Help - does anyone know the answer

F

fibi

Well-Known Local
Weaver
3 Men Go Into A Hotel. The Man Behind The Desk Said The Room Is £30.00 So Each Man Paid £10.00 And Went To The Room. A While Later The Man Behind The Desk Realized The Room Was Only £25.00
So He Sent The Bellboy To The 3 Guys' Room With £5.00 On The Way The Bellboy Couldn't Figure Out How To Split £5.00 Evenlybetween 3 Men, So He Gave Each Man A £1.00 And Kept The Other £2.00 For Himself. This Meant That The 3 Men Each Paid £9.00 For The Room, Which Is A Total Of £27.00, Add The £2.00 That The Bellboy Kept = £29.00

Where Is The Other Pound?
 
if they paid £25 and he gave each man £1 each that comes to £28...then men didnt pay £9 each, they paid £8.33333333333333333333333333(ok maybe not as many 3's as that but you get what i mean)
 
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cazzer said:
£30 - £3 - £2 = £25, surely??
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This was doing the rounds when I was at school and that was they way we were told to work it out, if they paid £30 to the hotel then they refund £5 that means they paid £25 plus £3 refund plus the £2, known as a mathematical error, your working on figures that don't really exist - ie the £27
 
So are you saying that each man did not pay £9? 3 lots of £9 was £27 when I was at school
 
They didn't pay £9 they paid £10 (£30) and had £5 refunded, I know what your getting at and it doesn't work out, it "appears" that theres £1 missing, we got told the right way to work it out was the way cazzer posted.
Another way of putting it is, they paid £30 to hotel, hotel refunded £5, blokes got £3 each = £27 paid, problem is when you add the £2 that was pocketed, it's being added instead of being taken away
 
Or think of it this way, paid £30, got £5 refunded = £25 to hotel
They paid £30, £10 each, got £1 refunded = £9 each =£27
They paid £27, hotel has £25, porter has £2 = no money missing
 
It is best to work this out in fractions.

The men paid £30 between them or £10 each.

As the room was only £25 it should have been 25/3 = 8 and one third pounds each.

Each man therefore paid 1 and two thirds pounds too much

They were then given £1 each so they still paid two thirds pounds too much.

Two thirds pounds multiplied by three is 6 thirds pounds or £2 which the bellboy kept.
 
cazzer said:
Overcomplicating things a bit I would say??? :)
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You may find fractions complicated and they are more difficult to work with than decimals, especially in mental arithmetic, but they are still a bona fide way of calculating.
 
It's simple. You don't add the £2 onto the £27 to get £29.

You take the £2 off the £27 to get the £25 cost of the room.
 
"You may find fractions complicated "

cheeky sod, might just report you for being insulting!
I meant you complicated the whole question as the answer was obvious
 
K.S.H said:
If fractions come into it the porter would have paid them £1.66 each
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It stated that the bellboy couldn’t figure out how to spilt £5 evenly between three men so he must have been thinking in decimals especially as our currency is decimal currency. You are trying to mix theory with practice. You can have one and one third pounds in theory but you cannot do so in practice. You could in the old money of pounds shillings and pence though.

The art of working in fractions seems to be a dying art these days. Decimals are much simpler to use especially in mental arithmetic. But even then do people understand what £8.33r means when dividing £25 by 3 using decimals? Or dividing £5 by 3 to get 1.66r or 1.6666666667. Multiply 1.6666666667 by 3 and you get 5.0000000001.

I could have done the explanation in decimals but would have ended up with £1.98 and that is not £2. I suppose that I could have gone to explain where the missing 2p was but it was simpler to use fractions.
 
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