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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to want to shout at people who can't work out how to use car patk ticket machines?

51 replies

Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 15:41

And furthermore to kick them in the back of their ankles?
Why don't they know their reg number?
Why do they put their money in over and over and over again before realising that they have to put the reg number in FIRST?
Why do they put 50p in and then ferret around in their pockets, handbag etc for another 30p by which time the first lot of money has come back out and the whole process starts again?

I know it isn't very festive but I honestly thought my head was going to explode with rage after waiting behind several people doing exactly this earlier on today. In the rain.
Actually I didnt want to just kick them, I wanted to bloody kill them.

Maybe I have ishoos?

OP posts:
Original poster
Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 15:42

My phone has ishoos. Car park

OP posts:
lynniep · 16/12/2011 15:43

I've never seen a car park ticket machine that needs a reg number!

LineRunnerCrouchingReindeer · 16/12/2011 15:43

Do you wanna share my chill pill? Xmas Smile

FioFio · 16/12/2011 15:44

I think you need to have a bit more patience. I always think if people had a bit more time for one another and were kind to strangers then we would actually live ina much happier society than we do at the moment.

LineRunnerCrouchingReindeer · 16/12/2011 15:44

lynniep where do you live? Shangri-La?

Our machines shout at us, now.

rabbid · 16/12/2011 15:47

nah sod em, i agree with the op Grin

ours round here need the reg though to be honest you can type in anything as long as you pay

the worse ones are the ones that take your picture then you have to wait for the machine to download the pic.

pensioners have lots of trouble with theses!

YonderRevoltingPeasantWhoIsHe · 16/12/2011 15:47

Loads of them need reg numbers around here, particularly the ones at the hospital. Although randomly they only need certain parts of the reg number, which makes me think a bit

Lots of machines aren't very well signed/ explained so YABU on that basis. But I do get self-service checkout machine rage standing behind old ladies in M&S so never mind.

Original poster
Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 15:47

Yes please linerunner
The combination of hyperactive toddler + rain + hideous last minute shopping was all too much for me and the incompetent ticket people were the last straw!

OP posts:
Wittsend13 · 16/12/2011 15:48

Yes i have used car park tickets they require reg number but normally it's just the numbers they ask for. Yet another way for them to make money so you can't give your ticket to someone else. YABNU I get annoyed with people like this too.

DreamsOfSteamingHotMincePies · 16/12/2011 15:50

I have never encountered a ticket machine that your have to put your reg number into, but I was ready to injure the person in the car infront when trying to get to the hospital when DS was trying his best to make his very fast exit from my overdue belly. All you had to do was press a button and take a ticket FFS! Clearly there was no impending births occuring inside that car!

Original poster
Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 15:50

Also why didn't the second person in the queue learn from the first?
I'm still disproportionately annoyed now. Can you tell? :-)

OP posts:
FioFio · 16/12/2011 15:50

Instead of getting so cross it might be easier and quicker to offer some help

LineRunnerCrouchingReindeer · 16/12/2011 15:51

It's so you can't pass on tickets to others.

Greenshadow · 16/12/2011 15:55

They introduced them where I live but there was such an uproar about how 'complicated' they were, that they were forced to remove them and go back to the old style ones where you just stick your money in.

Couldn't understand the problem myself, such a waste of taxpayers money to replace them.

LongWayRound · 16/12/2011 15:55

I think YAB slightly U. I live outside the UK, and every time I come back for a visit there are new ways of paying for things. Every year I have to learn some new procedure, and I find it very frustrating. Other people look at me as though I'm an idiot - how come I speak English, appear to be British and yet have no idea of how to do something that "everybody else" can? I know this can't be the case for every single one of the people you're complaining about in the carpark, but you have no way of knowing why each individual is finding it hard to get used to the system.

Practice patience :) Getting angry is bad for your health in the long term.

WTAF · 16/12/2011 15:56

Where I live we don't have to put in reg numbers, but when I go to visit relatives, in their town all the machines want your reg number. I don't know it! So I'm one of the people you want to bloody kill. And even I would say YANBU really, I should know it. If I lived there all the time maybe I'd remember it?

Maybe the people who do it (like me) are visitors from other towns where this silly policy of reg numbers on tickets doesn't exist! It's a mean spirited system anyway.

Original poster
Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 16:03

It is a mean spirited system.
If they'd go back to the old way everyone would be happier, except perhaps for the council.

The bit that annoyed me the most was the putting the money in, it coming back out, putting it in, it coming back out etc etc.

I should really move on and find something more worthy to get annoyed about.

OP posts:
Bathsheba · 16/12/2011 16:05

We have nothing like that here....you put £4 in...you get a 2 hour ticket...you go....

Dunrovin · 16/12/2011 16:07

Or you could take FioFio's suggestion and show people how to use them, next time.
Unless you enjoy feeling you would like to kick people?

Original poster
Bethshine82 · 16/12/2011 16:10

I'm sure they were very nice people.
I wouldn't really kick them.
I was just a bit on edge with DS.
And they should know their reg number. And have their ticket money.

Calm now.

OP posts:
ConstanceNoring · 16/12/2011 16:16

Here's one for you to get annoyed about, - people who walk very slowly (disclaimer - and I mean in a dawdling not really in a hurry sort of way, not those who are unable to walk any faster)

these slow - get in your way - dawdlers always seem to meander around or be accompanied by another equally meandering friend so that you cannot possibly no matter how many attempts slip past them.

I have been last minute shopping too, can you tell?

I actually feel a tiny bit better for saying that.

FioFio · 16/12/2011 16:20

Please say excuse me, it takes a few seconds and is much healthier than annoyance and anger

Bakelitebelle · 16/12/2011 16:25

It's not the people, it's the system. How ridiculously complicated - designed to confuse the new user. Save your anger issues for the people who decided to make parking even harder

ConstanceNoring · 16/12/2011 16:27

Actually FioFio I think that would be far ruder to do that - if you play that scenario through - you are wondering along minding your own business and someone from behind says "excuse me" (remember these dawdlers are not aware that they are in the way or annoying) so you stop and turn to see who it is and what they are excusing only for that person to whizz along past you.

It would be different of course if they were just stood still in the way, but they are travelling.

FioFio · 16/12/2011 16:28

saying excuse me is fine, it's not rude at all!

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