Family didn’t pay

[LonelyonThames]

I’m in the middle of a discussion with my DH about the events of his birthday meal last week.

I had booked a table for my DH, his sister, her husband, their DC and our parents. Everyone had a good time and towards the end of the meal I felt worried that it would be awkward to sit and divide the bill up between such a large group. I went over and paid discreetly.

To my surprise, upon leaving not a single person asked whether the meal had been paid for. I felt very taken aback that nobody even thanked me for paying for the whole meal, let alone asking if they could contribute. No discussion about money was had prior to the meal.

AIBU in expecting my DH’s sister and husband to have at least asked about payment? I can understand our parents not asking or paying but don’t understand why his sibling wouldn’t enquire about the cost?

😂

Right lol 🤷🏻‍♀️🤯

I would actually pay to be there when one of those who expect to be paid for was brazenly trying to avoid eye contact while everyone else asked if they were going to pay their share when the bill arrived, then the looks of confusion when they reply "But I was INVITED!"

Why is splitting the bill awkward?
Here's the bill it's £X so that's £Y each
Job done

They would probably pay then never speak to them again in dramatic MN style!

Yes, OP, that would explain it. 😐

We don't know what the grown adults expected.
We do know that OP got up quietly before the meal ended and settled the whole bill and never mentioned splitting it.
That looks suspiciously like someone who was happy to pay for it

That …. doesn’t happen? And nobody has said it does? If the bill reaches the table and the split is announced, people pay? It’s only if the host leaves the table and deliberately pays the bill in full without letting other people see it (as the OP did here) that the assumption is that the host intends to pay for his / her guests.

If you have to lie about the way ‘host pays’ works to justify your argument (while also claiming you’ve never seen it in real life so I’m not sure where you are getting this from), I’m pretty sure you have a fairly weak argument to begin with.

I also don’t understand why people think it’s cheaper to take it in turns to pay? It’s where reciprocal hospitality comes in. If I go out with 5 friends on 6 occasions, if I split the bill 6 times, I pay for 6 meals. If someone pays for me 5 of the 6 times and I pay for everyone the time I do the inviting, I also pay for 6 meals. Do you all have friends who would order steak and lobster when you were paying and insist on McDonalds when it’s their turn or something?

I keep remembering this comment out of the blue and laughing. 😂

Bravo!!!

You went and paid. I'm not sure how discreet you think you were about it but my guess is someone saw

@carrotbagel I was just thinking it was about time someone acknowledged that 🤣🤣🤣

I think the belief that the only way not to get ripped off is to split the bill says a lot about the people posting.

The only way they can be sure the ‘host pays’ model would be unfair to the host is if they know that on that model they’d take their friends for every penny they could and try and get away with paying as little as possible if they were hosting.

The hilarious thing is that they don’t even realise how revealing their posts are!

...Or people can't afford to pay for multiple people's meals at once but can afford their own share, without having to exclude themselves.
Many won't be able to afford what is easily well over £100 for a group meal and drinks in one go, but will be able to afford their share of, say, £30 at a time.

It's the posters with the EXPECTATION that they'll be paid for because someone invited them that's funny. If it's agreed/always the case in a group that the host always pays, and everyone is happy and affluent enough to afford it, fine. Many posters on these threads do take it as a given, however, that their meal should be covered if someone else asks them to come out.

I have said multiple times that I, personally, don’t expect that at all.

I have family where it’s always host pays, a close group (always the same people) where it’s always host pays (and the bill is usually about the same each time) and a number of other groups (more distant friends, work friends etc) where it’s usually split but someone might put money behind the bar for a significant birthday or similar.

It’s the people who absolutely insist that no one should ever expect the host to pay and that it’s ‘rude’, ‘bizarre’ etc. that I find to be funny. They genuinely seem to think that because their friends / family do something they know my friends / family better than I do. It’s just such a strange attitude, particularly the ones who insist that only the way they do things is ‘real life’.

I guess using their logic, my life isn’t ‘real’?

As others have said, this is MN, where many grown adults will sit and expect to be paid for because someone invited them. 😂
I don't know anyone, myself included, who would be so cheeky as to assume someone inviting me meant they were paying. I would expect to be paying my share/an equal split of the bill.

You are spectacularly missing the point that is being made though.
Setting aside the fact that you struggle to understand that people do things differently from one another, the point about this situation is that the OP went out of her way to pay the bill before the meal was even finished. She specifically chose to take care of it all before the bill was presented. By doing that she indicated to everyone there that she wanted to pay for everyone.

I suppose you struggled to read my subsequent posts or all of OP's, to understand that I'm really not all that invested in a situation that OP has since told us isn't actually real...

Someone who ‘isn’t invested’ doesn’t usually keep posting the way you have.

If that’s you not being invested, I shudder to think how you must come across when you actually care about a subject!

I can't help it, I'm enjoying the dramatic assumptions about my character on an anonymous forum. 😁

Glad you’re enjoying yourself. Me too - I’m having great fun seeing how many times I can get someone who ‘isn’t invested’ to post. Keep going. I won’t tell you what my personal guess is - that would be cheating.

Well it's just once more I'm afraid, it's getting a bit too involved now.
I'll leave you to it and stop my part in derailing the thread.

Bye then. By the way, I give you half a point for the sneaky ‘thank-you’ that only I can see.

I can imagine it, I’ve a relative it wouldn’t occur to to say thanks. They just get ferried to the restaurant, have their meal and get ferried back . Never even have a bag with them so assume no money on them.

Hard to say without knowing the family dynamics. When my in-laws were alive DFiL would always pay and got a bit arsey if we offered to help pay. He was pretty wealthy though. Same with my dad, again he has plenty of spare money.

However this means that my children expect us to pay, we're not well off but have a slightly better income than them.

It's my 60th soon and we last celebrated my birthday in a restaurant we'd like to go back to , last time the meal was £300, not bad for 11 people and three bottles of wine and soft drinks.