AIBU - train seat etiq

[Panandthegang]

First time post....

I travelled to London yesterday via train for work. Have done so a number of times before but certainly not a regular thing.

I’ve always reserved a seat because I have terrible travel sickness and have to face in the direction of travel. It also helps if I’m near a window and can see. When I got to my reserved seat, someone was in it chatting away to their colleague. Looking around the coach there were a few other seats dotted about but with bags on, reserved signs etc....

I’m usually very polite about these things (in the past would have died quietly in a corner rather than draw attention to myself) but for some reason - maybe reading so many cf threads?! - I stood up for myself and explained that wasn’t my reserved seat. Tbf they were fine and immediately started to leave and make arrangements to find seats elsewhere together to continue their conversation.

Trouble was this took ages and I stood there on the aisle beetroot while literally everyone in earshot was staring at me like I’d unknowingly committed some hugely awkward social faux pas.....had I?? Some unrelated woman even spoke up to say she’d reserved the seat next to mine but hadn’t said and had hcosen to sit elsewhere.....I didn’t know what to say so waited for them to go, sat down and tried to hide fro, the accusing eyes!!!

Happens umpteen times during any journey. The folk you asked to leave didn't make a fuss as they knew they were wrong - and the rest of the carriage's opinions didn't matter. A one minute wonder.

Quite often, if you check the reserved labels, they're only for part journeys and can be used the rest of the time. Always worth looking at the label.

Obviously realise this isn’t drama lol.... just wanted to know if there was an unspoken train seat etiquette rule I’d missed!!

Wouldn’t class myself as having social anxiety but definitely find it awkward and embarrassing to have people look at you while you wonder if you’ve done something wrong....

Thanks for feedback, will now work on not going red when asserting my rights

You didn't do anything wrong - I know what you mean about people taking ages to move though. I often commute and have to ask people to get up from the aisle seat so I can sit down and (usually men) take forever to move laptops, consider things, adjust coat, think again ............

said no regular long-distance train traveller, ever.

OK if you say so. My experiences are cross country, however you may get different lines. It's just musical chairs and missing carriages (where your seat usually is).

The other line I use doesn't have reservations so people just sit on the bloody seats when they turn up. There is only ever a seat issue if there are fewer carriages, ah yes as above.......

People who sit in reserved seats are knobs. I once had to kick some drunk football fans out of mine, that was fun.

Excellent workPan. I would copy and paste Askwhyiam's post and stick in in a document on your phone. It's brilliant.

As for other woman, she was either a virtue signalling martyr (in which case Epic Fail), or was a bit miffed with herself for not claiming her reserved seat. Your example might help her do so in future.

definitely find it awkward and embarrassing to have people look at you while you wonder if you’ve done something wrong

Totally normal human response, I'd have thought!

It totally depends. If there had been another seat to sit in that wouldn’t have made you sick I would’ve sat in that personally, but if not then yabu as you’d thought ahead and booked

You did exactly the right thing OP. And I know what you mean shout going red - me too, even when I'm not actually feeling embarrassed and then I feel embarrassed about going red!

If it's any consolation, I did similar....on a busy Christmas train from Brussels to Cologne. But I asked in French, fairly badly, and then had a long discussion in bad French when they produced tickets with those reserved seats shown (they were using the Köln - Bruxelles rather than vice versa). They moved, correctly.

And then moaned about me in VERY loud English for being obsessed by rules because I was European.

I speak English fluently; I am English.

I'd also had a glass bottle of champagne, so childishly spoke VERY loud English to my partner about how lovely OUR seats were and how delighted I was we had these particular ones.

Happily we were not all staying in the same hotel.

As a Londoner I always get people to move out of my seat if I have reserved it. It’s the whole point of reserving it so you definitely didn’t do anything wrong.

You booked a seat. They got out of your booked seat. Not sure what the point is here. I’m sure you wouldn’t have made them get up if they had been unable to, so you just did a thing most commuters do two to three times a day everyday.