Splitting the bill in restaurants

[Vympel]

Was at dinner tonight (my friend's relatives from California were here for a couple of days and this was our only chance to see them) with a friend of mine and some of her cousins. It was about a dozen people or thereabouts.

We were eating at a mildly pricey place in Darling Harbor.

My friend ate a bit at home before getting to the restaurant, and only ordered an entree.

The time comes round to split the bill, and the 'host' of the dinner (being the relative with whom the American relatives are staying) declares that each person should pay $60.

Wait, what?

That's bullshit. First of all, I ordered a half rack of ribs for $28, plus a coke, whilst my friend had an entree size serving of calamari ($16), plus a bourbon + coke.

On behalf of both of us, I put in $70. That's almost double what we actually ate and drank, which I thought was more than sufficient (to cover helping to pay for the lovely American relatives with whom we stayed back in March, who everyone agreed should not pay for dinner because they were guests).

But the 'host' gets visibly annoyed at my friend for not paying $60 when she bought less than $25 worth of food and drink?! She even said it was 'unbelievable' under her breath (I didn't hear her, but my friend did).

This is why I hate this arrangement in large groups eating where the bill is split evenly when the meal was not even. A lot of people at the table ordered more expensive dishes, wine, and desert, yet someone who only had a single meal and single drink has to subsidize their largesse? What for? What's so hard about just paying for what you ate?

It's times like tonight I wish I could rewind the dinner and make a point as to what we think the payment arrangement should be.

[Stofsk]

Holy shit, you guys are lucky I wasn't there. I would have told the host to shut the fuck up. I pay for what I paid for, not what anyone else had, unless I'm out on a date (where I would of course pay for my date's dinner as well as mine).

Seriously, I would have been angry. As a host, my purpose for the evening is to make my guests have a good time and feel happy. This 'host' doesn't sound like much of one.

[Vympel]

Holy shit, you guys are lucky I wasn't there. I would have told the host to shut the fuck up. I pay for what I paid for, not what anyone else had, unless I'm out on a date (where I would of course pay for my date's dinner as well as mine).

Seriously, I would have been angry. As a host, my purpose for the evening is to make my guests have a good time and feel happy. This 'host' doesn't sound like much of one.

Indeed. Essentially, we together ate a meal that was still less than the meal everyone else ate (i.e. wine, main, desert, coffee!), I paid more than what everyone else was being asked to pay, yet Maria was still being expected to front up the same amount of money as everyone else. $60 for an entree and a drink. What the fuck, really.

[Mr Flibble]

My friends vary between simple division, and calculating the costs individually. One of the group loves to do the calculating of what every individual owes. Somehow in the process even though he calculates carefully (he claims anyway, he did get lots of mathematics prizes, so he should be able to handle it), it always works out that there is more money collated than the total bill. He then claims he must have overpaid, and takes the extra as change when he pays the bill.

That behaviour has led to us not going out to dinner any more to avoid being ripped off by this guy.

As to what is preferable, I always prefer, paying base on what I ate, not a simple division, especially since I rarely drink much, and usually pick something fairly cheap, whereas some of my friends think nothing of throwing money away on expensive steak and desserts.

[General Zod]

Whenever I go out to eat with people we usually split the cost according to what we ordered unless it was worked out ahead of time. Sounds like this guy's just being a cheap douche-nozzle. If I wind up short I'll ask if someone can cover me if I get them back or vice-versa and it's usually not a big deal.

[Dahak]

You should move to a reasonable country...
Practice here is that the waiter will ask "separate bills or one bill", you say "separate" and the waiter will process each guest and you only pay what you consumed.
Anything else seems completely bizarre...

[General Zod]

You should move to a reasonable country...
Practice here is that the waiter will ask "separate bills or one bill", you say "separate" and the waiter will process each guest and you only pay what you consumed.
Anything else seems completely bizarre...

Or just eat at a reasonable restaurant. Virtually every non-fast food restaurant I've been to will do that.

[Stofsk]

Holy shit, you guys are lucky I wasn't there. I would have told the host to shut the fuck up. I pay for what I paid for, not what anyone else had, unless I'm out on a date (where I would of course pay for my date's dinner as well as mine).

Seriously, I would have been angry. As a host, my purpose for the evening is to make my guests have a good time and feel happy. This 'host' doesn't sound like much of one.

Indeed. Essentially, we together ate a meal that was still less than the meal everyone else ate (i.e. wine, main, desert, coffee!), I paid more than what everyone else was being asked to pay, yet Maria was still being expected to front up the same amount of money as everyone else. $60 for an entree and a drink. What the fuck, really.

Ultimately, I think you handled it well but what gets me is the passive aggressive rubbish your host did.

You guys are great hosts by the way. Makes me want to come to Sydney again. That's, like, completely off-topic though.

[Mr Flibble]

You should move to a reasonable country...
Practice here is that the waiter will ask "separate bills or one bill", you say "separate" and the waiter will process each guest and you only pay what you consumed.
Anything else seems completely bizarre...

Or just eat at a reasonable restaurant. Virtually every non-fast food restaurant I've been to will do that.

A lot of places do that here, but there are always a few that totally refuse to do separate bills for some unknown reason.

[His Divine Shadow]

That's the dumbest fucking thing I have heard, this week anyway.

[Stofsk]

You should move to a reasonable country...
Practice here is that the waiter will ask "separate bills or one bill", you say "separate" and the waiter will process each guest and you only pay what you consumed.
Anything else seems completely bizarre...

Or just eat at a reasonable restaurant. Virtually every non-fast food restaurant I've been to will do that.

A lot of places do that here, but there are always a few that totally refuse to do separate bills for some unknown reason.

Never underestimate the woeful service some restaurants have.

The last time I was in Sydney, my mother and I had lunch at a restaurant by the harbour. The service was simply put, lousy (the food wasn't too great either). It was one of those situations that I nearly got up and walked away from the table. (I actually didn't want to eat there, mum picked the place - I wanted to eat at a Japanese restaurant that was next door)

[Kodiak]

When he says "Everyone chip in $60" I'd just point out "Actually, we didn't eat that much. This will cover what we ate." Then let them decide if they'll accept that you paid for what you ate or if they're going to ask you to pay for their meal as well as yours. I once got caught in a similar situation and, not having the bill in front of me just paid what was asked for me and my date. Afterwards I did some thinking and realized that the person "hosting" us got their meal for free.

Separate checks is always a good idea when you're in unfamiliar company.

[Darth Wong]

But the 'host' gets visibly annoyed at my friend for not paying $60 when she bought less than $25 worth of food and drink?! She even said it was 'unbelievable' under her breath (I didn't hear her, but my friend did).

You have to get in peoples' faces when they pull shit like this. They think they've been wronged, when in fact they have been taking advantage. I had a roommate like this once; we all had an arrangement to chip in equal amounts of groceries, but he would count Subway subs as "groceries" even though he ate them as soon as he got home, whereas I would go on big $300 shopping trips to stock up the communal fridge and freezer. At the end of the term, he actually had the gall to accuse me of not pulling my weight because he had added up every fucking fast-food meal he ever bought for himself, and it added up to more than my grocery total.

I went ballistic and harangued him in front of everyone until he was completely broken and left. Fucking dipshit. If I hadn't done that, he would have continued telling himself (and others) that I was the freeloader and that I owed him something.

[CaptainChewbacca]

I've been at many dining occasions with fellow students when I was in college, and really 'pay for your own damn food' is the only way to go. Some restraunts have policies against splitting bills for groups of more than 10 (or in some cases 6!) people, but its best to ask. If 'everyone pitches in' there's always going to be someone who shorts things by $5 or $10, or who doesn't feel they should contribute to the tip. I've short-circuited requests to pay for other peoples' food by simply taking the bill to the register, paying for my own items with my card, and then handing a new bill back to the 'host' of the evening.

You have to get in peoples' faces when they pull shit like this. They think they've been wronged, when in fact they have been taking advantage. I had a roommate like this once; we all had an arrangement to chip in equal amounts of groceries, but he would count Subway subs as "groceries" even though he ate them as soon as he got home, whereas I would go on big $300 shopping trips to stock up the communal fridge and freezer. At the end of the term, he actually had the gall to accuse me of not pulling my weight because he had added up every fucking fast-food meal he ever bought for himself, and it added up to more than my grocery total.

I had something similar with my roomates in college. There were 4 of us, so one night a week each of us was to purchase ingredients and cook dinner for the house, with Fri-Sun being 'on your own'. One of my room-mates was a stoner, and would produce unmitigated shit for his meals that I couldn't eat, but he spent a lot of money on 'authentic ingredients', he was from Baja California and was convinced he was making delicious mexican cuisine even though everything was charred and tasted like mole sauce. I, on the other hand, would spend $25 on chicken nuggets, instant potatos, garlic bread, and veggies to create the kind of meal I had once a week my entire life. After a month, I was told that I was a 'cheapskate' and wasn't contributing like everyone else. I told my roommates to get bent, and I did meals on my own from then on.

[tim31]

Last year on my birthday Emily and I went out to dinner with friends; essentially it was three couples. After meals and dessert, I got up to go to the toilet, and when I came back everyone was looking somewhere else. It turns out that while I was gone the bill fronted, and they all pitched in what they owed, with Emily paying for me. Except that one of my mates(so I was told later) opened his wallet, declared 'whoops, no money!' and his wife simply put in for her own part of the meal and then looked the other way. So to avoid a scene being in progress when I got back from the john, other male friend and Emily covered the difference. Either a poor showing by this bloke or a brilliant bit of tactical work by the couple(two for one deal).

[Stark]

I hate bill-splitters in general. Like Vympel, I know what I spent and I'll happily chip in; if some dickface is going to declare xyz to be the 'contribution' from everyone they can fuck off and die. It boggles the mind that people can't deal with that.

Honestly, if the restaurant doesn't split the bill for you, it's not the sort of thing to work out at the table. Only people who know they spent way more than others would even bring it up.

[aerius]

I've never heard of splitting a bill this way before unless it's kind of fundraiser where you're paying for your spot at the table and not the food itself. Is this some kind of weird custom in Australia? I've never heard of something like this in Canada, even in formal business meals in fancy restaurants.

[J]

I've never heard of something like this in Canada, even in formal business meals in fancy restaurants.

That's cause you haven't been to the really formal & fancy meals with stuck up snobs Ivy League alumni or VIPs and foreign dignitaries.
Outside of such rarefied functions I've yet to encounter such an asinine method of splitting bills.

[CaptainChewbacca]

Yeah, its a rich people thing, because itemizing your meal expenses is 'undifgnified'.

[JointStrikeFighter]

It's not some weird custom some people are just cunts.

[Oskuro]

Around here, this practise is called "pagar a escote" (literally translates to cleavage pay ), and it is both very common, and a very common source of grievances and arguments. I would only agree to such an arrangement if the cost of the meal was agreed beforehand, for example if everyone is ordering the menu or somesuch. Unfortunately, restaurants not willing to split the bill are common here too, so check time is usually "whip out the claculator and complain" time.

[Spoonist]

If you are going to split the bill and add an extra fee to cover for "guests" then that must have been agreed upon beforehand. Otherwise your relative is being a douchebag. Especially since it was not only family.

Because everyone knows that splitting the bill like this makes everyone order extra so that they wont get screwed by the collective.

[Enigma]

If I ever end up in such a situation then I write down the price of the meal from the menu, add whatever tax and tip and that would be that. If the host disapproves of that then I'd show him a neat disappearing trick involving a spoon and ending with the host needing a proctologist. (I kid, I wouldn't use a spoon.... a knife maybe. j/k )

Everytime I went out with friends, we all paid separately.

[Vympel]

Yeah I was pretty much foolish for letting it go down like that - if my friend had told me what she overheard then, as opposed to after we had left, I would've said something. Like my friend said, now she's going to be the talk of her cousins all going on about how she didn't chip in, with of course no mention that she hardly ordered anything by comparison.

I was taken by surprise myself because every other time I've eaten with large groups, we've paid based on what we ordered, nothing more.

Oh well, at the end of the day we weren't ripped off, because we simply gave $70 and weren't going to hand over more. In retrospect, going to the counter and paying our part of the bill would've been a damn good idea, I should've thought of it.

[Korvan]

With my fiance's family the argument is usually over who gets to pay for the entire bill, with people pushing quite hard to be the ones to pay it. I was told of one occasion between two brothers where close to the end if the meal, one of them excuses them self to use the washroom, sneaks off to find the waiter and then tries to pay the bill. But it turns out the other brother had given over his credit card at the beginning of the meal to pay for it.

With friends and people form work, we almost always split the bill by what you ate. Had it happen a few times when people did pay for their food, but did not contribute to the tip which ends up looking bad for the entire table.