DH spent over 500 in strip club

[Graceunderfire01]

Hi
This is my first post. I had posted earlier but my message disappeared. I know this topic has probably been done to death but I'm looking for some help/ information.
Whilst going through our bank statements tonight I've noticed a number of translations for a strip club in our city and I'm fucking raging. Dh was entertaining clients after a corporate even that he was part of and obviously took them to this strip club. How fucking clichéd! Anyway my question is the translations are for set amounts , £110 x2 and £130 x2 - what is this likely to be? As in what service did he avail of? You may laugh at this question but my knowledge of the prices and range of the 'services' on offer at these places is not good.
Can anyone please help? I'm mortified to be asking and fucking livid I'm in this situation.
Thank you

Why do you have to approach this 'calmly and rationally'?
What is wrong about going ballistic?

Tell him there are no words for your disappointment.

Also, remember that whatever he says, he only went there because of the girls. Why else would anyone pay way over the odds for a late night drink.

I know a couple of men who work in jobs where they have taken people to strip clubs as part of client entertainment. Both devoted family men, and I have quizzed both of them on it (in a 'I can't believe that's appropriate!' way). Both men had different attitudes - one was doing it somewhat under duress, the other I think saw it as a bit of a perk of the job. In both cases they said it was a way of looking generous towards clients (expensive drinks etc) plus somewhere you could go at the end of an evening when there are relatively few other options. I'm sure there's a big element of bravado too.

One thought about the bill the OP has seen - I would assume private dances and certainly any 'extras' would be more likely to be paid with cash than a credit card? I would imagine the bill is for drinks, though obviously that doesn't prove no
cash was spent as well.

Math we have had an extremely difficult time of it lately. Extremely . We have had to make decisions and choices and had arguments over things I wouldn't wish upon my worst enemy. I'm not sure I'm up for going ballistic. Nor am i sure it's the best way to go. I will get very very angry and will hopefully get my point across succinctly. To go ballistic will just drag us back to a place we are just climbing out of. (This previous stuff was not his doing by the way.)
Of course if he doesn't see it my way or admits to anything other of have an issue with, I will go ballistic. I'm not a pushover if that's what you're trying to say.

Fairenuff. That's one of my main points I will raise with him

The only strip club pricing I was aware of had varying prices for women dancing depending on that woman... All 'transactions' were in cash (no place to swipe a card.... Or store a chip and pin) so I would say it was for a couple of bottles of vodka and a couple of champagne and he's playing Jimmy big bollocks :)

The people who are telling you you have a right to be angry are doing it so that he can't try and make out you are a prude, or mad or something for being upset and disturbed by the fact he's gone to a stripclub at all. It's important to labour this point because it's so easy for a woman's feelings to be belittled, disregarded and minimized when she tries to articulate what has upset her. Stripclubs are deeply misogynistic so don't lose sight of that.

Then there's the fact that this money came out of the family pot, and yes, until it is reimbursed he has used your money for this.

Let's say he was forced to go with work, well, he still should have talked it through with you.

Just trust your instincts. You don't have to go ballistic, if you fear his retaliation. But don't let people convince you there's something wrong with you for feeling as upset and confused as you currently do.

Why else would anyone pay way over the odds for a late night drink.

Because flashing the cash impresses clients?

Because it is hard to say no if clients are pressuring you?

I think the whole culture of strip clubs as a form of corporate entertainment is pretty grim but if you work in a culture where it is commonplace it may be quite difficult to avoid.

'Looking generous' in a strip club is always going to mean:

1 - looking as if you can afford to splash money, your business is doing well, ergo you are great, smart, aggressive, etc. You have the qualities that allow you to succeed.

2 - looking powerful; with a wave of plastic you can give your comrades the experience of other people's bodies.
(Looking powerful over women is assumed by the man who takes colleagues to a strip club to be an attractive trait that other men would admire you for.)

3 - looking callous; you don't see the owners of the bodies as respect-worthy if they can be bought and given and used to make you look like a big shot.
(Callousness towards women/ superiority over women is assumed to be an attractive trait by the man who takes other men to buy the services of women.)

The bottom line is that spending £500 without having to consult anyone, just whipping out that plastic with a smile, is only done to make the spender look good. Spending it in a strip club is done for the same reason it is assumed by the man spending the money that this will make him look good. That is why the corporate strip club jollies are so rotten not just the assumptions that men have about women, but the assumption that they have about other men, and the basic assumptions of what makes a man look good in the minds of other men.

I agree with all that, Math.

if you work in a culture where it is commonplace it may be quite difficult to avoid

OK, it might be more difficult for a man. But I doubt it. When I stopped taking clients to sex-related venues, I upped my game over dinner. I was saving a lot of money so could afford to host dinners as lavish as you like, hang around for hours after the meal with port & brandy, and I made a big effort with entertainment; we played games & suchlike. Everybody loved it. From time to time I'd take them to private drinking clubs for long nights on the booze and some fannying around.

Not all of the men in my department used strip clubs, though most did. The men who didn't were more universally liked & respected, imo. I feel there was some element of guilt bonding with the guys that used sex services: you might feel more obliged to do business with a man who could cause problems in your marriage, for instance, but you wouldn't be overly happy about it.

Yes indeed, guilt bonding is definitely a part of it. Not even with possible blackmail as an element of it. Just the aspect of finding the lowest common denominator and wallowing in it together.

Of course it was family money

No it isn't. If money needs to be spent for work expenses do you honestly think it appropriate to phone home and be asked if its ok to meet the requirements for his job? Absolutely ridiculous! Can just imagine my DH phoning and saying 'Darling is it ok for me to buy my weekly train ticket to London?' And me saying 'No' so he has is then unable to meet work obligations

No, the issue here is the strip club, not whether he can spend money which needs to be claimed back on expenses.

It's completely different spending it on sex workers though Joy and I think that most definitely does deserve an explanation to a partner.

Graceunderfire, for those questioning why it it is ok for him to do certain things at a strip club but not others, I totally get it. My partner was invited on a stag do to Krakow (sp?) and we knew that at some point he would end up in a strip club. We discussed it at length - he knows my opinion on strip clubs, and that I obviously wasn't ecstatic that he would be watching other women strip, however he promised me that he would be buying drinks and drinks only. It turns out he had actually had an awful time and sat looking very embarrassed at the back for 20 minutes before him and 2 of the other blokes decided to move on to a different bar. I'm not going to pretend I'm ok with him visiting a strip club, and he knows how insecure I can be - hence the lengthy discussion about it before he went.

I asked my partner what the transcactions of those amounts are likely to be and he said you can pay for a dancer to "entertain" your table privately for a set amount of time, say 20 mins, and you get a bottle of champagne and this would cost around the amounts you said? It just makes me more suspicious because he never mentioned it to you - or has he literally just not thought it was worth mentioning because of the issues you've been having as a couple?

Good luck speaking to him about this, I hope you get the answers you're wanting.

No, the issue here is the strip club, not whether he can spend money which needs to be claimed back on expenses.

The other issue is whether it can indeed be claimed back. That's a secondary thing you should keep an eye open for OP.

Joysmum, a prior discussion of upper limits on spending should take place if someone is using family money for business-related expenses. Both parties should also know whether the family money can be claimed back. The OP and her DH have not discussed these issues wrt spending. This doesn't mean he should assume she has given the go ahead, and nor should he assume just because it mightn't cause a financial problem that he can legitimately (a) spend that amount or (b) spend it in a strip club.

Nobody is expecting anyone to phone home to ask permission. All he has to do is sit down and talk about the budget with his wife, just as he would sit down respectfully if he were a partner in a business, and talk with his business partner about business expenses, max allowable expenditure on client entertainment, and forms of entertainment considered appropriate.

In this case, the DH packed the little woman off home and then behind her back took his mates to the club. No discussion took place that night as to where he was off to and no prior discussion had taken place about what he could assume to be an ok amount to spend of their money. So both elements of this were done behind the OP's back, and in fact if she hadn't found the receipt she would not have known where he had spent the money or even that it had been spent. He could have gone to the dog track. He could have gone to the ballet.

Eusta that's my fear. Exactly. I can never know what happened and I can never unknow he went if you get me. Very disappointing.

You can know an awful lot. Call the business. Either brazen it out that you are from the accounting office, and the boss says only booze and food can be expensed, or be upfront and say you are the other named person on the card account (i assume you are?), and you need to know what these charges are for. If they won't tell you, say you will advise your bank fraud has occurred and proceed from there.

Someone said they wont tell you because of keeping things confidential for their customers. I doubt very much you can get that kind of service even at twice the price he paid.

i expect he has just bought bottles, I really do.

I'm not going to pretend I'm ok with him visiting a strip club, and he knows how insecure I can be - hence the lengthy discussion about it before he went.

I want to question with the biggest possible question mark the idea that a woman who objects to a husband going to a strip club has some sort of insecurity.

What women who object to it have is respect for themselves and for other women, and also respect for men and thus the expectation that men are capable of human decency.

Not some quirk or weakness that we make men pander to as some sort of big favour.

You can be both though math.

Insecure
Object to strip clubs

I think that's what pp was saying

I wonder if op has spoken to her h about this yet

You can also be secure
And object to strip clubs

I object to strip clubs because I am secure

OP are you sure he can even claim this back?

I would have thought most companies would not approve expenses from a strip club.

I don't think you are over reacting at all, I would be very suspicious and I would have no respect for a man who went to strip clubs anyway.

I'm insecure.

I object to strip clubs because they are abusive and objectify women and for many many other reasons.

The two aren't related.

It's completely different spending it on sex workers though Joy and I think that most definitely does deserve an explanation to a partner

Exactly, that's my point as per my last paragraph.

mathanxiety we'll have to agree to disagree on that one. Work related expenses require spending. I'd no more discuss my spending limits with my DH than he would with me. Reason? Because we both know we won't take the piss and respect each other's decision making regarding what's necessary and what isn't. I'd not be legally tied to him if I couldnt.

That's takes me back to my point, this wouldn't be about the spending for me, it would be about what it was spent in and as I posted upthread, strip clubs aren't acceptable to me I'll add that I'd have his balls for earrings if I ever thought he'd do that