Foot the bill means to pay for something, to take on the costs. It has nothing to do with feet: here foot is a verb meaning “pay”, and in that sense it hardly appears outside this phrase. People usually say it about a large sum nobody wants to pay, and often the person paying isn't the one who spent the money: a company, parents, an insurer. In the news, it's most often taxpayers: Taxpayers will foot the bill.
When would you say foot the bill?
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foot the bill (for + noun); be left to foot the bill; who will foot the bill?
- The company footed the bill for our hotel during the conference.
- If the concert is cancelled, who will foot the bill?
- Taxpayers will foot the bill for the new stadium.
What changed
First versionMy parents will foot the bill of my studies abroad.
RevisionMy parents will foot the bill for my studies abroad.
Of can seem like the natural way to link bill to what it covers, but the thing you pay for is introduced with for, as in a bill for repairs: foot the bill for my studies. Nothing else in the sentence changes.
Pick up the bill means to pay for everyone at a café, usually by choice and as a generous gesture: Put your wallet away, I'll pick up the bill. Foot the bill is more often about big costs that have landed on someone: repairs, medical treatment, a stadium.
Your turn
When the pipe burst, the landlord agreed to ___ the bill for all the repairs, so we paid nothing.
Show the answer
foot — The landlord paid for all the repairs and the tenants paid nothing, so it's foot the bill. Split the bill means to divide the cost between several people, but then the tenants would have had to pay too.
Write about costs that someone else covered. Say who paid and what for.
When our flight was cancelled, the airline footed the bill for our hotel and dinner.
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