paying for mine separately" and never had an issue as many do this.

saajan_12

Will52 said:

I've always been a fairly generous person (although, living in London, the associated costs, service charge etc, has curtailed this a bit) and, for example, at Christmas, I paid for everyone's meal, including my father's and GF's. This was far from cheap. After 4 years, this has yet to be reciprocated. They come to London to visit, we tag along, and they know how expensive everything is for us, but they never, not once, put their hands in their pockets.

Don't agree with this, its your choice to be generous and its not generous if you're expecting someone else to return the favour, effectively equalling things out. Unfortunately nothing you can do here, next time don't pay for everyone. 

Will52 said:

When we go to restaurants, her default is to say 'let's just split everything equally' even though they have wine etc and starters. For a few years, I've grinned and beared it because I don't want to cause a fuss. But, recently, two things happened that really changed my attitude on this.

First, in a restaurant, I had only one main course and a beer, and she again did her let's split the bill act, wanting me to pay £38 for a £15 main course and a £6 beer. So i said no, we should each pay our own part (they of course had wine and all sorts of stuff). To which she seemed to take offence and went on the defence. Unfortunately, no one backed me up. I relented. Then, we went to a place recently, where my wife and I had some more expensive food and drink. So, I tested the water, "let's split equally as we usually do", I said. This time, though, she wasn't happy with that, she wanted to split this per person as we had had more. I was gobsmacked. I live in London, pay £2.5k per month in rent, I'm certainly not rich when it comes to disposable income, I'm saving to buy a place, why should I pick up the tab for everyone else's culinary decisions?!

Well what did she say when you asked why she didn't pay more as she had more last time? Its not about who can afford what, if there's an issue then agree beforehand how it'll be handled eg split equally or based on what you order. 

Will52 said:

I've come to realise that she's a chancer, a grifter. She is one of those women who just sits there and expects my Dad to shell out for everything, doesn't even go to the bar, not once, to get a round. So, to pubs. Quite often, my wife doesn't drink much, so what ends up happening is we drink rounds, but not the 3 of us, 'per couple'. So they will buy a round and expect the next round to be us, or more to the point, me. His GF, of course, drinks wine at £12 a glass in London, whereas I usually just go for a beer. She never stops to think that you can't expect others to constantly pick up the tab for you. So my round - expected to be every 2 out of 3 rounds - is around £28. And my Dad, once fairly generous, has fallen under her spell.

Rounds don't work if people aren't drinking evenly enough that you don't mind the slight variance. However in a pub its much easier to just agree casually beforehand that everyone (or the couples) can just order and pay separately. 
(as an aside, how do you get to 2/3 rounds instead of 1/2?) 
You can't really complain about the dynamic between her and dad, that's their business. 

Will52

Thank you for your replies, everyone.

I think the biggest issue going forward in regards to this is awkwardness. Of course, it's always the people at the sharp end of the kebab knife who feel the awkwardness. They won't. But I feel pretty strongly about it - not really from a financial perspective, but the principle of it. They are retired, with far more money than I have or likely to have. The lack of consideration is mind-boggling. They seem to be living in a bubble. Anyway, I think the solution is just to be firm about paying what I owe when the bill comes. Like some commenters say, if that causes offence, then that's up to them.

@sheramber I've already started saying I can't do this and that, I'd rather not go to a restaurant etc, but they come down for weekends, so it's sort of cutting my nose to spite my face.

@ButterCheese you're exactly right. I mean, without going into detail here, i think it's part of a bigger issue with myself and my father, going back to when I was a kid. Regarding this GF, it seems to me he's a bit insecure. She is 10 years younger than him, so I think he feels the need to suck up to her, both financially and emotionally (and politically even, he's completely changed over the last few years). As you say, it's not about the money, it's about the courtesy we have, or should have, for others, especially those closest to us. 

@oldernonethewiser yes I think it has helped! That's what I have been torn between, realising that it's not a huge amount of money and we don't see each other all that often and the principle of it, the fact that it annoys me so much. The gall of her - well, them - to me is unbelievable. So I will need to be firm on it in future. As I said in my post, it seems the people who have the most money are the tightest with it and always look for ways to save a few quid.

@heatherw_01 yeah, could do. Bit do you not think this would ramp up the awkwardness, based on the stand I made before?

@saajan_12 yeah, fair point. Maybe I didn't articulate that well enough. Of course I don't expect acts of generosity to be reciprocated, or equalised. No. But, considering how much money they have, and the fact that I'm his son, I dunno, maybe I expect the odd, "no probs, we'll get this'. I don't pay restaurant bills to get it back in return, but I've also stopped doing this with my father because of these issues. Well, this woman has got a brass neck, she's not afraid to ruffle feathers, to offend my dad's family. She just said what I have said in the past 'well I hardly had anything', but of course she then, by default, has the support of my dad. Regarding the rounds thing, sometimes my wife doesn't come out or she doesn't drink, so my dad will buy a round first (this being from both of them - he pays for everything for both of them), then us (my wife and I, or just me if she's not out or not drinking) - including her £12 wine - then back to them, back to me. So I'm buying 3 drinks each time, but only one for myself, they are buying 3 drinks but 2 for themselves. So, say, after 6 rounds, that's a total of 18 drinks, 12 of which have been bought by me (6 x £12 glasses of wine I might add). Sorry, I'm not good at explaining this point!

Thanks!

ButterCheese

Will52 said:

Sorry, I'm not good at explaining this point!

I think you've explained it fine.  It is awkward to discuss these things with family, but if you just say "nah we'll just pay for our own thanks" then that should suffice.  It's also about you learning that your presence there is enough.  You don't need to treat people to be worthy of their company.  If anything else is said then you'll have to make a decision whether you want to continue doing this, or (if it was me) I would simply not go out with them, and I'd tell my Dad why.  If relationships are important to you both then the demads of the GF and the money situation should not come into it at all

af1963

So, say, after 6 rounds, that's a total of 18 drinks, 12 of which have been bought by me (6 x £12 glasses of wine I might add). Sorry, I'm not good at explaining this point!

After 6 rounds in total ...

You've bought three rounds containing 9 drinks, and you have drunk 6. Three of those nine that you bought are £12 glasses of wine.

They have bought three rounds containing 9 drinks, and have drunk 12. Three of the nine that they have bought are £12 glasses of wine.

You're not paying 2/3 , you're paying 1/2 and drinking 1/3 of the drinks, costing a bit less than 1/3 of the overall total.

Murphybear

I am completely on your side.  I’ve had lots of meals out over the years and most of the time the bill has been split if everyone has had roughly the same amount of food and drink.  Having lived in London for 25 years I know expensive it can be.  

I used to work for a big University and one lunchtime I went out with 5 academic staff, I was the only non academic.  After we’d eaten a fabulous meal one person asked if anyone thought they had eaten  less than the others and they all looked at me.   I was more than happy to pay an equal  amount as I’d had such a good time but they insisted I pay less.  One did a sum in his head very quickly and came up with a low amount.  There was nothing wrong with the Maths, we all worked in the Maths Faculty.   They were such lovely people.  

When I left the University they took me out to an expensive restaurant, their treat of course.  My immediate boss told me to stay as long as I liked, after all, I was leaving.  I missed the job and my colleagues but my husband and I were moving to Devon, about 200 miles away.

I’ve  had a cheeky thought for you.  Next time you go why don’t you panic after the meal and pretend you left your wallet at home  . Do you think that would work.  Or you could try paying cash and pretend to only have enough to pay for what you had eaten.  You probably won’t get away with it more than once but it may teach the others a lesson.