My friend and I have always argued about the rules or carpooling, or rather, who owes whom what.

Is it ridiculous of me to argue that I don't owe him gas money if he offered to drive somewhere we were both going. I mean, he was going to go there whether I rode along or not. Is it wrong of him to demand gas money from me?

I guess I could understand if he offered to drive somewhere. For example. We had a tee time at a golf course that was like 30 minutes away. We both made the plan and he offered to drive. Do I owe him gas money in that situation?

I hope I'm not coming off as cheap. We've just always argued about it and he thinks he should get gas money no matter what as long as he's driving. I think he is wrong.

Opinions?

 

In my exp i would only ask for gas only if i was low on gas and no little to no money, i would offer to drive and say "Yea we can go to the mall, we can go if you throw me like 10, i wanna check out some games anyway". In that situation i was gonna go but i would of had to go later or another day cuz i didnt want to use the gas. Really when someone offers you a ride your kinda supposed to offer some money, kinda like when you go to the restaurant and you leave your waiter a tip. Another more recent example is last week i offered to take some classmates to wawa on our lunch break, i didnt expect to someone to pay for me or even throw me some money but i was offered some anyway. It all depends on the person who is driving anyway. Last example, i used to take my old roommates to school, we all go to the same school again i didnt ask for money unless i was low on gas.

 

That's another thing I've noticed too. Which kind of frustrates me. When people just fill up it's not a big deal, but as soon as they get to their last quarter of a tank they all of a sudden need you to throw them some cash. I'd rather them just be consistent and always ask for the money.

 

When I used to drive and had 2 people Carpooling with me, I paid for half the gas, the other 2 paid for the other half.
Not that I was being an ***, but the extra weight and driving out of my way to pick them up and the amount was agreed on before we started the Carpool.
I know of large companies in California that have the Carpool vans that come with a gas card and all. A friend of mine was in 1 of these and the company supplied the van and the gas was taken equally out of the employees that used it paychecks.

 

I didnt ask for it all the time cause i didnt like asking for it, so i figured id just ask for it when i actually needed it.

 

That's a good point. Asking for gas money is always kind of awkward...

 

When I was picking people up for work they would give me like 10$ here and there. It wasn't a big deal and I didn't bother asking every day.