Dear Urban Diplomat: Can you slap your friends with invoices for a fun weekend at the cottage?
Dear Urban Diplomat,
I invited a crew of friends and their kids to my cottage last weekend. They brought snacks and lunches, but I supplied most of the booze, some top-notch steaks and salmon, and gas for the boat. I even rented a water trampoline. At the end of the weekend, I divvied up the cost and emailed everyone, asking for $60 each. So far, no one has paid up. We all enjoyed the weekend. Am I totally off base to expect that we all share the cost?
—Equal opportunist, LAWRENCE PARK
You’re so far off base, you’re practically in the outfield. You cannot, by any stretch of hospitality etiquette, slap your friends with invoices. You’re hosting, not running a resort. There’s no doubt entertaining is expensive, but keeping a ledger defeats the point of going to the cottage, which is to relax and have fun. It’s also extremely tacky. Either declare it a BYO-everything affair up front or abandon your inner Ebenezer and foot the friggin’ bill.
Send your questions to the Urban Diplomat at urbandiplomat@torontolife.com
If it was stated upfront that all costs would be shared between everyone then no problem from my point of view. As long as the decision to purchase all those fancy steaks and a water trampoline were a group decision with the understanding everyone has to chip in.
If however you invited everyone one up without having this conversation you’re stuck with the bill.
A host should stand all the costs of entertainment.
Perhaps scaling back on the extravagance would
haven’t gone amiss and the guests would have
enjoyed themselves all the same.
Anyone who wants to “push the boat out”
–a British expression–
should have the resources to get back to shore.
Are you insane, or a libertarian? You don’t invite people to a party and then stick them with a bill. You invite people to a party so they invite you to parties. If it was too expensive for you, too bad, just hold off on hosting for a while and attend parties thrown by others (assuming your invoices haven’t torpedoed your friendships).
I’m confused…did your guests force you to go for the steaks/salmon and a water trampoline? If not, and you were simply trying to show them a great time, stay in the spirit of hosting and realize it was your idea, and therefore ultimately your fault if you went over budget.
This is a great FYI for next time that chicken, and some inner tubing probably would have sufficed.
The word “invite” is key. You invited, they accepted, you bare the cost.
Had you said, “Let’s all go to the cottage together and share the expense.” Well, that’s a completely different story!
UD:
You made this up, didn’t you. No one could possibly be this clueless and still write a coherent sentence.
Seriously?
As Joe said above nothing wrong with making grand plans in advance, figuring out the costs and asking your friends to chip if you do it in advance.
ie. Hey Bob, so excited to you and Sue up this weekend. I was thinking, we should get some nice steaks, and maybe rent a water tramp for the kids. If we split the costs evenly should not be more than $60 a couple, is that cool? Let me know and I will arrange everything. Thanks again, Mr. Cheap and Polite
This has to be a joke!
We regularly entertain at our cottage. Some invites are all inclusive, others include a byo list that almost all guests have followed, the lone exceptions being DD friends? Usually everyone brings more than required and often includes goodies for us to enjoy privately. I would never bill guests unless they agreed to pay shared expenses.