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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

Saving a space in a queue to pay. Who was BU?

74 replies

TriggersBroom · 06/03/2014 15:19

I'm intrigued as to who was being unreasonable (if anyone) here.

There is a queue of about 7 people waiting to pay at a small supermarket attached to a petrol station. Three tills are open.

Woman A is number 6 in the queue and realises that she has forgotten something so leaves her basket at the side of the aisle and nips off to get forgotten items.

Woman B is number 7 in the queue and moves up to take her place.

When woman A gets back to the queue, it has reduced to 2 people. Woman B is now number 2. She doesn't offer to give her place up to woman B.

There is a bit of follow-on too, but interested to see whether MN thinks there is anything unreasonable in this scenario so far.

OP posts:

wobblyweebles · 06/03/2014 15:57

She didn't. Just unloaded her shopping onto the belt, then unloaded his shopping onto the belt while I glared...

Original poster

TriggersBroom · 06/03/2014 15:58

on your behalf. Did you ram her ankles?

OP posts:

QueenStromba · 06/03/2014 16:11

I'd only expect to save my space in the queue if I'd already put my stuff on the conveyor belt and I had way more time than I needed to grab the thing I forgot before it was my turn. Even then though I'd apologise profusely to the person behind me.

SarahAndFuck · 06/03/2014 16:32

I don't think you were unreasonable OP.

Although if it was me and the queue hadn't moved, I'd have let her go back to her original place in it. Since it had moved significantly I don't think she should have expected to go right to the front of it.

We had an odd situation of someone saving a place in a soft play place last week at half term.

It was crowded and as we paid to go in we were told that they couldn't guarantee us a table or a seat.

Luckily, someone was just standing up to leave as they let us through the inner door, so we walked over to that table. And just as we got there, a woman seated at the next table moved over to it, leaving her friend sitting at her original table, and said "You can't sit here, I'm saving it for my friends, they've just called to say they are about five minutes away."

So in other words, not even in the building yet, or even in the car park. DH and I just looked at each other and sat down anyway, DS was long gone with just his shoes left behind.

And the woman was furious, she started shouting at us that she was saving the table for her friends who were 'only' five minutes away, that we were ignorant, that her friends had four children and a baby to get out of the car and they 'needed' the table and she was saving it for them.

I suggested she fetch the manager over so he could decide who should have the table, customers who had already paid to get in or customers who had not yet arrived, and as it was one of those tables made of two small ones pushed together, DH separated them so her friends could have half.

None of that was good enough so she just stood beside us shouting "ignorant!" until a member of staff told her to stop it or leave. She went back to her original table and her very embarrassed friend.

It wouldn't have been so bad if she'd been saving that table for longer, but she moved over to it about two seconds before we reached it. And her friends arrived about ten minutes later and were fine on the other half of it.

MrsMook · 06/03/2014 16:49

I had a similar experience to wobbly recently. Just pipped to the queue by another lady with a basket a bit more full than mine. Her children then joined the queue with a basket each, therefore a stealth trolley load. I'd only got about 4 items. It was a cheap supermarket where generally trollies give way to people with a few items. I felt that the limits of cheekiness had been exceeded.

I'd usually let someone back until the point where the next person has to load the checkout.

MoreBeta · 06/03/2014 17:33

wobblyweebles - what does queueing theory?

On average everyone still gets served at the time they would have expected before they decided to join a queue.

Problem is the psychology of queuing.

The people in the queue that the man left were happier as they gained a bonus of someone leaving the queue in front of them. The people in the queue that his wife was in and he subsequently joined feel aggrieved.

The outturn experience of a queue and feelings of 'fairness' matter a lot more than how long on average people expect to queue. People are happier to queue if they feel it is a fair queue.

Queuing attitudes vary a lot by culture though. A scrum is an acceptable queue in some cultures and standing in line waiting is very upsetting.

pancakesfortea · 06/03/2014 17:40

morebeta your job sounds amazing!

ShadowFall · 06/03/2014 17:41

Woman A was being unreasonable.

If you leave the queue without having first got the person behind to agree to hold your space, you can't expect to just rejoin it in your old space. You either do without the forgotten item, or rejoin the queue at the back.

Monetbyhimself · 06/03/2014 18:06

Is this a reverse AIBU? Are you really woman A ?

'Wonders why nothing exciting ever happens in my Tesco Express'

Scholes34 · 06/03/2014 18:11

Woman A was unreasonable. If four people had been served by the time she got back, either the queue was moving very quickly or she was away a long time.

I once made the mistake of popping back to get something in Aldi after I'd emptied my trolley onto the belt. There were two people in front of me, but by the time I got back,the two customers had been served and everyone was looking for me as I was holding everyone up at the check out. I'll not make that mistake again.

MoreBeta · 06/03/2014 18:52

pancakes - I don't do queuing theory now but something even more exciting with ...... ....... power stations!

I tried retiring once but I missed the excitement.

whatareyoueventalkingabout · 06/03/2014 19:11

I
Am I being really stupid here? Did woman a ask if woman b would hold her place for her? "Do you mind if I just nip and get an item?"

if not the woman a is a massive dickhead.

If yes then woman b should have offered the place back and woman a should have said "no it's ok, you have less than me, thanks anyway"

juneybean · 06/03/2014 19:18

I bet she left her car at the pump as well!

whois · 06/03/2014 20:08

She was U to expect her place to have been held. But not as U as a guy in a shop I was in last week...

Shop with a massive queue, think at least 20 people, maybe more. I was now 3 from the front.

A guy walk in from outside the shop, picks up a super full basket from the floor by the door and goes to the lady in front of me 'I was behind you yeah?'

I was a bit confused about what was going on but said 'you weren't infront of me, you've not been in front of me the whole time I've been in the queue'

He says 'yeah I was, I was here yeah, but it's a massive queue yeah, so I've been and done other shopping in ither shops'

Me (quite confused) 'so you can go and join the queue like everyone else now.'

Him: 'no when there's a big queue yeah you don't have to queue. You can say where you were and go and do other things yeah. I'm not waiting in that line yeah like when I've got things to do yeah'

Woman behind me got involved, as did pretty much everyone in the queue calling out 'don't let him in' and then he got really stroppy.

We had come to the front of the queue so I just went round him and paid and everyone else bunched up behind and basically physically excluded him from the front.

Strange guy! He really thought it was ok to just look and see where you would be in a queue, go out toothed shops then come back! TBH I probably wouldn't have stood my ground had he only had a few items but he had an overflowing basket and I only had 3 things.

Sunnymeg · 07/03/2014 17:28

She should have left the queue and taken her basket with her. She had chosen to continue shopping, so has lost her right to a place in the queue. I was brought up to believe this sort of thing is the height of rudeness.

Onepactupac · 07/03/2014 17:33

This SUCH a British thread!! Got everything: queuing, supermarket attached to a petrol station, passive aggression, writing about it after the event....classic!!

God I miss England sometimes

NorbertDentressangle · 07/03/2014 17:42

I was in the same sort of scenario explained in the OP yesterday.

I was Woman A (the one who forgot something) and Woman B was played by a lovely man.

In my case when I rejoined the queue Woman B noticed I'd come back and offered me my place back in front of him.

I thought it was a kind gesture but declined and we had a little laugh about the fact that the price I pay for being indecisive/forgetful is that I go to the back of the queue.

How polite and British was that ?

Alisvolatpropiis · 07/03/2014 17:48

Woman A was being unreasonable.

You leave a queue, you lose your place.

slithytove · 07/03/2014 19:20

gamer I get my forgotten items when my shopping is being scanned
That way my bags get packed too and it's all with permission

70isaLimitNotaTarget · 07/03/2014 19:28

I was in Sainsburys once and there was a shopper with a couple of items (veg) in her hands, a shopper said "You can go in front of me"

The veg holder then waved her DH towards her with a trolley .

Much arguement ensued (I was through the till too quickly to hear it all, even though I took my time deliberately )

YuccanLiederHorticulture · 07/03/2014 19:56

Woman A def being unreasonable.

If there had still been a queue of 7 or more when woman A came back, then woman B might reasonably have considered letting her in (especially as, with 3 serving points, the size of woman A's basket would have caused her no delay) but would not have been obliged to do so.

If the queue went down that much, woman A was doing more than just nipping back for one forgotten item, she was deliberately trying to bag a place near the front of the queue while she did the second half of her shopping, and that is an unbearably entitled thing to do.

YuccanLiederHorticulture · 07/03/2014 20:02

If this is becoming a general thread for queuing anecdotes, here is mine:

I'm in a supermarket with about 10 items in my basket, and am about to unload onto a conyeor belt when a woman rushes up and says something like "could I possibly go ahead of you I only have one item" but doesn't wait for me to reply, just goes on ahead of me. So I just raise an eyebrow and say nothing.

She then proceeds to, after the assistant has scanned her one item, ask if they have stamps in the till, and they normally do but this till is out of the exact type she wants so the assistant has to go and get the key to look in another till, and then once the stamps are sorted out she wants to pay by card and can't get the card to stay in the reader properly, and then she wants cashback ... and by the time she is finished I am FUMING!

No of course I didn't say anything to her. I'm English.

rabbitlady · 07/03/2014 20:21

if you leave the queue, when you return to the back, not to your original place.

if you are in the queue, you should have finished your shopping. it is not acceptable to leave your husband in the queue holding your place while you get the shopping done then stroll in at the front of the queue.

when queuing, do not talk about anything gossipy and interesting unless you intend to finish the story for the people nearby, who are pretending not to listen, as the frustration caused by an unfinished story can last for years.

diddl · 07/03/2014 20:32

Here it's quite usual that if you forget something you leave your trolley and the person behind saves your place and moves your trolley forward!

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