[USER]

My sister, her husband, and I were recently hosted at the vacation home of good friends of ours. They very generously fed us breakfast and lunch, drove us around, etc. To cover some of their hosting expenses we paid for dinners out, filled their gas tank, bought drinks, etc. All good there. At the end of it all, we tallied up our contributions to figure out what we owe each other. My brother-in-law felt the contributions should be divided by family, so I would pay half. I felt it should be divided per person, so divided in three. He felt it was stingy of me to suggest that they should pay double. Was I wrong?

In a later discussion, my sister said she agreed with me, but mentioned the taxi the three of us rode in, where I again said the fee should be divided in three (even though the taxi charges a flat fee, regardless of the number of persons). She said, in that instance, she felt it should be divided in half (as that is how a taxi driver would bill it if I shared a taxi with another party). I lean towards agreeing with her on that.

Who do you think is right? (For the record, this is not a hill I’m going to die on. I was just saying what I thought was logical, and was hurt that this was perceived as stinginess, but we’ll hopefully clear that up.)

PS: I don’t know how to turn off comments to wrap this up (lol). My brother-in-law is actually a very generous person. There’s more context and complexity added by cultural differences. I wanted to know if I was crazy for suggesting dividing by three, and you have answered.

Thank you.

For as much as can be controlled by me, my BIL and I will be fine.

[Mitch]

Per person. Three ways. Especially for things like dinner. You’re essentially paying for half of one of their meals and drinks if you split it two ways.

[Ashley]

I’m a single person that vacations with her family, the rest of whom are all coupled. We always divide per person.

[Lizzie]

This is pretty awful for family to argue about. Of course they are in the wrong, we travel with my family all the time and never would ever expect a single person to pay the price of a couple, it’s divided equally per person or less for them to make things easier.

However, if I had the money and it wasn’t going to affect my day to day, I’d just pay it to avoid an argument. I try to always be generous when I can and not worry who is right.

[Jennifer]

You are definitely right in my mind. Why should you pay more because you are single. Divide by 3.

[Jenny]

3 ways. If they weren’t married, it wouldn’t even be a thought that it would be 3 ways.

[Alicia]

Taxi I agree w sis but meals yes 1/3

[Tracy]

I would agree with your sister that things like the taxi would be divided by 2, or gas for the car, etc, where the number of users doesn’t change the price. But for things like food, I would definitely divide by the number of people.

For the future, I would recommend establishing the spending and reimbursement protocols before the vacation, that way everyone is on the same page from the beginning.

[Diann]

I man, every time you go somewhere with the two of them, you’re going to be paying half. Right now it’s not a hill to die on, but e v e r y t i m e y’all go somewhere together, since you paid half this time, you’re gonna pay half the next time because he’s expecting YOU to keep the peace.

He is stingy and entitled to expect one person to shoulder the cost of two.

[Elfin]

I think anything flat rated should be divided by family and anything billed by person should be divided by person. If it is a small enough difference, it is just easier to divide by two

[Alicia]

Anytime I go anywhere with siblings (I’m married, my brother is single, and my sister is in a long-term relationship), we always split by the number of people.

We just rented an air bnb recently for a concert out of town and split it 5 ways.

[Lynne]

This is petty.. And at my age I am not going back and forth over money. That said I am paying half and ending the discussion.

Because in the end I was hosted in someone’s home so I still saved money.

[Author]

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