Travelling in a group? How to make splitting bills less awkward

There’s a strange, though handy, thing that happens in Brazil when you go out to eat with a group of friends. At the end of the meal, when it’s time to pay, it’s not just one bill that comes to the table – say the word, and each diner will get their own personal invoice.

This is a normal thing in Brazil. Everyone wants to pay their fair share, and restaurants are fine with making out individual bills for each diner.

Splitting finances can be awkward when travelling in a group.Credit: iStock

Anywhere outside of Brazil, however, and that’s just not going to happen. It’s not going to happen at hotels either, or in taxis, or in bars, or anywhere else where multiple people will be contributing to a single cost.

For those who are travelling together, particularly friends who wouldn’t normally share expenses, that can present a certain difficulty. How do you manage your group finances? How do you ensure everyone pays their fair share, without a Brazilian-style bill-splitting for every expense?

Of course, the internet comes to your rescue. There are multiple apps out there designed to help travellers in that situation, each offering a variation on the idea of shared finances for travellers who don’t share bank accounts.

Credit: Greg Straight

One of the most convenient is Kttipay, which works on a pay-first basis – that is, everyone travelling together puts an agreed amount of money into the “kitty” before the holiday begins. The app will then issue your group with a digital Visa debit card that each person can use for shared expenses such as hotel bookings, restaurant bills, and transportation.

The benefits here are obvious: everyone is paying from the same account, using money that has already been transferred, so there’s none of the awkwardness of chasing up mates for cash at the end of the trip.

There’s also real-time expense tracking, so everyone in the group can see what is being spent, as well as no transaction fees when you use the digital debit card (which you use by tapping your phone, in the same way you do your standard bank cards in Australia).

Another popular app is Splitwise, which allows travellers to upload their expenses as they travel, including in various currencies and with various percentages, meaning everyone will know how much they’ve spent and how much they owe others in the group by the end of the trip.

That’s a more basic service than Kttipay, though still useful. Splid is a similar, popular app that offers the same service.

For an even more basic strategy, though also helpful, you can use Wise, which allows travellers to transfer money to a single account and convert that money into the currency you will be spending, using a digital or physical Visa card. This will work well if you are happy to place a lot of trust in one member of your group, and will save you plenty on transaction and conversion fees.

And then, of course, there’s the really old-school way of just withdrawing cash, pooling it together, and dipping into the pile every time there’s a shared expense. You won’t need a phone to achieve this – but you will need to trust someone to look after all that money.