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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

You grab a table while I queue up....

313 replies

Grandshiredoubles · 14/02/2015 23:24

Which means that some people before you can't get anywhere to sit. Happened today in Waitrose where the naice people should kmow better. Do you think people should wait until they have their food before getting a table or Aibu. Talking about YOU lady with the red shoes in malvern today

OP posts:

UncleT · 15/02/2015 09:03

Single people (as I often am) can get on with it and find a seat (or not) whenever they've finished paying. One point often overlooked is that it's often easier to get a spare seat if you're on your own, as sharing a table with others can be an option when a place is busy.

ImBatDog · 15/02/2015 09:04

most cafes around here require a table number to take an order, so you have to sit down before going up to order unless you're taking it out.

as for places like mcdonalds, i would rather eat it in my car, always guaranteed a seat that way!

If we have to eat while out and about then dh or i will sit down with the kids, ds is disabled and won't wait in a queue, but its very rare we do this, normally i take food with us!

ChillieJeanie · 15/02/2015 09:06

I am a paying customer though but one without someone else to stake a claim to a table, and in my example was one who had already paid and was waiting for my drink. The ones who were not paying customers (yet) were the couple who had walked through the door and not even got into the queue to order yet felt that they had the right to lay claim to a table.

If paying customers are the criteria though... Last Sunday I had plenty of opportunity to view the people in Costa while I was in the queue. One table for four was occupied by a woman with a toddler and a baby in a pushchair. They had no drinks or food from Costa with them and she was feeding the toddler sandwiches from a lunchbox. Ten minutes later (yes, it was a long queue) a man walked into the cafe to join her. He then queued up, ordered one drink to go, and they all left. So in a heaving cafe she had occupied a table for four without ordering a single item from the premises for well over 20 minutes (probably more like half an hour in total since she was already in place when I arrived) by the time he had got his drink. Would you consider the woman to have been reasonable in her behaviour? She wasn't a paying customer after all.

Sparklingbrook · 15/02/2015 09:07

I wouldn't like to share a table if I was on my own. I just wouldn't bother.

UncleT · 15/02/2015 09:09

I generally wouldn't either, but when needs must it's an option - and the OP is moaning about not getting a seat.

Sparklingbrook · 15/02/2015 09:10

I would say she was BU Chillie, but so were you for waiting ten minutes in Costa. Why is it so slooow in there always?

susiedaisy · 15/02/2015 09:10

I always get a table first. Always have always will. I have kids and my mother has mobility problems. Wouldn't even consider queuing for food with all of us only to find we can't get a table and your food goes cold. Ridiculous attitude, I am buying food and need a table so I find one as far as I can see so do most people. And if I'm on my own I only queue up in a place with plenty of tables and if I can't find a quiet cafe I get a take out sandwich and drink from a shop and either stand up and eat it, go back to my car and eat or find a bench somewhere.

Unless the establishment seats you themselves they are leaving it to you the customer to find your own table so that's what most people do as far as I can see.

UncleT · 15/02/2015 09:11

Chillie you mean without another paying customer to grab the seat? They're not some random stranger in the equation, they provide revenue to the establishment too, and being human they'll also appreciate a sit down no doubt. There are many things in life that are harder for one - that's just the way it is.

ChillieJeanie · 15/02/2015 09:13

Most of the time when it's like that I wouldn't Sparklingbrook, but occasionally it's nice to have someone else make my coffee for me for a change! Fortunately I can usually time it to be when there aren't many people around but last Sunday I had been having a clear out and taken a car load of rubbish to the tip so it was later than I would normally like.

Dunkling · 15/02/2015 09:14

I don't think it's unreasonable to do that.

If I'm going to buy food I expect to be able to sit down with it.

Sparklingbrook · 15/02/2015 09:15

I know what you mean Chillie. I was in Starbucks once and the queue was out the door, they were coming up and down the queue taking your order. It took forever, and I did wonder why i was actually doing it. For a coffee.

ChillieJeanie · 15/02/2015 09:16

But they aren't always paying customers either UncleT. Witness the woman hogging a table for ages when neither she nor the children had anything. One large cappuccino for a family of four doesn't really cut it.

UncleT · 15/02/2015 09:19

People not buying anything and taking tables is clearly an entirely different discussion.

susiedaisy · 15/02/2015 09:21

Our local Costa is a nightmare, it's so busy and it takes so long to get a coffee but yesterday people were still piling in there, the queue was huge, why? Why do people continue to go in knowing it will take 20 mins to get to front of queue and then there might not be a table and the noise of them banging out the used coffee ground is constant. We have 7 others places to get coffee in our shopping centre including another Costa's inside a tesco store but people seem to swarm into that Costa's.

pictish · 15/02/2015 09:22

No you don't stand in a queue with three kids and all your coats and bags, clogging up the counters while you order for everyone, then stand balancing three trays of food with nowhere to eat it!
You look in, see if there's a table, then send the kids to sit at it while you get the food.
That's not rude, it's common sense.

If you would rather stand in an obstructive gaggle, clutching trays of food, while the kids go mad, for the sake of politeness, then more fool you.

No table, no purchase.

Sparklingbrook · 15/02/2015 09:23

I think the same susie. it's nice enough when it's empty and there's no queue, but other than that it really isn't worth the bother.

OnceUponATimeAgain · 15/02/2015 09:25

i dont like it - it interferes with the flow, all the time people are sitting and not eating they are there for longer, if people queued, got food, sat and ate the tables would be used by more people

KatieScarlettreregged · 15/02/2015 09:30

When cafés stop serving food when they are full, I will stop getting a table before I pay for the food.

Binkybix · 15/02/2015 09:31

I'm sure that of people didn't bagsie tables then there would be enough tables left for people who had received their food, but whilst some people do it then I do it too. I never used to but needs must.

If I haven't reserved for any reason and there's no spare table I have occasionally just sat down on a spare place on a 'reserved' table. No one has ever said no when I've asked.

RitaOrange · 15/02/2015 09:38

@ table martyrs !

Its insane to take 3 under 5s all in coats ,2 in a buggy up to the till where there is hot food/drink - idiots!

Just get a bloody table and sit down .

BrianButterfield · 15/02/2015 09:40

Susie - exactly! The only time I've ever queued like that was in a service station when there was really no other choice (apart from go without coffee, which, no.)

There are hardly any places now where Costa is the only place to get proper coffee. Even if you prize it above all else, surely it's not worth queuing for ages for? And I love coffee!

MomDirection · 15/02/2015 09:46

Oh I'm so glad the MN tide has turned on this one! Of course you bag a table, of course you send older kids to get it (what's the point of them otherwise?) and of course you don't pay for food without having somewhere to sit down to bloody eat it!

MomDirection · 15/02/2015 09:51

And Chillie - coffee shops encourage long stays...you see people on their laptops for hours only order a couple of quids worth of product. It's good for business in the long run as it pushes the culture ('hang out here not at at home'). Also the woman you saw ordering nothing - that's unusual so really not much point citing it.

The80sweregreat · 15/02/2015 09:51

its just restaurant/ coffee shop law really - unless the place is completely empty and I am the only one in the queue, then it makes sense to secure a place to sit first before you end up with a tray of hot drinks and rapidly cooling food, whilst doing meerkat impressions trying to find somewhere to sit, especially if there are a few of you too or with kids. I can see why it winds you up, but a lot of these places are not that big and if its so packed out I cant find anywhere to sit I would just go elsewhere.

susiedaisy · 15/02/2015 10:01

When we were on holiday in Florida several years ago people were having work meeting in Starbucks, actual proper meetings. Only 3/4 people but they were all crowded round a laptop with paperwork out and they only had a coffee each. It was considered normal from what I could see of it, but then Starbucks were on every corner and there were less overcrowding

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