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An easier way to solve this problem: pay with cash.

I always despise the asshole who’s like “hurrr-durr I have to use a card”

Cash? What’s cash? LOL . All I know is that I use this small rectangular piece of plastic with a stripe on one wide and numbers on the other. It’s all about portability and convenience.

But I agree, bring enough small bills and pay with that…less hassle.

If the waiter/tress can’t split the bill itself, have one person pay and split the bill afterwards using billmonk.

If you ask, most good pos systems will have a way of breaking the check up.

In Iceland the restaurants just do the splitting for you. In other words you just pay for what you eat. No need for fancy gadgets that are destined to end in a landfill. :)

Plan ahead.

Uh – in Canada, most debit/cc machines can split it for you.

I haven’t played Credit Card roulette in years.

Last time was at a Sushi restaurant with about 8 people. Bill was $200 or $300. HUGE rush while the waitress was picking a single credit card out of a bag. Great meal, huge rush and I didn’t have to pay anything.

Alternative version of Credit Card Roulette:

Each person at the table has a choice. They can put their card in, or they can “buy out” their participation for their simplified fraction of the bill (no fancy calculations, just 1/people) or some slightly larger amount to offset their reduced risk.

The “losers”, those whose cards weren’t picked, split the cash from the non-players. The “winner” is as screwed as before.

Only participated in this kind of thing once. I chose the buy-out, the “losers” grouped together and bought a bottle of Dom Perignon with the proceeds and shared with the table :)

We always just used buxfer to keep track of where everyone was on the IOU front.

Most of your chain restaurants and any well established local restaurant can assign items to a specific seat position within their POS system. When it comes time to print the check, they can then be split up by seats or assigning multiple seats to a bill.

If that fails, a calculator or some good old common sense/rounding, usually works.

I’ve been saying there should be a device like this at every restaurant for years, since I routinely eat out with 6-12 people, some of which are couple and some which are not. I think it would save waitstaff so much time it would be worth it any expense.

My rule is that if the people at the table are all adults, the bill gets split evenly.

But without bistromath, what will power our space ships???

If you all have iPhones, there’s a Paypal app for that.

Or, if you happen to be dining at a restaurant with a multitouch table, there are other clever options: http://endquote.com/projects/surface/restaurant/

Also don’t forget the credit card roulette iPhone app.

When ever there are more than a few people, payment always ends up $10 – 20bucks short. This would solve that. Also, you don’t have to wait so long for your next beer since your waitress will no longer be splitting a check for 23 ways.

CC Roullette is correctly played by placing all cards in a hat and having the server draw them out one at a time. Last card standing is the ‘loser’. It makes for much more drama when there’s only 2 or 3 cards left.

Having said all that, I always carry cash if I know I’m going to be sharing a table with a group. Cash is king for a reason.

Not every problem needs a technological solution.

Interesting factoid: people who “don’t want to bother” tallying up everyone’s orders and would rather split a bill up evenly drink lots of expensive alcohol.

I agree with Dan, it’s cool and all, but it comes off being a solution in search of a problem.

I find it funny that this was invented in Korea, which is a country where people rarely go Dutch. Typically, the host or the elder pays.

In that light, it definitely comes off as a solution in search of a problem.

I like it.

Some UX questions though. - How do you assign what you order? - How does the restaurant know you haven’t cheated them? - Does it interact with a “mothership”?

If you are the sucker stuck with paying the bill and then trying to get everyone to pay you back then I’ve been working on an app to you might like: http://split-the-bill.com/

:)

My bad (should have previewed): http://split-the-bill.com/

Credit card roulette works best when the last person drawn is the one who pays. Makes it a more exciting game.

If friends go Dutch, they are not real friends. Among friends, you fuss over whose treat it is.

I hate being with a a group where people fuss over individual items. It’s so stingy. Just enjoy the company and stop grumbling when it’s time to pay.

What Elliot said. Inevitably, people who “don’t want to bother” with accounting for what they consumed also generally “don’t want to bother” with ordering a reasonable (read: not excessive) amount of food / alcohol.

$12 for Tomato Soup?

How did they invent a machine to solve UNKNOWABLE DARK MAGICK ?