Who is BU? Possible CF-ery over bill splitting

[IHaveAGreyLamp]

I’m interested in peoples opinions on how a restaurant bill should have been split as currently my family are 50/50 as to who is BU!

Last week my parents, DSis and her husband, toddler DD and I went for a family lunch.

DParents had two bottles of wine. BIL had four pints. DSis had a glass of Prosecco and then two glasses of wine from the wine on the table. I had one glass of Prosecco. DSis and my Dad had liqueur coffees also.

After a lovely meal, toddler DD got a bit fractious and tired. It was taking ages to get the bill so I asked if my parents would cover my bill so I could make a swift exit and that I’d pay them when I saw them again.

Yesterday I gave my mum £30, to cover my food and one Prosecco and also a bit towards a tip.

DM is now demanding an extra £15 because they ‘split’ the bill between the 5 of us. I don’t even mind splitting a bill evenly (even if someone people had more courses etc) but given that they all had a lot to drink and I didn’t, I don’t think I should be contributing to the booze that the rest of them had!

DSis and BIL doesn’t think it’s fair I should be made to pay for the drink, but my parents do. Usually if I’m out for a meal I will happily split it if things are fairly even, and if I’d had even just one glass of wine from the bottle I would have just split it without argument (I wouldn’t be whipping out the calculator to see how much I owed for one glass of wine from a bottle type of thing!) But I’m a bit miffed because if I’ve been drinking at dinner and others haven’t, I will always say it’s not fair for the non-drinkers to pay for alcohol and will usually insist that the drinks bill is sorted separately to the food bill.

What do you think? Should I have been funding their lunch time drinking and just sucked it up? Or are they being cheeky?

YABU- You should have accepted the splitting of the bill including the booze
YANBU- It’s unfair of them to expect you to pay for the booze when you didn’t have any

We always take the alcohol off before splitting the bill if someone had not been drinking alcohol, the split the alcohol bill between the drinkers
A lot of non alcoholic cocktails etc are the same price as alcoholic ones

@IHaveAGreyLamp as you know how much yours came to, send the breakdown to yr DP and ask why you need to pay more. If they say for the alcohol you can reply, that you didn't consume it so why should you pay for it

@Chalfontstgiles

We always take the alcohol off before splitting the bill if someone had not been drinking alcohol, the split the alcohol bill between the drinkers A lot of non alcoholic cocktails etc are the same price as alcoholic ones

And how many people drink virgin cocktails as opposed to water, Coke, or juice?

Most places a coke = £2.50
A glass of wine = £7

I’m teetotal and after a couple of times I was stiffed by having to split the bill including wine, I now refuse to subsidise people drinking.

YANBU, OP. The people who moan that it ruins the night are invariably the big spenders.

Well we always pay for our DC when out for meals .Also my lovely PIL would always pay for us as well whenever we were out .However my DM and SD were not very well off ,so we would just split it.I think unless the £15.00 means you are unable to eat for a week, or have to miss a bill then I would just suck it up I think. The problem with splitting bills like this, is that it can lead to awkwardness in future .So say you go out for an early Xmas meal in December /January or whenever we get unlocked you will spoil your meal worrying what to do when the bill comes along at the end of the evening!

A lot of non alcoholic cocktails etc are the same price as alcoholic ones

So what?

It makes no difference if the non-drinker pays for what they have had, i - as the OP did, in paying for her 1 prosecco - and pays for their Cokes etc, or recognises that everyone has had one cocktail at the same value, so is cool with splitting the bill.

[quote IHaveAGreyLamp]@BarbaraofSeville It was a nice-ish place. My lunch was two courses from a set menu which was £17.95, plus I had a coffee at £2.50 and Prosecco at £6.50. I don’t know how much my parents tipped but they always do at least 10% so I actually gave a bit more than 10% of my meal for a tip[/quote]
Just have your siblings each pay you 7.50 then pay your parents.

@willloman

These are your parents. Pay the 2^&% bill! How much have they forked out on meals for you, growing up!?

So what, that means I should be paying for their drinks at every meal out we have from now until they die as ‘repayment’ for childhood food? Jesus wept

I always suggest we pay for drinks separately, alcohol or not, makes it fairer i think.

@willloman

These are your parents. Pay the 2^&% bill! How much have they forked out on meals for you, growing up!?

Are you hard of reading? OP has paid her bill. Her parents are asking her for 50% extra to subsidise their boozing. CFs.

Sounds like they have a drink problem. Anyone who can down an entire bottle of wine each AND have more later without ending up in a stretcher clearly routinely drinks more than is good for them.

Yes it's annoying when someone has had a filet mignon and you've had a bowl of pasta but that's the price you pay for having a group lunch/dinner.

I cant agree. If you ate an expensive steak would you really let someone who just had pasta pay for your steak? I would be mortified

We always put in extra if we are drinking and my parents aren't, they often protest or sneakily pay the bill in its entirety but I never expect non/light drinkers to pay for alcohol if they have had a disproportionate amount.

It’s always the pissheads who want to split it evenly.

I hope the others weren't driving!

You are right but I would pay and next time just pay for what you have plus a generous tip.

They can't complain about that.

For me it would depend wether it’s a regular thing that you don’t drink and they do or if at previous get togethers you had benefited from the splitting and only now have changed the rules

Yanbu and I’m shocked your mum asked for it. My mum would have refused if I’d even offered the £30 let alone ask for £15 more!

@LunchBoxPolice

It’s always the pissheads who want to split it evenly.

That’s not true, I’m more than happy to split equally with my friends ans family irrelevant of what I did or didn’t drink. They are the same.

However if money is tight then it should be made clear that any given individual is intending to only pay for what they consume, to avoid any doubt or situations like this.

The fact the ops parents are arguing with her over fifteen quid though is appalling,

YANBU

I hate this type of thing, I’m not tight but I can’t drink alcohol with food. I have to have one or the other. With food I’ll always just have a soft drink. My friends and I always had the tradition of going out for dinner and drinks on Xmas Eve and the table (most of them) would put back maybe 5/6 bottles of wine over the course of the meal while I had one or 2 cokes. They would always want to split it evenly and the first few years I did because I didn’t want to seem cheap but after 5 years of paying for others alcohol, I put my foot down and paid only for what I had. I would then put into the kitty for the alcohol for the rest of the night when I would be drinking in the various bars we went into.

I wouldn’t give the £15, they didn’t clear it with you first about splitting evenly and if they want to fall out over it, so be it.

These are your parents. Pay the 2^&% bill!
How much have they forked out on meals for you, growing up!?

Pretty sure OP didn’t ask to be born and that one of the biggest parts of being a parent is feeding your child.

@imamearcat

I think you all sound a bit tight!!

When I go for a meal with my family everyone wants to pay the bill!!! Sometimes we split evenly between couples / families.

How lovely that you're all so financially comfortable that you can did that. Not everyone is.

The financially comfortable calling those less fortunate "tight" is really revolting behaviour. Have some empathy ffs.

The financially comfortable calling those less fortunate "tight" is really revolting behaviour. Even if you are financially comfortable (as opposed to stinking rich) it's not tight to feel reluctant to split bill equally if you either don't drink a lot of alcohol or you have a naturally small appetite and never have starter, side dishes etc. It always seems to be the big eaters who want to split. And no, it doesn't even itself out in the long run. If you're a small eater today the chances are you'll still be a small eater when you next go for a meal.

I think if you're going to leave before the bill is paid, you should expect the bill to be split evenly unless you specifically throw down some cash to cover your portion before making an exit.

That's a big favourite amongst the CFs who deliberately overspend compared with the others present and then put down an even split as their 'share' before hotfooting it.

Some don't even pay their share: 10 people present, total bill £400, their share of that (with fine wine) £70, they chuck down £20 and say "That should more than cover it, but let me know if it's any more" - knowing that people will feel too awkward to do so.

Others offer to collect the money up and go over to pay and then use the tips that others have given to pay for their share instead of adding anything more.

The real pros are the ones who 'suddenly realise' that they've forgotten their wallet every single time - and apparently have never ever heard of phone banking.

The people who pull this trick - and try to gaslight you that you are the mean one for not paying for their copious alcohol - are doubtless the same ones who insisted on sharing meticulously fairly as children: they always get the sledge downhill but 'honourably' wouldn't dream of taking their sibling's turn when it's time to go back uphill.

YANBU parents shouldn’t try to profit from their children. I wouldn’t entertain taking a penny from any one of mine.

Don’t pay the extra £15, the £30 paid covered the cost you spent and more. I really do not like the attitude of an even split in a group when it is known that one or more people have had substantially less than others. It’s pisstaking on a major scale especially when the person concerned is guilted for highlighting it.

There is no way on Gods green earth that my mother would have allowed me to pay at a family lunch. I think its incredibly naff of your mum to pursue you for £15.