To think you don’t get out of paying the bill because you don’t drink?

[ThatHardyWaspAgain]

I’m sure this has been done many times before by people in similar scenarios.

I went out for a bit of lunch with two friend’s and one of them brought another friend along that I’ve never met but was nice enough.

However, when it came to the bill, she said ‘’Can we please calculate it all with the alcohol you’ve had separately paid for? Because I only had classical cokes’’

So, we did as she asked. Added up everything but removed the drinks. So 3 of us paid for our drinks in a split, and then did another split for the rest with her and her food and classical colas.

The annoying bit is, she had 3 of them. And they weren’t really much different in price to most of our alcohol.

We all had the same roast and mango cheesecake.

I wouldn’t mind but she kept insisting we all had a dessert so she didn’t feel alone in having one. We’re adults after all but it is a bit annoying

Separate thread to come to see if I would be U to tell my friend not to bring her along again

She also didn’t tip.

The lady that drank all the cokes wasn't a designated driver. She just wanted everyone else to pay for her cokes (as well as their own drinks) and somehow managed to get her way. Do you really think OP was unreasonable to object?

@fromthegecko thank you for pointing that out so nicely - it was meant to be yanbu but I was typing in a hurry! Think it's time I got the reading glasses I've been putting off for some time now. I can't edit it now so waiting for someone to yell at me lol. I was just sharing a situation where I think its reasonable to pay for drinks - the designated driver :)

Why didn’t everyone just pay for what they had?

Since they now have each item on a bill just ask the server for you to all pay separately- it's just as easy, there is no reason why the food split should pay for soft drinks.
As to the dessert "I don't want to feel alone" , just refuse to be pressurised. On the other hand, in my opinion, whether you tip or not is a personal thing.

🤣🤣

Yeah exactly 🤷🏻‍♀️

Quite.

When I've been out for a meal with a group I've encountered both methods, the everyone pays for what they ordered and splitting equally. Splitting equally makes everything simple and guarentees the bill will be covered but those who ordered cheaper items will effectively be slightly subsidising those who ordered expensive dishes and/or were liberal with the alcohol consumption. Splitting by what everyone ordered is the fairest but it requires everyone to log what they ordered. I've been at one meal where we were paying for what we ordered, I gave my share to the host and left because I had a train to catch, found out later they were £20 short for the bill and the host ended up making up the difference out of her pocket. If you are going to use the system where everyone pays for what they ordered, hand out a pen and paper to everyone at the start of the meal so they can write everything down as they order it.

Classical colas has made me laugh!

If anyone's interested, coke rebranded to "new coke" due to repeatedly losing to Pepsi in blind taste tests. People were so outraged that they would change the recipe from the coke that they new. So they changed the recipe back and rebranded to coke classic. It was and never has been classical cola 😂

🤣🤣🤣 possibly.

I just find it silly that 1 person says they won't pay for alcohol, because they only had coke, and no one had the sense to either split by what each person had or the sense to just get her to pay for her own and the other 3 split theirs between them. And then the OP asks if they're being unreasonable for being upset at their own foolishness. It doesn't sound like the person asking not to pay for alcohol had anything to do with the calculating.

I’m not sure why, in response to her request not to pay for alcohol, you didn’t just ask to take her food and drinks off the bill and she paid for them separately. The rest of you then spilt the remaining bill (food and alcohol) between you.

It was a reasonable request not to pay for alcohol (this can be for various reasons not necessarily only financial), but IMO the bill was then mismanaged by the group, leading to the rest of you paying more.

The desserts are neither here nor there, she could have sat and eaten her dessert or chosen not to have one.

Part of the irritation comes from going along with suggestions you weren’t comfortable with or didn’t think through at the time and she isn’t at fault for that.

Absolutely. In many places alcohol still costs significantly more. Also, some people may have religious reasons for not wanting to pay for alcohol. OP is being petty.

Ages ago the OP pointed out the lack of reading comprehension on part of many of the responders. You and the person you quote are also both guilty of this. "She has paid her share of food, plus her drinks" - no, the entire point of the original post is that the cola drinker had the alcohol removed, but the cola left on. So the three alcohol drinkers contributed to her cola (which cost almost as much as the alcohol) whilst she didn't contribute to the alcohol. Not sure why this is quite so difficult to comprehend, but there you go. Wouldn't have picked you up on this were it not for you chucking unwarranted insults around. Bit "petty" of me, I know. Still, amusing thread!

Hi just to inform you as someone who is a hospitality boss:
No we cannot supplement wages with tips, the wages we pay are as per legal requirement, is living wage, plus we pay NI contributions etc. My last place we actually paid over minimum wage.
Staff also pay taxes etc so a tip can be great and it also motivates to keep up the good work.

As for @ThatHardyWaspAgain Classical coke? I've never heard it called that before. Coke is usually, for a pint between £3 and £4. Alcoholic drinks are well over that, I don't have any in my pub the same or less of a price than a pint of coke.

YANBU. I would of asked for her to pay for what she ordered then split with the rest.

We used to go out with family to gatherings to a pub that did BOGOF. Every time the bill was split we’d pay £43 to the pot, this didn’t include drinks. When I actually added this up we were paying £20 over what our meals would have actually cost so it turned out the birthday person who didn’t pay for their meal was being treated by us. The next time we went to prove the point, we paid separately, no skin off anyone’s nose. We’re still there but only paying ours.

What? 😵‍💫

You've just answered your own question.

You tip when service has been really excellent.

That's the point.

The incentive for restaurant staff to provide really excellent service is tipping.

I bet you don't get invited a second time!

And that's the fault of the person who did the calculating and not the person who asked for the alcohol to be removed. You're saying people are not comprehending, they're comprehending fine. The group messed up the calculating, she didn't ask them to pay for it, they failed to take it off. So that's their fault.

This! ⬆️ Unless I'm misunderstanding, you would have been happy for her to pay part of the alcohol the rest of you had but you're not happy about paying for part of her non alcoholic drinks?
All seems a bit petty. Just pay for what you each had? 🤷‍♀️

I think the error arose because they didn't notice what a massive amount she'd spent, so she's ended up being subbed by £7.50. If they'd done a simple split (which, in any case, they were quite happy not to do) the drinkers would have been subbed by about 50p.

Everyone should just have paid for themselves. But I still don't see how OP is unreasonable, exactly. Other than by writing an ambiguous AIBU?

That's impressive. Managing to shoehorn in a reference to calories on a thread that (a) has nothing to do with calories, and (b) where nobody asked.

They put Doric columns on one side of the can, and Corinthian on the other.

The service is generally not excellent. It's often mediocre. I'm not tipping that, it's already been paid for.

I don't mind other people doing something else or having a difference of opinion. I do mind the banal insults over what is a gratuity that many other workers on NMW don't get.

It's up to restaurateurs to charge what is needed for the service they want to provide and to recruit staff on a wage that they will accept to do the work. My contribution to that is my custom, being an easy customer (which I am) and paying the bill in full. Anything else I choose to give is at my discretion.

I've read many threads here on this with daft reasoning like "staff deserve tips to put up with dreadful customers. No, they don't. Staff deserve decent managers who will kick out the dreadful customers and not allow their staff to be exposed to them. That is their job, not mine. How much of a tip would actually make it ok for staff to be abused then, using that lack of logic? Ridiculous.

I don't go to places where there are 'dreadful' customers because it would be unpleasant and my time/money is finite. If that contributes to the place shutting down then good riddance to it. Good staff will always find work.