Modern Etiquette + Manners: Splitting the Restaurant Bill

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Monday, March 14, 2011

Didi Lorillard, GoLocalProv Business Manners and Etiquette Expert

Good manners bring people together and inspire selflessness.

That's what psychologists discovered during a recent study of how common etiquette affects our lives and therefore, our relationships. The Pennsylvania State University researchers found that when we participate in courteous acts of kindness, such as holding open a door for someone, it “created a shared motivation between those involved”—a fun and happy nanosecond.

The good intention spreads even further when the person holding the door continued to hold it longer for a third and, perhaps, fourth person.
Moreover, those who had the door held open for them tended to step up their pace to shorten the time it took to reach the held door. Psychologist David Rosenbaum said: “This small gesture is uplifting for society.”

There are reasons to be cheerful, however, there are also those nights out-on-the-town when you've held the restaurant door open only to find that when the bill is brought to you, you're not feeling as generously motivated.

Since you have an early morning conference call, you ordered just one Seven & Seven, and a bacon cheeseburger with a Heineken, whereas your date had two Cosmopolitans, grilled tuna, and two glasses of Greenvale Chardonnay; your colleague, who never takes conference calls on weekends, downed three Old Fashioneds, a rib-eye steak, two glasses of Cab and a Jagermeister; his wife, who vented about having had a bad week of sales figures, mellowed out on three Margaritas, Lobster Risotto, and two Diet Cokes. To make the bill sting worse, all three sank into the decadent chocolate explosion with mass abandon—without offering you a bite—then proceeded to top off the debauchery with a round of White Russians!

The bill is placed in front of you because you're obviously the most sober patron, albeit the most angry since your date and colleagues have announced that you're splitting the bill four ways. You estimate that they each ate and drank at least twice as much as you did. You're not sloppy drunk enough to be flaunting false bravado by picking up the check; you're disappointed—and bitter.

You mull over options for just paying your share of the bill:

You can throw your card into the pile and pay your quarter share.
You can estimate your share and anti up the cash to cover just what you ate and drank.
You can have the waiter add up what you consumed, including the tip and tax, and charge it to your bank card.
You can add up what you and your date consumed and ask the waiter to charge your card for that amount; or hand over the cash to your colleagues to cover you both.

Time and again, it's the same dilemma, whether you're out to lunch with your posse celebrating your BFF's promotion, or decompressing over drinks with your crew after work—how do you just pay for you?

Dos

When the occasion is celebrating one of the party goers, say, an engagement, then beforehand give the others the heads up, “Let's all go in on drinks and spot Jake to a round.” Then it's clear; you're all chipping in for the first round; or maybe you take turns buying rounds. Pay for the round as you go.

When out to dinner with friends to celebrate, say, your partner's birthday, announce that you are buying the first, or last, round of drinks to toast the big day and be sure the waiter/bartender is listening—when you hand him your bank card for the round of drinks.

Don'ts

When you anticipate that there could be a brouhaha about splitting the bill, don't procrastinate; make it clear from the start that you're just paying for what you're going to eat and drink; or for what you and your date consume.

When asking for separate checks, don't forget to tell the waiter/bartender, while s/he's taking the order, that you want your own check, or the bill for you and s/he—nodding toward your partner.

When you don't want to pay for someone else's splurge, and you haven't made the ground rules clear by setting boundaries from the start, don't sneak off to slyly pay and come back to the table announcing that you've paid for yourself and you're leaving—because they'll bad mouth you as you're walking out the door.

Didi Lorillard answers questions about business and social etiquette free of charge on her Web site NewportManners.com; follow her on Twitter, and Like her on Facebook and LinkedIn—after you've read her previous columns on www.golocalprov.com.

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