Your Tab would have been held open.

It means they don't yet close your check, and you don't have to pay right away. Rather, you keep ordering things over the course of the evening, until you are done. Then you say you want to pay and they give you your bill and you pay. That way, you don't have to keep paying, or keep using your credit card. Just do it one time.

It is sort of like when you sit at a table and order things. You do not pay for your drink, then the salad, then the entree, then dessert. You wait until the end to pay. Same idea.

The only thing I do not like about it at a bar is sometimes they ask to hold your credit card. That prevents you from walking off without paying.

Another thing about a tab is you can get drinks for friends and say put it in my tab. The only problem with this is if the group is large it could be abused.

At a crowded bar, when I order from the bar I usually like to pay right then because who knows where I'm would end up by the time my drink was drunk.

It’s kinda like a subscription. Bars know people usually drink more when they’re not handing out actual cash as they drink. Bars are there to make money selling drinks.

A tab is when you agree to settle up what you owe at the end of your time in the bar. I think it stands for “Tabulation”.

LOL keep the tab open so you just settle up when you are ready to leave ...usually ask for a credit card

You should have told him politely "no, it's already open".

The tab the tab. It means you pay the total on your last order instead of right now