to be cross with people reserving tables in a self service cafe (especially when there are signs saying don't do it) before they have paid?

[MrsSeanBean]

I find this very annoying. There I am queuing up and waiting to order and pay, and a good 50% of the tables are filled with people 'reserving' seats for their friend/ relation who is clearly behind me in the queue. When I have paid and am staggering around with a fully laden tray and my shopping bags, I have nowhere to sit. In the past, I have sometimes asked if I could sit at a vacant seat on a table of 4 but the lone person sat there waiting for his/her companions has refused. I think this is downright rude and unfair. I would even be prepared to 'move on' when the companions finally arrived ??? mins later - by which time I may have finshed anyway. It's not as if anyone owns the table and I feel I have priority if I have paid and have a tray and need to sit and eat.

AIBU?

If not, has anyone come across a solution (apart from the obvious one of bumping back the wrong way past the queue to the till and complaining to the already harassed and busy staff)?

I agree. I also hate the invisible person people don't pay to get on the bus and take up a seat and the people who don't pay for their bags but give them a seat when there's loads of people standing.

I've always hated this too, but now I sit at a table holding onto my 25month old toddler whilst DH gets a high chair to restrain him, and he'll then go off to get drinks whilst I bf my 16 week old so that when he returns I can have my tea/food and feed my toddler.

Very sorry, but I think we'd be more disruptive trying to queue with my toddler loose and my baby screaming with hunger as I shout 'excuse me' and accidently ram the push chair into peoples shins when trying to chase my toddler who has suddenly run out of site.

at other thread, think paolosgirl and I must be related, we think the same!

YANBU - annoys the hell out of me too, although I don't mind those with small children bagging a table - you don't really want to be taking the whole family up to the counter. Same goes for the very elderly or those with limited mobility.

M &S does seem to be particularly bad with those car coat lemon suckers (). They are neither elderly or in anyway disabled.

I tend to wander around, saying in a loud voice how these people aren't meant to be sitting down without a drink when the sign says the table is not to be reserved. I am usually with somebody so I don't look like a mad woman talking to myself although maybe that is the way to get people to get out of the way. Nobody wants to share a table with a mad lady!

Unfortunately it usually means that some poor soul ends up rushing their last mouthful of their food to give us their table rather than the guilty parties getting off their guilty arses and waiting elsewhere until they actually need a table.

No real solution - sorry.

Babies excluded from my annoyance starlight

Mrs SB - forget the name too but glad someone gets me!!

YANBU - this has annoyed me for years!

When I go anywhere with other mums, one of us usually sits with the kids whilst the other gets what they want and vice versa. I think anyone with small children should be excused for nabbing a table before they've paid. Tom ideally needs to be in a highchair and if there isn't one I usually go elsewhere (apart from KFC in Poole that didn't have any and we'd already been q-ing for 15 mins before we discovered there wasn't any!).

We had a 20 or so pages long thread about this a few months ago.. It became very heated so be warned.

at 20 pages.

Did it reach any conclusion?

All I want is to reach polite agreement with my fellow car coat wearers diners about somewhere to sit and eat my rapidly cooling food and drink!

Perhaps 20 pages is a slight exaggeration, but it did go on for a very long time. And no conclusion was ever reached I believe.

I have to disagree. If you pay for your food, drinks 1st - you are then left in the possible position of no where to sit. Get a seat 1st.

If I'm on my own with DC - I get a table - they sit down - I get the food - much easier.

Oh - and

But naturalbornmum - if I am on my own I have to buy and pay before I sit, can't do both sadly.

Mrssean - well thats not really anybodys fault is it?

Would you be prepared to share with me if you had a vacant seat though NBM?

Yes, I am very kind.

Also, why do cafes put up signs explicitly asking customers not to reserve tables until they have paid for their food/drink?

Ah well that's a relief!

TO stop people like you moaning.

I never moan in public NBM, I am the epitome of civility!

It must be the other ones then.

You bag tables, you jump the queue. Jumping the queue is rude and unacceptable (unless you are physically incapacitated - having small children in tow does not qualify).

If everyone only looked for a table once they had their food, everyone would get a table when they need it - at least without waiting more than a few minutes.

And yes, I said this on the other thread, too.

i'm afraid i'm one of those "table reservers" as when taking elderly FIL out for lunch with DC i tend to plonk him at a table whilst i go and get food. its easier on all of us if he doesnt queue as he cant hear whats being said to him and gets confused about whats self-service and whats not.