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?

This.

And I'd say also strange not to thank you, as well as rude.

Everyone should have inquired (except kids), honestly… PARENTS INCLUDED.

I’s be so mortified to do that. Wow.

I would offer to give money for my share, I would have asked about the bill and if you’d told me you paid, I would have said thank you and meant it. Then I would have asked what the total was and given you money!

Usually if it hasn't been discussed beforehand the waiter arriving with the bill is a cue to sort out the bill and if splitting individually or by group etc.

if someone sneaks off to pay the bill, the assumption is because they are treating, not that they want to split it, if this is the case most people would say "i'll pay and then you all can send me your share tonight/tomorrow."

no one is a mind reader and your actions don't suggest someone who wants to split the bill.

obviously they should say thank you. The boat is irrelevant.

If you invited them I would I expect you would pay the bill ? Unless you told them specifically otherwise

I think when you invite people out for a meal many people assume that means it is on you to cover the bill. Lesson learned for next year! Sorry this happened to you, especially if jealousy is behind it!

Have you asked them to pay?

Why did you go and pay for everyone if you wanted to split the bill? You invited them and paid so I think it’s clear why they have assumed you were paying. Extremely rude of them not to say thank you though.

If I was invited to a family meal I would presume I was paying for myself but would also expect some discussion around it such as shall we split the bill? Or do you want me to pay and then you pay me back?

I would presume I was paying. However, seeing as you have paid a conservative minimum of 100k for a boat and could easily add a zero to that, the assumption is you’re very comfortably off.

Presumably they don’t have the disposable income you do or maybe even enough to easily pay for the meal. How much per head? Having previously had a lot more disposable income, I did live in a bit of a financial bubble and thought little of spending £150 plus for 2 a couple of decades ago whereas I’d balk at that amount now.

I can only imagine for you this is is little stuff. Don’t sweat the little stuff.

So the OP is by most people’s assessment rich (if she can afford a £100,000 boat) but apparently can’t afford to follow normal etiquette and pay for her husband’s birthday party.

On top of that, she did everything possible to make it look like she was paying and in many social circles (particularly with family) it’s completely normal to pay for invited guests. Instead she expected the family to psychically know that she expected them to pay.

This is looking more with every post like a deliberate attempt to separate her husband from his birth family by making them out to be greedy spongers.

It’s a pity she decided to ruin her husbands’s birthday by having ‘discussions’ like this afterwards.

Well, no.

A nice 3 course meal with expensive ingredients at home (and I cheat and buy in prepared food for at least one course) and a nice meal in a mid range restaurant (not a super expensive one where you pay for the experience) aren’t that much different and the restaurant is much less hassle.

The last bit (about turning it down if too expensive) requires the person making the arrangements to make it clear it’s ’pay your own way’ since, particularly with family, standard (admittedly old-fashioned) etiquette is that the person doing the inviting pays.

The OP didn’t do that and deliberately settled the whole bill but expects the guests to somehow ‘just know’ she expected them to pay (but not all of them - only the sister and her family). Apparently different people at the table were meant to draw different conclusions from the same actions.

I fully accept the rules are changing / have changed so people often split the bill but because it’s not currently clear, the invitation needs to say which applies. I’d be interested how the OP (or her DH) phrased the invitation. I always work the cost in if I’m not paying.

Yep, this.

Among my group of friends, it's always clear if a meal out is being paid for if we're all covering our own.

Exactly this

It's a strange old world on MN. When I contact my family and ask if they fancy getting together for a meal at a pub, not one of them would assume that means it's on me. Ditto getting a group of friends together.
Op - if you wanted your lot to pay it would probably have been better to suggest that you stuck it on your card, then everyone could take a pic of the receipt and transfer their share after. We do this all the time and it's easy. But - my family aren't chancers and would never let me pay for their meal without at least saying thank you.

@nocalorieleftbehind I’m sorry but just because you and your family don’t thank each other doesn’t mean that it’s not good manners to say thank you for dinner/thanks for a lovely night. I do the latter even if I’ve paid for my own meal. It’s common courtesy.🤷‍♀️

Toot toot! ⛵️⚓️🏴‍☠️

That is all. I love this thread.

Why would you not expect your parents to at least ask or pay? They're most likely to be able to afford it.

I find the idea that 'oh, they're loaded so they can pay' shocking.

Many people look wealthier than they actually are in terms of disposable income. Owning your house does not mean you have loads of cash, for instance.

I once heard the presenter Chris Evans thank some celeb or other on his show because they'd once been out to dinner with loads of people who, one by one, disappeared from the table without paying and so leaving Evans with the bill. But the celeb pitched in 50%. They may have both been wealthy but that wasn't the point.

It’s not ‘they are loaded, they can pay’, it’s that the OP did everything a person does when they are intending to pay, nothing a person does when they don’t intend to pay and is now displaying performative shock when her DH’s family were silly enough to believe her.

The fact that this is unlikely to have been the rent money does matter a bit but the OP’s actions matter more.

Yeah but are you all rich enough that a couple of hundred pounds wouldn’t make any difference to anything?
I have no idea if the Op is well off or insanely rich but you can see why people wouldn’t expect to pay if invited by someone they know is loaded. Especially when the invite is for their other halves birthday and they do actually sneak off and pay for it all before the end of the meal.

Yep, my family often invite me and my children out to eat does that mean I assume they are feeding me and my children? Never heard anyone assume this irl. Another MN thing that doesn’t happen in the real world.

MN is sometimes like a different universe. In my 45 years I have never thought if someone asked us to go out for dinner that they would pay. It certainly isn't the norm for most people, MN seems to have a thinking that unless you are rich enough to pay for everything you should never invite people out. Its absolutely ridiculous.

We often go out for dinner with friends to celebrate birthdays etc, everyone pays their own way, sometimes people may pay for wine for everyone or something but no one ever assumes. It's about £60 a head in most restaurants near me incl a few drinks so most people can't afford to pay for too many extras for dinner.

How odd that you assume your social circle is the ‘real world’ and that everyone else’s lived experiences aren’t.

How sad it must be to have such a limited outlook on life.

How sad it must be to be invited out and expect that it means your dinner and drinks are going to be paid for and you don’t have to pay for yourself, not buying it though tbh. Doubt the people on here get invited out very often if an invite means their night is paid for.

The fact you paid for it all without saying anything is weird. Surely just pass the bill round. They still shouldn't have assumed you'd pay buy by paying it quietly you have made it appear you were happy to do this.

As I’ve said multiple times, I don’t expect that at all. I do expect people to make it clear which applies and to recognise that different people have different lives.

I also know my own family well enough to know how things work for us.

I’m so sorry you aren’t able to recognise that not everyone is exactly like you and your family. Living with a complete lack of understanding of other people outside your own social circle sounds dreadful but you do you. I know some people are much happier living a limited life.

Most people mix in social circles with people similar to them.
So it's very likely that everyone in their social circle has the same views/attitudes.
It seems odder not to realise that "other people do things differently" than to assume that everyone must do things the same as you.

My DD is the age that all her friends are turning 18 in quick succession.
So she has been to lots of birthday meals recently. It's been really interesting to notice the number of variations on the "who pays for the meal" question.

Some people (well their parents) have paid for the whole thing.
Some people have expected everyone to pay for themselves.
Some people have paid for the food and expected people to pay for their own drinks.
Some people have paid x amount off the bill and split the rest.

DD's friends come from a range of backgrounds which I suspect reflects the difference in attitudes. Although interestingly the families that you would expect to be better off are not necessarily the ones offering to pay for everything.