Online Application Question

ChrisWeiland

So I am in the process of applying for a job and have been tasked with the following riddle:

A standard measure of spirits is 35.5ml. If a barman pours less than 35.5ml for each serving, the term used to describe this is under pouring. If the same barman under pours one shot of vodka for every five he has sold, what would be the total sales of vodka in shots if there was a surplus of one 70cl bottle?

eezipc

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

So I am in the process of applying for a job and have been tasked with the following riddle:

A standard measure of spirits is 35.5ml. If a barman pours less than 35.5ml for each serving, the term used to describe this is under pouring. If the same barman under pours one shot of vodka for every five he has sold, what would be the total sales of vodka in shots if there was a surplus of one 70cl bottle?

Just say you don't drink. That's the real test there.

El Weirdo

That's not a riddle.

stimpson

98.5915492958

Mean Laqueefa

about the equivalent of an Atari Jaguar

ChrisWeiland

stimpson wrote: »

98.5915492958

Yeah i make it 100 shots sold myself

Sin City

I would imagine some drunken scumbag would realise he is being under charged and smash the bottle over the bar mans head

So no profits to be had

stimpson

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

Yeah i make it 100 shots sold myself

We'll you're obviously measuring all your shots at 35ml, you underpourer.

Cee-Jay-Cee

Wan meeeeelyan.

MyStubbleItches

78.87

stimpson

MyStubbleItches wrote: »

78.87

Question is ambiguous. If he has sold 5, does that mean he has taken money for 5 bottles worth but used 4, or sold 5 bottles but taken money for 6?

ohnonotgmail

stimpson wrote: »

Question is ambiguous. If he has sold 5, does that mean he has taken money for 5 bottles worth but used 4, or sold 5 bottles but taken money for 6?

I take it as the part in bold. but there is some ambiguity there.

Sky King

If it takes two men four hours to dig half a trench, how long does it take a spider wearing boxing gloves to pull a thorn out of a frog's hole?

zinzan

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

So I am in the process of applying for a job and have been tasked with the following riddle:

A standard measure of spirits is 35.5ml. If a barman pours less than 35.5ml for each serving, the term used to describe this is under pouring. If the same barman under pours one shot of vodka for every five he has sold, what would be the total sales of vodka in shots if there was a surplus of one 70cl bottle?

How much is he under-pouring by?

Wheety

zinzan wrote: »

How much is he under-pouring by?

I took it as 1/5. For every 5, he was only really pouring the amount of 4.

zinzan

Wheety wrote: »

I took it as 1/5. For every 5, he was only really pouring the amount of 4.

Comes down to assumptions because of the ambiguous nature of the question..

"If the same barman under pours one shot of vodka for every five he has sold"

Is that a full shot of vodka he has saved by under-pouring or is he just under-pouring one shot out of the five.

ChrisWeiland

Wheety wrote: »

I took it as 1/5. For every 5, he was only really pouring the amount of 4.

I took it that he was pouring 35ml per shot thereby saving 0.5ml each time

By that logic 20 shots are sold per bottle

for every 5 shots poured one is saved meaning 4 shots saved per 70cl bottle

70cl (20 shot) surplus = 5 bottles sold = 100 shots

DubDani

He makes each Shot 28.4ml, which means for every 5 he sells he "saves" one 35.5ml shot. So he is selling each shot short by 7.1ml. 700/7.1 = 98.59

Wheety

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

I took it that he was pouring 35ml per shot thereby saving 0.5ml each time

By that logic 20 shots are sold per bottle

for every 5 shots poured one is saved meaning 4 shots saved per 70cl bottle

70cl (20 shot) surplus = 5 bottles sold = 100 shots

But 35ml is just an arbitrary figure. it's not stated anywhere in the question. Why not 34ml or 33ml?

It is ambiguous but it could be taken as under pouring by 1 shot in every 5 or he underpours 1 in every 5 but then they don't say by how much.

kneemos

El Weirdo wrote: »

That's not a riddle.

More of a fiddle.

Hurrache

Wheety wrote: »

But 35ml is just an arbitrary figure. it's not stated anywhere in the question. Why not 34ml or 33ml?

It is ambiguous but it could be taken as under pouring by 1 shot in every 5 or he underpours 1 in every 5 but then they don't say by how much.

They do, he underpours the amount that leaves him with a surplus bottle, so you work it out from there.

wexie

Hurrache wrote: »

They do, he underpours the amount that leaves him with a surplus bottle, so you work it out from there.

But he underpours the amount of a whole bottle in how many shots?

We don't know that....

Question is terribly ambiguous, the way I read it we don't know how much he is underpouring by so therefor the question can't be answered with the information available

Wheety

Hurrache wrote: »

They do, he underpours the amount that leaves him with a surplus bottle, so you work it out from there.

But he could under pour by 7ml a shot which would make it easier to work it out. You don't know how many shots it takes for a bottle to be surplus. That's what you have to work out.

ChrisWeiland

wexie wrote: »

Question is terribly ambiguous, the way I read it we don't know how much he is underpouring by so therefor the question can't be answered with the information available

I think it's fair to say that the answer is approximately 100 shots

zinzan

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

I think it's fair to say that the answer is approximately 100 shots

Not necessarily.
Assumptions made would have to be detailed also.

wexie

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

I think it's fair to say that the answer is approximately 100 shots

yeah if you read it that he underpours one shot out of five in that he saves 1 shot for every 5 poured.

if you read it that he underpours one shot out of five by an indeterminate amount then you can't work it out.

So I guess you'd have to wonder about what this particular question is testing, math skills, english comprehension or logic?

I guess though logically you'd have to go with :

if there's 2 ways of reading this question, but one of the ways leads to be not being possible to answer the question....well then it should be the other one.

Or should it?

Was it multiple choice OP?

ChrisWeiland

wexie wrote: »

Was it multiple choice OP?

No multiple choice. It does make you wonder what they are testing for alright.

misstearheus

Tree fiddy.

biko

This is even worse than school kids asking about their homework.

awec

Is this one of those stupid questions that's supposedly going to give an insight into how your mind works rather than actually have a correct answer?

Allinall

You’re all missing the critical point.

A shot of vodka does not equal a measure.

It’s a trick question .

_Dara_

By how much is he under-pouring? It seems like there is incomplete information. And I reckon that's the test. If you answer with a figure, that would be total bluffing. They want to see how conscientious you are. You need more information and it's fine to say so.

I've had multiple choice questions similar to the above before. One of the choices would be "Insufficient information provided to solve problem" or something along the lines. I answered a few that way and did well in the test.

Tokyo

ChrisWeiland wrote: »

So I am in the process of applying for a job and have been tasked with the following riddle:

A standard measure of spirits is 35.5ml. If a barman pours less than 35.5ml for each serving, the term used to describe this is under pouring. If the same barman under pours one shot of vodka for every five he has sold, what would be the total sales of vodka in shots if there was a surplus of one 70cl bottle?

None of the above information is relevant, if you don't know how many 70cl bottles there were to begin with...

pleas advice

Allinall wrote: »

You’re all missing the critical point.

A shot of vodka does not equal a measure.

It’s a trick question .

where do you drink? they're hardly lookin for staff at the minute?

Arghus

If you have to ask AH the job may not be for you.