Every engineering group has a different lunch time dynamic. In some groups, it is considered odd if a teammate doesn't join the lunch crowd at exactly noon; in others, it is a free-for-all, with everyone doing their own thing. Also, in large, corporate settings, there is a distinction between people that always eat lunch at the company canteen, those that never step foot in there and those that mix things up. Now with the crowd that experiments with intrepid jaunts into the local restaurant scene, there is one commonality: no matter the level of education of the engineers at the table, regardless how many have degrees in higher mathematics, when the finally check arrives at the end of the meal, splitting it equitably has the potential to become an exercise in frustration. It doesn't happen every time but it happens more often than any respectable practitioner of arithmetic would probably like to admit. Only bean counters at the Congressional Budget Office could take pride in such tomfoolery.
Over the years I've noticed some common pitfalls that can occur during payment phase of a luncheon. All those engineering degrees are completely useless in working through the fuzzy maths of bill splitting. So to help improve this situation, I've come up with a list of suggestions for eliminating the most obvious hassles in figuring out a check. I have one goal, one assumption and one axiom. All the suggestions, or rules if you will, follow from those three. I've also included some commentary explaining the reasoning behind each rule.
Assumption: This list of rules is appropriate for a group of people lunching together on a normal workday. It is assumed that lunch should not take more than one hour. Goal: The overriding goal of the rules is to reduce frustration and increase the common good. An ideal bill is one that can be split evenly across all luncheon participants. Axiom: The time spent on figuring out what each participant of the party owes is to be minimized. Any contradictions or omissions in the rule set will be resolved by applying this axiom.
The rules follow in no specific order.
This rule is to eliminate the confusion that occurs when one person orders a salad and the guy sitting next her orders a steak dinner. Splitting a check is much easier if everyone orders an entrée at roughly the same price.
Figuring out 15% seems to be beyond most people but dividing by 4 is not.
A corollary: Multiple credit cards should not be used as a courtesy to the server.
If everyone but one guy orders a coke, the one guy who orders the double margarita ruins it for everyone since he'll almost always put in less cash than required.
Cheap bastards need to be humiliated in public. Otherwise, they'll remain cheap bastards. Tim Martin suggests, "Do I look like a bitch? Put in your share jerkass!"
It's much easier to remember and pay off a twenty dollar debt than a $6.25 one.
Whoever borrowed money needs to take the time out of their day to go to the ATM and get enough cash to repay their debts. Debts that are not repaid quickly tend to be forgotten. Unpaid debts reduce the common good.
A corollary: it is not appropriate to take interns or new hires to expensive lunches unless they are being fully comped and they know it ahead of time.
Most servers will notify customers if they order slow to make items. If a server does make this comment, it is necessary to order another item.
Suggestions and recommendations to this list are welcome.
Posted by payam at February 11, 2004 12:39 AM
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Diners who seek to maximize return on lunch by consistently ordering at the top end of the 20% variance shall have no grounds for complaint when MegaLax is introduced into their coffee.
If money is borrowed, the borrower, not the lender, is responsible for remembering to pay the money back in a timely fashion. If the lender has to ask for the money, the borrowed is deemed an ass, never to be trusted with a loan again.