that people who grab tables at self service restaurants without getting food dirst

[Windsock]

are nobs
owners of small kids etcetc ussual conditions apply
it REALLY annoys me.
this messes up the flow of traffic and one person sits there hogging a space where 4 people could get in eat AND have left byt he time their person arrives

the point is that if people dont hog tables then the flow of traffic works better.
so by the time people have ordered, someone else has eatne

i though that much was obvious for all the " why buy food when you have no table" folk

Yes it winds me up big time too
Language students herds groups in summer are the worst. So rude and they don't give a shit.

But it doesn't work like that. Sorry, will still find a table to sit at before eating.

valium I think OP is referring to coffee places and IKEA type of places. You get your food and drink in the hope that by the time it's on your tray and your ready to sit down there will be a table for you.

You're

We must have this debate at least 10 times a year and it's always evenly split.

It makes no sense to me to get a table while waiting for your food. Inefficient use of resources, selfish and rude.

Agree that if people didn't hog tables there would be less of a problem with finding a seat

Course it wouldn't. The number of people in the queue bears no relation to the number of seats does it? It's not the Hard Rock, they don't count you in at the door.

YABU, still loads less 'table wastage' than if you were hanging around waiting for a menu, then someone to take your order, then food to arrive. It may be self-service but people are still paying customers, who are understandably trying to avoid hanging around like lemons while their trays of hot food get cold.

YABU. I hate it when you're eating, and all the time there's a flustered parent with a tray of food and a clutch of hungry children in your peripheral vision trying to stake a claim on your table by keeping their eyes fixed on you and grinding their teeth.

Sometimes I feel I shouldn't do the McFlurry run if they've got a very determined look about them.

"I find it a bit strange that u would go into a place, buy food & then have no where to sit to eat it.

I always find a table and then get my food."

You doing that is the reason why the OP would buy food and have no place to eat it.

If you save a table and then spend ten minutes in the queue waiting to purchase your food then you are causing the OP, at the front of that queue and looking for an empty table, to have nowhere to eat hers.

While your table sits empty for ten minutes, save for a pile of bags and coats or whatever you have used to reserve it, the OP could have been using it and gone by the time your food was ready. And (as long as nobody else was table blocking in the same way you do), you would still be able to sit there too when she had finished as it would be empty at about the same time you were leaving the front of the queue.

Yabu if there were 6 people in front of me in the queue for mcdonalds, the person at the front would not have eaten their food and be leaving the table by the time I was served.

I will continue to grab a table before eating, if you want to wait that's up to you.

I always send ds to get a seat while I get the food. He's just a pain queueing with me, jiggles about and constantly chatters! He's better off out of it.

shatnwea so what are they supposed to do when there's no table available because people like you who have come in AFTER them have occupied a seat for 10 minutes for no good reason

Who eats and is ready to leave in 10 mins? Especially if you have small children with you

Exactly comma
Hard to see like anyone can disagree with such simple logics

so what are they supposed to do when there's no table available because people like you who have come in AFTER them have occupied a seat for 10 minutes for no good reason

I expect them to avert their gaze. Nobody likes an audience when they're troughing in a food court.

It doesn't ruin the flow.
Most people don't sit down, wolf down their food and leave.
They stay and chat or eat at a normal pace so the seat wont be available when you are done paying

How about go home, and make yourself a nice sandwich. You will have clean plates and cutlery, the floor will not be awash with sticky stuff, and no 'other people' to worry about.

How would people who do save react to people with food purchased walking over and sitting in the chairs their child/friend/partner are trying to save? If I've got my food and there's one person sitting at a 3 or 4 person table with no food while their buddy is at the back of the line Ime and my friends aren't going to stand around

You might take that chance if you were in your own buying a coffee. But I'm buggered if I'd go in there with others, spend £20 on food and then it goes stone cold while I faff around looking for a table which is taken up by people nursing a tea that they bought an hour ago but they're reading the paper/texting/gossiping and don't fancy moving yet.

It does ruin the flow whether people hang about for a while or not.
Most people try to look away and not stare shanters. It's probably you feeling guilty about jumping the queue that makes you feel "watched"

"Most people try to look away and not stare shanters. It's probably you feeling guilty about jumping the queue that makes you feel "watched""

I'm being facetious. I don't even like McFlurries.