From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishfoot the billfoot the billPAY FORto pay for something, especially something expensive that you do not want to pay for He ordered drinks and then left me to foot the bill! → foot
Examples from the Corpus
foot the bill• It will be, as usual, the taxpayer who will be footing the bill.• These two mindless cads decided to bring the girl along to the East and have her foot the bill.• Individuals in dysfunctional environments often be-come dysfunctional in other aspects of their lives, with their organizations ultimately footing the bill.• Sometimes they came alone, sometimes with a man in tow - to foot the bill!• The program asks businesses to foot the bill for daily newspapers in the classroom.• Her father is footing the bill for lessons, which cost about $ 100 for two hours.• Airlines currently foot the bill for the security systems.• Many customers will have to foot the bill for water meters, which most companies will eventually install.• It has already been argued in some detail that foot the bill is semantically transparent.• If taxpayers footed the bill, those costs might well be higher. 