Should someone who's been waiting longer than you at the bus stop always get on first?

[Letthebodieshitthefloor]

The bus I take is essentially a coach, always plenty of seats even at busy hours.

This morning I approached the bus stop, a woman was already there, and I saw her glaring at me because I was standing in the bus stop rather than at the side.

She then let another woman on first who'd perhaps been there longer than she had, then got herself in front of me and looked at me making sure I wouldn't get on before she did.

It's all a bit petty really, the bus was almost empty, it's not going to go without you.

If there were a pregnant/vulnerable/elderly passenger getting on and I could see there weren't many seats left then I'd let them on first.

Literally everyone does this in London

They literally don't At the bus stop I use you have about 8 or 9 busses that stop there. No way will you know who is there for which bus. The bus pulls in and you walk towards the door, end of.

@Letthebodieshitthefloor

A savage.. 😂 If you arrive later and there are many people there it's hard to know who got there first etc. Unless you form an orderly queue based on arrival time

you might not know who got there first, but the people in the ramshackle queue will know, VERY accurately, who joined when, and will as a group, be clocking and checking that people get on in the correct order.

the English take queuing very seriously.

That said there is obvious exceptions for those seen as needing a seat sooner.

Unless the bus is full

Or its commuter/school run time

Its an unwritten law that takes years to fully understand and applies in any situation where people will be served one at a time, so not just on busses

Unless you form an orderly queue based on arrival time

Mate - this is exactly what you do. You would be battered if you deviated from the rules if you lived near me!!

Savage

Oh dear OP, of course it’s rude you should know this. It’s an unspoken rule, those who get there first get on first because they were waiting longer. That lady was being polite to someone who had probably been there longer than her.

Yes
Unless there’s someone who needs to get on first particularly, or if you choose to let someone on first.
If someone stands miles away and makes no move to get on before you, you can safely just get on.

No rule against standing in the shelter if others have chosen not to though!

The rule I follow is that anyone waiting at the bus stop in a queue goes ahead. Sometimes people choose to congregate around the stop rather then queueing ( which is where this woman appeared to be) and in Edinburgh she would wait until those in the correct place had got on first.

It was easier when people stood in line in a proper queue.

Now some stand back from the stop, or the first one waits at the wrong end of the shelter so you feel rude if you go in front of them to wait out of the rain.

Then you get the polite 'after you' 'no, on you go' etc when the bus arrives.

Generally in London (replying to poster who mentioned ti) you get on in as near as humanly possible to the order you arrived. Yes there are different bus numbers but once people move towards the door you can very quickly allow for this.

Many places in U.K. also have an actual queue to stand in but it depends on what the bus stop is like, ie if there’s space to queue

The whole rule stresses me out tbh. Where I am in Bristol you get huge crowds of people waiting for the bus- they're not in a line so I have no idea who arrived in what order or who was there before me - my memory is terrible especially for faces. Usually I just let everyone on before me as I can't cope with the potential huffing and puffing if I get it wrong.

@Letthebodieshitthefloor

A savage.. 😂 If you arrive later and there are many people there it's hard to know who got there first etc. Unless you form an orderly queue based on arrival time

Yeah but you don’t need to know the order of the people before you. You just need to know they’re all before you

@Larchneedles

It was easier when people stood in line in a proper queue.

Now some stand back from the stop, or the first one waits at the wrong end of the shelter so you feel rude if you go in front of them to wait out of the rain.

Then you get the polite 'after you' 'no, on you go' etc when the bus arrives.

But how do you queue when there's several buses which people may be waiting for at the same stop? Sometimes it's just not feasible to have a queue for every single bus, especially for some of the busier stops in cities which are served by 10+ buses.

I think etiquette definitely depends on circumstances, there's no useful blanket rule.

Except on the jubilee line where they queue up! grin

This is true! Jubilee line is mental!

I go out of my way to avoid it at rush hour as it’s so crowded I once nearly had a panic attack (and I’m a long time Londoner)

The first time I saw the queues of bankers etc each side of those screen doors I couldn’t believe it!

@2022success

Unless you form an orderly queue based on arrival time

Mate - this is exactly what you do. You would be battered if you deviated from the rules if you lived near me!!

Savage

Exactly

@NearlyAHoarder

I began to realise that given your inability to accept any mitigating circumstances at all, practicality, speed, forty spare seats, there may well be some nuances in the etiquettes

My inability? Your lack of basic manners at the bus stop and now your response to me demonstrates that you still have things to learn in terms of social etiquette.

And does the vast majority on this thread also lack that inability, or is that reserved for me?

Yes
It's normal bus etiquette to me.

I am old enough to remember when just about everyone waiting for a bus queued properly. None of this standing anywhere!

Where I live now people still queue properly (rural) but anywhere built up it seems no one does.

Just spent a week in London and queueing it seems is non existent. A couple of times me and DH had been the first then and ended up waiting a good while for a bus so made sure we were first on (the buses were pretty crowded).

It just comes down to most people having no manners today

What do you do in a pub op? Everyone knows who was before them, even in London

Pre-pandemic when I used to catch the bus - bus to work, the queue thing worked, but the buses are relatively few and far between so anyone there at the same time as you is getting on the same bus.

Going home - around five different bus routes and two different bus companies, plus people waiting for a bus could be spread out over a fair distance so unless they're regulars you don't if they're waiting for a bus or just stopped for a chat outside the coffee shop three doors down...

@MsJaneAusten

I got very confused when waiting for a bus in Cuba as whenever anyone new arrived at the bus stop they would ask ‘ultimo?’ and the last person to arrive would raise a hand or nod at them, but everyone just sat or stood where they wanted to. When the bus arrived, they seamlessly formed themselves into a queue, with each person standing behind their ‘ultimo’. It was a thing of beauty.

What a thing of beauty.

@FourTeaFallOut Said it perfectly.

In the situation you describe, where there is only one route stopping there and it doesn't seem that frequent, then yes, there is a queue. I live in London, and loads of bus stops have multiple routes stopping very frequently. In this case people don't usually queue.

@NearlyAHoarder you 100% pushed in you do realise pushing in front typically doesn’t always involve actual pushing, right? No physical contact needs to be had and you can still push in?It just means putting yourself to the front on the queue when it wasn’t your place to do so? If he was there first and you didn’t offer him to get on first out of queuing etiquette and politeness then you pushed in.

What do you do in a pub op? Everyone knows who was before them, even in London

I often don't, actually. Not at a crowded bar.

Yabu. Unless there is someone who is elderly, pregnant or disabled you absolutely let the people who were there first get on before you.

[quote NearlyAHoarder]@GreenFridays I did not Push in.

I did not.

I stepped on to the bus quickly.

If I'd stepped aside, he would not have got on to the bus any quicker.

I'm all for bus etiquette, I have NEVER pushed anybody aside to get on a bus depriving them of either a seat or a standing place, NEVER,that's just not who I am. I'm more likely to be the one left behind at the bus stop because I wasn't assertive enough.[/quote]
I think you've misunderstood the term 'push I'm. It doesn't involve pushing. It simply means that you went ahead of someone who was in the queue before you.

Maybe it's a regional thing, but it's a expression I grew up with. 'Pushing in' in a queue was a heinous crime from the first day I started school.

I used to sometimes get a bus which was timetabled to arrive at 9.25.

Every time, all the elderly people would force all the others to get on before them, as if their pass was scanned after 9.30 they didn't have to pay 50p.