Do you pay for only what you eat when you go out with friends?

[heartbroken22]

Sorry to the other poster who is asking but I'm glad they bought it up. Does anyone have any stories where friends have been a bit shocked because they had to pay for what they ordered? I have! Luckily a friend of mine spoke up and said how about we pay for what we've ordered (she mentioned how I at the time just had water with my meal whereas everybody else had a drink). I was quite depressed at that moment in my life and would just go out and pay together. Some of the other friends in the group would take advantage and order the most expensive meal and drinks. I think they found it hard to swallow their next bite when told they'd be having to pay for what they had.

Oh you do think rather a lot of yourself...

Depends. Our book group we itemise everything and pay for what we’ve had.
General outings with most friends/family we just split it, concessions made for those not drinking.

How do you figure that one out?

I innocently answered what to me seemed like a fairly uncontroversial question with an uncontroversial answer, only to get the chronically offended on at me saying I'm pearl clutching because I do something that you don't, that I think I'm a hero because I mentioned that I do one tiny thing to make someone else's life mildly easier, and that I think a lot of myself for reasons as yet unknown.

Go outside and get some fresh air my darling

Normal etiquette for a dinner in my experience (comfortable incomes) is splitting is the default option but if someone has eg an extra course they might offer to pay more. If someone isn’t drinking or is eating a lot less normally someone else suggests they pay less. But generally accepted that maybe there will be up to a £10ish difference between value of what people order and splitting the bill is still ‘fair’.

I am now back in the Chinese restaurant with the school staff Christmas dinner, my first such event, eking out my first year's salary. Nothing was said about how payment was to be made, so I sat there at one end of the table, carefully ordering the cheapest items and no booze. At the other end of the table, the headmaster of a large local secondary school and his wife were ordering the most expensive items and drinking a lot. The bill was split. I just about managed to cover what I had to pay, but it's stuck in my mind. When raising the subject afterwards, I have met with disapproval of my belief it is not appropriate to ask the poorest to sub the richest.

@WibbleBibble If everyone's paying separately we always work out the split ourselves, especially at somewhere like an Indian restaurant where there are probably various sides etc. Its a royal pain in the arse for a probably (even more so at the moment with the staffing issue) very busy member of wait staff to do. They don't know who's eaten and drunk what.

It's all very well to say 'well person X ordered the saag aloo so it goes on their bill' but they could have shared that with 2 other people.

Split it. Chuck in an extra fiver if you've ordered a sirloin steak or something.

It's excruciating when people pass round the bill and get calculators out. People forget they've ordered a side and extra drink and they rarely think to add a tip or they're too stingy to do so. At the end of it all it comes up short and there's a big debate on how to meet the shortfall.

You pay for the of experience of a great meal with friends. If you want an itemised meal go to the supermarket and eat it at home.

You pay for the of experience of a great meal with friends. If you want an itemised meal go to the supermarket and eat it at home.

But that's what the CFs always say when trying to gaslight people into subbing them. How come the lobster & cocktails people are obviously so much more fascinating than the pasta & coke people - to the extent that the latter have to pay more for the 'experience' of dining with them and the implied great pleasure of their company; whereas the former are paid for providing that amazing altruistic experience to their 'friends'?

I've heard of a lot of boot-filling determined bill-splitters trying to shame the more modest people with 'you shouldn't have come to the meal if you couldn't afford it' - when it is they themselves who actually can't afford to eat and drink at the rate they are without being subbed.

For the record, I'm a boot-filler when it comes to restaurants (not a drinker, though), but I'm very upfront about it and refuse to let others sub me, even if they try to insist.

It's ridiculous: imagine if you went to the supermarket with a friend and you had a few items in a basket whilst they had a jam-packed trolley, and then they suggested putting it all through the till together and paying half each. Who would ever try to suggest that as a sensible or fair thing to do? Madness.

I always just pay for myself.
I'm not paying for someone else's starter, side, dessert and drinks.
Being as most menus have the price at the side of each dish it's not hard to remember how much your own meal came to.

We just split equally, but anyone who knows they had more to drink or ordered the steak will insist on paying extra or cover the tip, although no one's working it out to the penny.

In my circle the concern is usually to make sure you're paying your way, rather than to get others to pay for you. All my friends are first to the bar etc and sometimes it can be hard to get them to "let" you pay your share.

What's a CF? I've never in my life wanted anyone to sub me 😂. The stingy ones who account for every penny, then forget to add a tip are the ones I've subbed! Mostly I'm out with trusted friends and if I end up paying more one night it balances out over the course of the year.
It's so embarrassing passing round the receipt and getting calculators out while the poor waiter stands by There is always a shortfall.

I prefer if people just pay for their own. When we eat out with friends we often go to a really lovely little country pub where you order and pay at the bar with your table number. So that’s easy then turns at the bar so we buy each other drinks.

I have however paid for the entire bill before but it’s a cost benefit analysis on how much I like the people. In one job we used to have free dinners out when entertaining at really expensive restaurants. Now this workplace was very sociable I did not like a couple of my colleagues enough to ever sub them. Job sorted by going to restaurants where it was a set menu. Myself and another colleague worked this out. We were never going to sub Mr dickheads dinner.

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It really isn't that much of a faff to add up a few items. When I go on a night out, I have a rough idea what I've spent when I order from the menu and so do the rest of the company.

If you you split the bill because you're all having similar dishes then fine. That doesn't mean that those who pay for what they order are stingy or can't afford it. What a strange thing to say.

I regularly go out with the same group for birthdays, Christmas, pre-show dinner etc but our tastes, dietary requirements and appetites are very different.

This means there can be a big difference between the most and least expensive meal.

This. Op you don't speak about the people as though they are your friends so why are you going out with them. I wouldn't dream of this even being a thing with my friends tbh