Dodging Your Round at the Pub is Rubbish – Here’s How To Do It Better

Brits like their alcohol, that’s not news, but the fact that the average Brit will spend £90,942 in their lifetime at the pub is.

Alcohol is getting more expensive and with the average Brit spending 14 months of their life at their local some sneaky round-dodgers have come up with some interesting tips for avoiding paying for their round.

The most effective hacks for avoiding your round are:

1. Drink slowly when it’s your turn so someone else buys the drinks
2. Hold the door open to let the group in so you were at the back when you get to the bar
3. Go to the toilet when it is your round
4. Buy a round as early as possible in the night to avoid expensive rounds of shots later on
5. Pretend to have an important phone call when it is your turn to buy a round
6. Pretend to forget your wallet
7. Wait until last in the hope people have gone home when it gets to your turn
8. Go out for a cigarette when it is your turn
9. Say you have to go as it approaches your turn
10. Talk about how skint you are to make your friends feel guilty about asking

Now, I’m as money conscious as the next man but seriously, holding the door open to let the group in so you’re at the back when you get to the bar? That’s real deep. I get the fear of buying a round too, it is expensive but ultimately you are getting what you pay for.

In a finding that also made me cringe, market researchers OnePoll found that while three quarters of those dodging a round get away with it successfully, three in ten have been caught acting a top booze Scrooge.. It’s one thing to resent paying for a round but being caught deliberately avoiding it is a different thing all together. Some try-hard Brits just don’t know where the line is and It understandably leads to arguments – one in ten Brits have even ended up in a row with their drinking buddies over a round.

One sneaky punter pretended to be sick when he failed to cough up for a round while another jammy dodger tried to charge a round to his friend’s debit card behind the bar – until the bar manager announced his trickery to the rest of the pub.

Trickery may be part of the culture, I’ve been out for ‘one drink’ and ended up paying for the first round and having to leave before the rounds are repaid. This has happened more than once and friends always seem to have a peculiar case of amnesia the next time we go to the pub.

One issue that I would love to see explored is how many people feel obliged to participate in rounds? Is it socially unacceptable to just buy your own drinks when your buddies are in a round? After looking at the findings I might consider it, a quarter of adults admitted to buying cheaper drinks when it’s their turn but make an expensive choice when someone else is getting the drinks in.

Happy drinking all – remember, trust no one.