RUBBISH!!
Totally with 6 footer on this one. An absolute nightmare trying to keep abreast of things when away for more than a nightstop. Yes it means that you can all go out for a lovely meal, which can if I'm not mistaken include half a bottle of wine/2 beers-obviously as long as you are outwith the GASO approved limits (200' from aircraft isn't it??), but have heard of a large crew who opted for separate bills and it took 1.5 hours to sort out due to- a language & "I didn't have the chips" etc.- faff at the end of it. It is fine for a small 2-4 person set up which is probably the way that our civilian masters researched it as, but multiply to a crew of 15-18 then it becomes an embarrassing pain in the backside. And if its across in the "land of the free" then your 10% allowance for tipping is insufficient as the standard, unless I'm mistaken , is 15%.
Also, I've been on a crew who had to sort it all out on landing on the way back from a multi-stop trip because the sectors were too short to get the monies all in to the co-pilot. Our civilian counterparts must be laughing their socks off at us.
Bunch of A**E