Udhay Shankar N wrote:
It's sometimes awkward when the bill arrives at a large gathering of people at a restaurant - figuring out who pays what, &c. Here's an interesting study of precisely this problem. I'd be fascinated to hear comments from Madhu (and others!) on this.
As someone who is still owed money after being tasked with the unfortunate job of splitting bills for people at restaurants on more than once occasion, I know this situation all too well. :)
I didn't read all 26 pages of the report (why can't they write this stuff in plain English?) but I'm not surprised at the conclusion. It's rarely a fair distribution when a group of friends go out to restaurants and some drink and eat more than others, yet the bill is split equally. If one of the group is a teetotaler (like, say, Biju at silk meets) and drinks only Diet Coke while the others have a couple of drinks each, then that person is unfairly lumped with having to pay not only for his food, but also for the alcohol others are drinking. So while that person may have consumed, say, Rs. 500 worth of food, he gets asked to pay, say, Rs. 800 as his share.
I am a big believer in fairness, and I hate situations like this. So usually what I do in a group is to simply keep an eye on what people are drinking, who the non-drinkers are, and who the vegetarians are. When the bill arrives, I offer to help split it properly. I split the food cost 60-40, with the 60% being divided evenly among the non-vegetarians, and the 40% being divided among the vegetarians. I then just add individual alcohol consumption totals to the respective shares of people. Being in the restaurant business, it's easier (though not always with 100% accuracy) to track drinks, unless I myself am a little tipsy, of course. I remember menu prices pretty well (need to stay abreast of what other restaurants charge), so that comes in handy too. This method is more fair than equal splits, though even this way there might be a variance of about 10-20% on what a person actually owes. (Once in a while, you will find a person bitching about his or her share and how instead of, say, Rs. 500, he or she had to pay Rs. 575 instead. Those people drive me up the wall.)
But on other occasions, where I know somebody else will probably get their hands on the bill first and I won't have the chance to do all my fancy arithmetic, my behaviour is consistent with what classic economic theory predicts. Why stick with one drink and the cheaper dishes on the menu when the bill will be split equally? So I tend to order a bit more and maximise my gain. ;)
Lastly, fairness and family-style dining don't go well together. It's easy to calculate a person's share of the bill at an Italian restaurant where individual plates are ordered. It's not as easy at an Indian restaurant where dishes are shared. Then there might be cases where a person is non-vegetarian but doesn't eat seafood/pork/beef. So many complications...
Alright Udhay, I've written my share. :) -- <<< * >>> Madhu Menon Shiok Far-eastern Cuisine Indiranagar, Bangalore Visit us @ http://www.shiokfood.com Phone: (080) 4116 1800
