When you go to a restaurant with your adult children who pays the bill?

[chroniclesofj]

My Children want to contribute but I never let them. Sometimes my mum pays

Same here. I will pay if out for their birthday/special occasion.

The adult children always offer and are appreciative but we always pay when we go out for dinner, for them and partners.
The only exception is if it's mine or DHs birthday and the DC have invited us out for a birthday meal.

Very much depends, but the last couple oft times I was with my parents, I paid in France and took them out for Sunday lunch in Switzerland.
When they stay with me, in Europe, I do all food at home and they take me out once or so.

Well maybe some of us cant buy our kids a car or give them a house deposit, so paying for the odd coffee or meal is our way of treating them.

Don't think that's too hard to understand.

Your reply seems a little tetchy

People are only answering the question, not applying judgement

My husband and I pay every time and we tell the adult children that we are saving inheritance tax. Our adult children have their own children to support and mortgages to pay. We don’t.

Sometimes they contribute otherwise it’s down to us, from a joint account.

90% of the time, I do. Recently DS1 paid for the whole family, as a birthday treat to me, which was lovely of him, and at times DS2 has insisted on taking me out for dinner or lunch which is also very lovely of him as he doesn't earn much. But it's usually me who gets everyone together for dinner in a restaurant, on the understanding that i am offering to pay.

We pay for DCs and girlfriends/boyfriends. There may come a time when we can’t afford it but we do for now.

My dad always pays for us and we always pay for our children. But we split with my in laws because they’re tight!

I saw a great Tik Tok - the caption was "Every trip is all inclusive when you go with Dad".

Mind you, I will happily pay everything for my DD until I drop dead..

Meals, I mean - not her whole life!

I've always paid since I've been working, and my parents are retired. We never had a meal out before that.

It depends a bit on the context but we would generally take it in turns. We don’t split the bill generally although DH does in his family.

I'd be thrilled if my mum offered to split, or even offered a contribution -or even came out with any money on her!

Ours are young twenties, no house deposits yet perhaps we shall perhaps we won’t. Didn’t pay for their first car either - but paid for driving lessons.

Will always treat them when we eat out. We can afford to.. they have student loans to pay off for ever and ever! House deposits to save for …

The reasoning is in the term, ‘treat them’. We like to treat our kids, what they do or don’t earn is immaterial to us, we don’t look at that aspect and determine ‘fair’ or not. It gives us joy to treat them, so why wouldn’t we?

Also, as another poster has said, it’s also in recognition that we got free uni, got paid student allowance to attend uni, had a plentiful job market on leaving uni and to climb the ladder initially, had an easy entry to the housing market, and went for long runs without significant cost of living pressures. While we have paid our kids way through uni and helped them financially, that’s still not much in the grand scheme of things compared to the much easier rides we had. So, it makes us feel good to treat them to meals out, takeaways or holidays. Plus, we’d prefer to do that now rather than saving it in order to give it to them when we die.

When I first left Uni and started working my parents paid for me, but now I’m in a better job (and they’re on state pensions) I mostly pay for them as I’m pleased I can treat them. It’s not an expectation from them at all though and if e.g my partner and I get lunch they’ll get the round at the pub after it.
My partner’s parents meanwhile expect us to cover EVERYTHING. Even when they suggest we go out for a family meal for his birthday, they expect us to cover the bill. We’ve tried asking them to split occasionally but they say things like “we’ll get the next one” or “we’ll transfer you some money towards it”, we’ve had to cut back on meals out when they come to visit as it costs us a fortune. They also sit there and order freely 🙄

We always pay for DM as she’s only on a state pension.

We have 5 DCs and they all have partners so there are 12 of us if we go out for a meal together (usually birthdays plus other celebrations) so the bill can be pushing £1000. We always paid until the youngest was 21. Now we split it, or we’ll pay for ourselves and the birthday person. Sometimes on our birthdays they pay for us. Apart from the youngest they all earn a lot more than us.

We usually treat the oldest adult DC when we go for a meal with him and his family as they’re not high earners but both work hard.

We sometimes let the middle one treat us as he and partner are both very high earners and they enjoy taking us to more expensive venues that we can’t afford on our meagre pensions.

We didn’t gift money towards cars, driving lessons or houses as we’ve never had that sort of income.

Adult DC in their 40’s and settled.

My siblings and I are all in our 50s. Mum always insists on paying. There’s often an unseemly scramble to pay first, but she always then pings the money into the account of whoever paid. She will let us pay for coffees and cake and that sort of thing, but an actual meal is always her, one way or another. She is also a demon for pinging money across if I host Christmas. She won’t brook any argument, so we make ourselves feel better by buying her extra nice presents at Christmas or for her birthday.

God how rich are you

We always pay.

We take it in turns (roughly - no one keeps count).

I’m a single mum on a low income. My kids are all doing very well for themselves and earning way more than me! But if we’re going out for one of their birthdays I still pay. If it’s just a regular meal out sometimes one of them offers to pay and we have a little tussle back and forth before I graciously allow them to!