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'm guilty as charged but only when I have the 5dcs in tow (eldest 5.11 - youngest 9mths), we do occasionally all queue up together but it's easier all round to seat them first and send just one adult to the counter.

piximon If you can even get to a cafe I reckon you're entitled to behave how you want.

I would LOVE to have more kids but after a christmas hol with a 25m and a 16week I can't see how it is remotely possibly to manage another one. Surely with 5 you are WAY outunumbered. How do you cope with the competing demands?

op yanbu it's a pain in the arse.

"that is a different matter entirely LackaDaisycal - trying to push a baby, keep a toddler in line and juggle the tray... I would not begrudge you bagging a seat.
"

have to disagree. either it's ok or it's not. having your children with you is no excuse to think you deserve special treatment.
so if you're ok with table reserving fair enough plonk down your kids. but you're just as bad as the rest of them so don't go complaining if you see an able bodied adult reserving a spot for another able bodied adult who's still in line for food.

I do not really understand what the problem is. If I am going fot a coffee or something with some friends, usually one of us goes for the drnks while the others wait at the table. I would not dream of asking them to stand in the queue with me because someone might pay their drink before me, it is absurd IMO. It is only unfair if there are free sits at that table(not for the person queuing) and they do not let you use it when asked. To be honest I would not want to sit at the same table as a family, it would make me feel uneasy.

Actually, I think the cafe is being unreasonable serving and charging more eat-in customers than they can seat. I try and reserve a seat first because I don't want to pay for food I have nowhere to eat.

I do this sometimes, because I have a dodgy knee and find standing for a long time painful - BUT I wouldn't do it if there weren't plenty of tables free anyway.

Gorionine - wouldn't you feel at all guilty if someone who's already paid for their food and drink can't find anywhere to sit whilst your friends are sitting without drinks at their 'reserved' table and you are still queuing? I would.

I'm a table reserver, and I agree with Gorionine - why should I pay more to eat in and not get a table? If I'm alone I've been known to plonk down my coat to grab a seat. But then, if I'm on my own, I have no objection to sharing with other people!

BUT - have never seen one of those signs saying 'don't reserve a table'. Think I'd avoid those places if I did see one.

ho ho! We had a BIG thread on this not so long ago and you would not believe how heated it got.

I am on your side, bean, but I have not read all the other posts and no doubt things will be polarised by now.

How about when you are on your own but need to give a table number to the counter staff (not where you getthe number at the counter and then plonk it on a table)? You have to put a coat or bag on the seat then or someone else would end up being served your cheese on toast or whatever.

I've always just been given a number at the counter, simple. Aren't you thinking of table service places?

I think cafes need a different system if it is self service-it is quite wrong to expect anyone to buy food and drink before they have a table.
If you are friendly people are generally friendly back. Last week it was crowded in M&S, I was on my own and sat down at a table, not noticing that someone had put their coat there, she came out of the queue to remove it and I apologised and said I hadn't realised and she said it was quite alright-as it happened she got her drink just as I finished and so had the table. If I had been all officious I expect she would have been rude back.
Sometimes you need to get a table first-last week I was with my aunt who was shakily using a walker to get around-the only sensible thing to do was to sit her down-we had already negotiated 2 buggies and a wheelchair-she was an absolute hazard!!
I am sure that cafes could get their act together and not leave it as a free for all.
Some people will bag tables and some will get cross-nothing will change unless the system is changed.

mayorquimby, I don't think I actually said having kids meant I deserved special treatment; that's your interpretation of my post.

I just said I would if the kids were with me, not that I deserved to if the kids were with me.

It's not something I get worked up about as a rule, and if there are no free tables once I've queued, I'll ask to sit with someone on their own at a bigger table who looks close to finishing.

Hmmm. A system could help I suppose.

Maybe the only way to the tables should be through a kind of 'gate' after the till.

I do accept that some people are more justified in sitting down first though, if they are elderly, with dcs, disabled etc etc. Cafes could have 'priority seats' for them. The system would get abused though as with P&T parking.

I never get annoyed outwardly, too British, but seethe inwardly when my polite requests to share tables are snubbed because 3 invisible friends are sitting there.

Somewhere like Weatherspoons or similar where the numbers are on the table and you pay at the counter but are served at the table. I think if you go to Nandos you get a number on a holder which is fine.

I had to dump my coat on a chair in an airport pub once as the table I'd earmarked as 'mine' someone sat down on just as I reached the counter (tables were numbered) so I had to bag another one quickly with my coat. I'd been loathe to leave my stuff lying around for obvious reasons before that but I was flying on my own. No one was there to hold the table!

Well I would not feel guilty no. But to be honest, I have never given it a second thought as I think it would be a nightmare for a familly to all have to queue when just one person is carrying/paying for the drinks. Like MerryMadMarg I have never seen any singns telling that I am doining anything wrong by sitting down with the DCs while DH gets the drinks. If I had I would just avoid the place as well as I am an absolute stickler for rules!

I never reserve a table when I'm on my own - that isn't fair.

And when I'm with DS and/or DD I queue up with them. Always feel bad if we reserve a table, especially if I then see someone looking for a table.

"mayorquimby, I don't think I actually said having kids meant I deserved special treatment; that's your interpretation of my post.

I just said I would if the kids were with me, not that I deserved to if the kids were with me."

no i accept that you did not say that you deserved special treatment.you actually never said if you thought it was wrong or right. my post actually quoted someone other than you who said it that having kids with you made it "a completely different matter".as i've said all along, if you don't think it's wrong then go for it, it's the restaurants fault for not having a better system.
my point was that some on this thread seem to be saying "oh it's fine if you have the kids with you.too diifficult to negotiate otherwise" and my point was simply that it's no justification, either it's not ok or it is. so if you are someone who will do it when you have kids with you, then you have no right to have a go at those who do it even though they do not have children as you are both guilty of the same "crime" as it were.

so sorry if you thought my comment was directed at you, i honestly didn't intend to have a go. my comment was directed at those who in my view are hypocritical in saying that's it's not ok to reserve tables ahead of others, but if you have kids with you somehow that changes this rule and then you can most definitely take up seats ahead of others even though you would not accept the same conduct from a chuildless patron of the restaurant.

sorry mq, was only skim reading.

that'll teach me to pay more attention in future

Sorry to say I am one of those who sends her blind dp and 4 year old to sit down while I get the food. It is far more stressful for all if they are in the line with me.

The ogre in this, already hinted at, is the cafe that only provides seats for customers who have completed buying the drinks, and not for the customers for whom the drinks are being bought. Think 'Weatherspoons' or any pub-eating-house. You buy your drinks in a self-service fashion at a bar and take them to your mates who are already sitting down; no problem.

Solution is to only go into places with no queues and tables three-quarters empty: then it doesn't matter whether you take up table- residence before or after buying.

But train-travellers who sit on the outside of two and occupy the other seat with their luggage ....

I don't have any problem with the train travellers-I just ask them, politely, to move their luggage-they always do.

I sometimes grab a table first if I'm with my DC's as otherwise I'm often left wondering around with a tray full of food and drinks, glaring at the empty handed people seated at the tables. John Lewis cafe is terrible for this. You can walk round in circles for hours before finally finding somewhere to sit.

What I hate more is when people que jump to the coffee station, thinking that if they don't want hot food, they can skip the hot food section. That would be alright except it leaves everyone with hot food watching it go cold in the vain hope of getting served sometime soon.

Last time I was in a cafe and DS was choosing his drink, a woman que jumped straight to the cakes and hot drinks in front of us because she didn't want cold drinks - meaning we had to wait even longer! Grrrrrr.

I don't think it is a problem worth getting upset about-people do the method that suits them and everyone gets a seat in the end. I would demand a refund if I couldn't sit down-it hasn't happened yet.

Madmentalbint - but I've never seen a sign in the John Lewis cafe saying not to sit before ordering food. And quite frankly, the way my John Lewis have their cafe set up, you'd be mad to go to the line before grabbing a table.

I agree with being upset about the queue jumpers, but some cafes have staff that serve only 'their' bit, and you feel like a twit waiting for people in the hot food section to order (for example) when you can see a free staff member at the counter that you actually want to go to which is a little way ahead.