AIBU for getting the rage at people who walk through the (open) barrier?

[CustardLover]

My local tube station (London Zone 3) has only got two little gates which means that when the herd piles off the trains at 6.30/7, there are queues on the platform to get through. This means that the gates are often left open, although the scanner still registers your oyster card / travel card.

Now, as users of London Underground will know, if you fail to check out again after checking in at the beginning a journey, LU will default bill your card for the maximum possible journey price, even if you're not liable for it, so even though the gates are open, most people still want to scan themselves out, hence the queues.

So far, so annoying for us all. However, the thing that drives me batshit crazy is when we're all politely (and yet clearly tired and annoyed after a day at work and having to shuffle these tiny, slow beeping gates) taking our turn, some arseholes just ignore the queue and walk straight through, without scanning. No skin off my nose you might think, if they have a travelcard / didn't scan in / don't care about paying more then whatever. HOWEVER, when someone walks through the barrier like that, it freezes the scanner for the next person - the light goes red and you have to wait a beat of two seconds (which feels like 20 minutes with the bubbling crowd behind you) to then scan your card and proceed. Sometimes, while you're waiting for the light to go amber again, another joker walks through AGAIN and sets it off.

Obviously, I am terribly British and never say anything, perhaps occasionally tut under my breath, but AIBU to want to run after those people, grab them by the lapels and scream 'WHY DO YOU THINK YOU'RE SO BLOODY SPECIAL? Do you think the rest of us like queuing? That's we're too stupid to see that the gates are actually open? YOU FROZE THE SCANNER YOU SELFISH LITTLE PRICK.'

Or should I just go on holiday?

Yy to queue police. Then they can catch all the self importants who think it's ok not to pay as well. Grrrr that gives me the rage most of all.

If you mean they are queue jumping assholes then YANBU!

I still remember a lady snorting with fury at teenage me when i accidentally put my ticket through upside down.

I keep meaning to visit London, but then I read stuff like this and think I'll give it a miss.

I loved the 'bubbling crowd' image.
But maybe get out of London, at least for a while.

But surely even if they waited in the queue to go through the sensors would still block the gate for the next person anyway?...... unless they're super intelligent sensors that know if you've queued or not.

I have no idea how they work as have only visited London once and we were waved through by the people on the gate. I feel for anyone who has to deal with that daily though as it was one if the most traumatic days of my life. I couldn't cope with all the people and noise! I did grow up on a remote coastal farm in NZ though and now live in tiny village in the middle of nowhere here in UK. I thought our nearest city centre was busy(it is very popular with tourists, so is often crowded), but was totally overwhelmed by the numbers in London.

OP, are your gates the wide ones, used for luggage, wheelchairs, buggies etc?

If so, I know what you mean about a swarm of people turning up and all trying to get through. At my station though, everyone is very respectful of the queue situation and takes it one at a time!

I don't think it's that the gate senses people going through (although I may be wrong), I think it gives a certain amount of time to get through the gate. If it senses that someone is still moving through, it freezes the gate, makes a loud noise and then takes a second or two to reset. During which time everyone else is tutting and Getting The Rage.

Also, people sometimes don't realise that you have to then take a step BACKWARDS so that the sensor can't see you anymore, that will quickly reset it. If you just stand there it won't do anything.

I think op is saying they walk through as someone else is scanning their oyster on the gates.

YABU. They don't need to queue. You are expecting them to queue for your convenience.

I dont think op means they are queue jumping. I think she is saying that the person with the paper ticket is going in through too quickly behind the oyster card payer. The gate is then supposedly sensing that two people went through on one oyster card and freezes, so the next oyster card payer has to wait a few seconds for it to reset.
I have never seen that happen at my local station or anywhere else though.

I'm so glad I've never been to London if it causes all this upset!

OP - you want to come to my sleepy little backwater of a station. We don't even have ticket gates, just a polite sign asking you to buy a ticket please, if it's not too much trouble.

Ours too lady.

So you expect those of us who have no need to queue as no Oyster card to scan to wait ages instead of walking through an open barrier?

Only ever have a paper ticket so if the barrier is open I'm not standing in a queue I don't need to queue up for :-/

If I'm understanding correctly your gripe is that people who don't need to queue because they don't have oyster cards should queue with people who do have oyster cards, rather than going straight through the gate which has been opened specifically for people without oyster cards to go straight through. Sorry but that sounds bonkers.

Am now getting pop up ads for Rope Barriers!

This is utterly nuts!

If they faffed around looking in their bag for their Oystercard and then scanned it, there'd be an even longer delay. So they are saving you time. It takes them 2 seconds to pass through instead of, say, 10.

Unless OP is saying that everyone who doesn't have to scan to avoid paying should wait at the back until all of the pay-as-you-go travellers are through?

I have no idea what you are talking about and I travel to London a couple of times a month.

I buy my travelcard ticket. I might walk through the open barrier. How does this affect anyone else? There are hordes of people walking through at once, it's an open barrier.

If somehow, me walking through this huge wide space alongside several other people does have an effect on something you are doing with an oyster card which I don't think I have ever noticed in this situation and it means a 2 second delay then seriously, so what?

Surely the point of opening the barriers is to stop people queuing and going through one at a time? Isn't it?

Also, it's cheaper to travel by Oyster card than it is with a daily paper ticket.

One could quite reasonably say (and I do) that not having to faff about queuing and tapping is the trade off for paying the premium price.

I guess if you had a paper card you might not realise that by doing this you're causing it to freeze? I do have an Oyster card though rarely use the tube. I've never seen this happen and didn't know it caused the scanner to freeze.

2 second delay for, say, 400 travellers - that adds up to a lengthy delay for the poor sod at the back.

I don't have a clue what this is all about. How can people walking through an open gate with bits of paper about their person possibly affect an electronic device some feet away?

I didn't know about this before, but it does explain why I sometimes get the red light/beep beep/seek assistance when using my Oyster card at the start of my journey (I travel from a station without barriers, just an Oyster scanning machine).

What does give me the rage is getting off my train at Waterloo East, being carried by the crowd up the ramp to the exit barriers, then the person in front of me stops dead at the barrier and proceeds to search their bags and pockets for their Oyster card, while the impatient person behind me pushes me while tutting and sighing.