AIBU to think using their voucher only on their share was rude?

[Dinnerdrama]

We were invited out to dinner with friends at the weekend.They planned to visit a particular restaurant and asked if we’d like to go along.
We had a nice enough meal, couple bottles of wine, liqueurs. All quite pleasant for a Friday night.
When the bill arrived one of our friends presented a voucher and asked for the bill to be halved and the voucher taken off theirs. The waiter seemed slightly bemused and repeated back the request. Our friend repeated and clarified they wanted the bill split and the voucher taken off their half.
I almost died of second hand mortification. Is this not CF of the highest order?! I wouldn’t dream of doing this when I invited people out. If I was that skint, I’d use the voucher as a couple and
not invite others along.
For the record, I have been out for a meal previously with them where I have had a voucher and I had the voucher taken off the whole bill and split the remainder.
Cannot believe the brass neck, it has put me off going out with them again. Massively embarrassed on their behalf, not sure why, they didn’t seem to be!!

I agree, when people talk about faux pas and being crass I just assume they’re over the age of 75, because no one I know of a similar age to me or even my mum and her friends are sticking to some imaginary etiquette.

It’s all very keeping up appearances. Unspoken rules about gift cards that should be shared? I’d love to see the etiquette book that lists this as the polite thing to do!

You would throw a friendship away over what you believe to be a faux pas?

Not like you expecting their £50 for yourself?

I’m not over the age of 75 or close to it, though what’s wrong with being over 75 anyway? They have a lot more life experience than the rest of us!

I wasn't referring to "inviting someone out to dinner" only to making a mutual agreement to go out to dinner. If I invite someone out to dinner that means I pick up the entire tab.

it seems very tight of them. Yes, yes, no different to cash but in reality it's so cringe worthy. If they wanted to use it for just themselves, they should have gone for the meal without you.

If you are friends with someone you are MEANT to do friendly stuff. Shout each other a beer or a coffee, buy a gift if your friend is feeling down, use your pay rise to grab some gig tickets for both of you and use a meal voucher across the whole meal and then half the total, so it benefits all of you. That stuff lubricates the friendship and makes the friend feel of value.

if you choose not to do that then you are sending out the message that you are acquaintances. That’s fine, but expect if the other person thought you were friends that relationship will cool.

Not in my world, unless you say "my treat".

I didn’t say there was anything wrong with it? Just that people of different generations have different ideas of what is acceptable. I think this idea of faux pas and etiquette is outdated and silly. I cannot imagine being so stuck up that my friend used a gift card, and didn’t use it to benefit me, that I would label her ‘crass’, be enraged by the faux pas and decide to not be friends with her anymore. You must live a very petty and privileged life to think that £100 cash value is so easily disposable to someone that they should just give you half.

Rubbish. Of the highest order.

I don't give a crap if my friends shout me a coffee or not or buy me x,y and z.

I'd hope my friends weren't judging me in the way you do with yours.

Who is throwing a friendship away? Mad how much people like to extrapolate their own scenarios. I said I’m reluctant to go out for meals with them since we have such a different view on etiquette. I do think less of them for being happy to benefit from me sharing my gift vouchers with them, and then they pull this move. Fine, I will continue to see them for other activities we do like walking, coffee or a bottle of wine in each others homes. I just won’t plan dining out again.

So if they happen to suggest the restaurant you have a voucher for? I still think I'd share it, just because I'd feel awkward otherwise. But wouldn't mind if a friend didn't share their voucher.

Not privileged at all unfortunately ☺️
I work as a carer. My life isn’t petty. I’m far from rich.

But it’s just good manners, isn’t it?
You don’t have to be wealthy to know what is considered polite behaviour and what is not.

And I know that acceptable behaviour varies too depending on your social circle, culture etc, but I still think OP’s friend behaved rudely in the circumstances described. OP had treated her before and also was shocked by her friend’s actions and says no one else she knows would do that. Her friend was clearly out of step with others in her social circle.

That sounds really transactional and unnecessary. My friend wants to go to a gig, meet for coffee, go for dinner, go on a city break, lovely, I enjoy their company so I’ll pay for myself. I don’t need them to pay for me, because then I need to reciprocate and pay for something else next time. And it just goes back and forth, no one benefits, but the second one person isn’t putting in their fair share, then there’s resentment. it’s just a back and forth that is just pointless. If I want to treat my friend it would be a one off and no strings attached.

If you’d not have used your own gift voucher recently to reduce the bill before splitting, I’d have said you were BU. Because you did that, then they really should reciprocate. Ordinarily a gift voucher is not equivalent to a discount voucher and should be thought of as cash though. However, what you did earlier in the year set the tone so they were rude in this instance.

Well I don't talk about my friends the way you have been talking about them, so sorry to assume

Explain further why being friendly to friends is rubbish.

It’s not about ‘needing’ to do anything. It’s about having the good fortune of having a voucher and using it to benefit everyone. That’s a friendly thing to do with friends. The fact that that’s not obvious is an anathema to me. It’s literally the premise of comedy skits and films, 🤣

It wasn’t a treat if she expects reciprocity? And if you want to share your gift card and pay out of pocket then that’s very generous and nice of you. I just cannot fathom being enraged that someone didn’t share their gift with you and thinking that they’re the ‘crass’ one

You said (and I’m paraphrasing) that you expect friends to buy you coffees otherwise they’re not friends, they’re acquaintances

The madness of this thread though might at least explain to the OP why her mates decided to use their voucher on their half of the bill. Hopefully she can invite the same friends out for a drink and make sure that she brings along a really delicious packed lunch which she would eat all by herself with no sharing 🤭

I said that friends do friendly things and gave some examples. You decided they were expectations.

You said if that doesn’t happen they’re not friends they’re acquaintance's? I don’t need to buy my friends anything for them to be my friends, they just like me 🤭

I have friend who buys me a "Theatre Token" for Christmas every year.

If I see something I like I might give them (or another friend) a call and say "Do you want to come and see XXX", if they say "yes" and I book the tickets should I be using their present to pay for both of us or just my ticket ?

We’ll have to agree to differ on this.
They didn’t have to share, they could have just used the gift card some other time, and that would be absolutely fine. But to do it the way it was done here is simply rude in my experience. It is crass.