I remember my college days like it was yesterday, managing a tight allowance and staying up late working on group projects. I always loved hanging out in big groups but it also meant stretching the budget sometimes. When it came to adding the tax and the tip, plus splitting the bill, it was extremely awkward and difficult. If we are being honest, I normally leave that to the finance major friend— it was such a hassle to do everything manually. If only Tab existed during my college days,  I’m always envious of the new tech today’s kids inherit! Tab is an app that calculates the bill for you just with a picture of the receipt-- super handy for group gatherings. 

Enough college flashbacks, now I use Tab even for dinner dates with my girlfriends. Here’s how it works:

A quick snap of the receipt and the app will identify the items to its price then each person claims their own orders, voila and personalized sum for everyone! It’s like magic. Multiple people can select the same items, so if I shared the pizza with two other people we would have a different total than those who didn’t have any pizza, micro-splitting the bill. It also lets you adjust the tip value, calculating from the total and not subtotal (I had no idea tip was calculated before tax). The best part? You can even connect it to your Venmo account and forward the fees to whoever handled the bill with no extra charge. Why even have a wallet anymore? 

Some things are worth nothing. Tab is completely free, no hidden charges

Having a Tab account lets you save all your previous receipts, it also lets you generate a unique code for other users to access the Tab bill. Everyone can be on their own phone and claim their own orders instead of passing one phone around. Another cool feature is a birthday button where Tab will split the bill evenly between everyone and count out the birthday queen. Yas, queen! 

One thing that is a little tricky with Tab is getting the angle and lighting for the receipt shot. The flash will go off when you take the picture straight from the app because lighting really matters for Tab’s technology. It’s just as crucial as getting that perfect food snap you took during Dinner. Lighting and angle of the picture has to be clear and flat enough for the technology to read the text but Tab also has orange banners that will guide the receipt shot for max efficiency. From my experience, the receipts are usually quite photogenic, something about the texture of the paper and the ink just works well with any quick shot. 

I love this description from Tab: “No more back-of-the-napkin algebra or typing in prices by hand!” --that’s exactly what I used to do. Tab is available on the Google Play store and Apple’s App store.