Janet CollinsWithout a Queue
April 27th 2009 22:48
Where would we be without the queue?
If there is one thing that has promoted courteous behaviour over the last few decades it is the almost blanket adoption of the queue. I do say almost but I am often surprised at how people have come to accept that they have to wait in line.
It is nowhere more obvious than my local bus stop. To accommodate the ever increasing number of people catching buses to work and elsewhere, many bus stops out my way have adopted queuing to quell any arguments over who gets on first.
I doubt that this system has been adopted all over Sydney but my bus stop is a pretty popular pick up point and therefore there are more people at the stop than can fit onto any one bus a lot of the time, especially in peak hour.
Banks are another example of services that have improved the way we queue. We may all criticise them for just about everything else but they generally try to make things more orderly these days.
The single line is a large improvement on the individual queues for each teller. I can remember time and time again being stuck behind someone who had a lengthy transaction and watching an opposite queue move swiftly through. It was enough to make my blood boil at times. They eventually, like many other organisations, have learned to organise a single queue so as to make service more customer friendly.
So too have places like Medicare and the RTA made it so easy we only need to take a ticket and wait for a number to be called. No-one even needs to actually stand in a queue for service.
There are other queues that cause constant frustration. Think about waiting on a telephone queue for some customer service. That one often is designed to raise our temperature if anything can.
I had an experience only today where I waited and waited and was put through to “someone who could help me”. I must have spent five minutes telling this person all my personal information so she could verify I was who I said I was, only to be put through to another section that had a recorded message saying there were too many calls and to ring back later.
My second call was a lot less polite but it was hardly the fault of the person at the other end of the phone but rather the management. It is situations like these that call for some sort of organisation.
It is this type of queuing that needs serious revamp. We have become accustomed queuing for so much else in recent years. To aid crowd control at sporting events and concerts - all those gates that force us to walk around S-bends for a long way just prevent any queue jumping - and everyone just accepts it but the invisible queues on the telephone just seem to get worse.
I accept that there are a lot of situations where a queue cannot be organised. Train stations are one where there are so many entry points it makes it near impossible to organise.
They often say queuing is inherited from our British ancestors who have always accepted waiting in line as normal and everyday as anything else. Having said this, queuing for everything has not always been as much a part of our culture as it is now.
There were some interesting studies done on queuing not so long ago by a behavioural economist, David Savage, at the Queensland University of Technology. Savage’s research covered four 20th century maritime disasters, one of which was the sinking of the Titanic.
Savage concluded that British passengers on the Titanic died in disproportionate numbers on the voyage because they queued politely for lifeboats. Americans, he believes, elbowed their way on to the lifeboats leaving many Britons behind.
While most of our everyday lives are never really life or death situations, the culture of queuing often triggers a lot of debate. I, for one, would think that some of our organisations could get their act together and organise things just a little bit better.
Phone queues are a pain and can be very costly if you are calling from a mobile phone. There must be some better way.
sourced: www.independent.co.uk
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Comment by Nevar
Is Why
Where I am already; queue-less in Alaska.
Comment by Norm
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If push came to shove.
Comment by Norm
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Equal and Opposite
Arses and Elbows
Footy Power
Comment by Janet Collins
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I am not sure how crowded Alaska is but orderly queues can make life a lot more pleasant I can assure you.
Comment by Janet Collins
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You don't seem like a pusher and a shover to me at all and you can be an Aussie and a gentleman at the same time....really,
Comment by Nevar
Is Why
But, I'll keep your thoughtful suggestions in mind.
Comment by Morgan Bell
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Movie Train
Comment by Janet Collins
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Hahaha! So Sarah Pallin was pretty sophisticated for your neck of the woods then?
Comment by Janet Collins
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I hate going to a bar and the people and the bartender keeps serving the ones either side of me and I am waiting there for ages. I think queuing in a bar would just take the whole atmosphere of being in a bar away. I don't think we'll probably go that far.
Comment by the world of gaye
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REFLECTIONS
THE WINDMILLS OF MY MIND
Comment by The Rusty Can
Everything
Comment by Nevar
Is Why
Especially when this occurs to top it off; I somehow manage to get that not so rare individual who won't speak English well and doesn't care to validate you as a client with a problem and suggests that they ask their supervisor.
Who then will ask their supervisor for advice using perfect Oxford English.
Arrrrggghhh . . .
Comment by Nevar
Is Why
Janet, didn't you notice that Sarah and Todd are about the same body type? The black around her eyes isn't all makeup, she's the bare knuckles champion of Wasilla y'know. That gets her more respect around Alaska than being Governor does, that's for sure.
Gaye, sorry, Americanism is like the flu, easy to catch ~ hard to get over.
Comment by Janet Collins
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I actually think at the bus stops (well out my way at least) and at the larger events, people are a lot more civilised than they used to be and pretty well accept waiting their turn.
I'll admit at other places, particularly when there are not organised queues it can be pretty awful. Just take the Boxing Day sales for example. I would never even attempt to go to them.
Comment by Janet Collins
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My telephone experience didn't even get me through to another person. It was a recorded message that just told me to call back.
What makes it worse is that often when you are making these type of calls it's because something has gone really wrong to begin with and your mood is tense to. It's as if they sense it!
Comment by Janet Collins
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Women, I have found, are OK queuing up to go to the loo probably because there are always queues and they just know they will have to wait.
About Sarah - they obviously did do a MAJOR makeover before they put her out on show. The voice somehow gave her away!
Comment by Wilson Pon
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Honestly, I always thought that waiting for bus and lift is the most boring in life...
Comment by Janet Collins
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I too think that waiting in a queue is pretty boring but at least it's better than getting pushed and shoved. The lift one is a good example. How many times have I waited for a lift and someone runs in the door and jumps in front of me and the doors close.
That really makes my blood boil!
Comment by moonglow
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Comment by Janet Collins
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As I said to Wilson, I'd much rather just wait patiently in line than be pushed and shoved around and have people push in front of me. That's the beauty of the queue - it creates some sort of order.
Comment by Cibbuano
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When I lived in China, I went mental when people would ignore the queue and wave their money in front of the teller's face.
Comment by Janet Collins
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I can well imagine. Just look at how people push and shove on the train stations and wherever else they can get away with it.
Comment by Lilla
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Having lived all over this globe, I have to agree with Cibb. Sometimes you have to go to where there is no sense of order to appreciate the little order and minor violence of inconveinience we generally *suffer* in Australia.
And I use that term suffer lightly, here.
Hey Nevar,
*guffaw* Alaska sounds good, however, I would be too scared to freeze to death whilst standing in a short queue.
Lilla ...
Comment by Janet Collins
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I can well imagine how other countries can force people to just push and shove because otherwise you would never get anywhere. I love a queue because it stops this bully behaviour. I just wish they could do them everywhere.
Comment by Lilla
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The saddest ques I ever saw were the Moscow Bread Ques. . . and as starving as they were there was no shoving and pushing at all, something my fellow well fed, spoiled, red neck Queenslander thugs could well take a lesson from.
It is another reason I could not stand in supermarket ques anymore, to listen to those poor young people being abused the way they are, so often ~ for nothing ~ and so young some of them. How could you not end up mean, dismissive and drunk on a friday night after pressures like that? Not everyone has the family background to get a proper education and someone has to do it. I ended up getting involved in quite a few arguments at the checkout in my time telling some horrible huge big bully to back off. No doubts about it, Janet, people are getting ruder the more well fed they get *Chuckle* and ques seem to be the place where good breeding ends up showing itself, or not as the case may be.
Personally, I think this is the most civilised form of responsible answer to the problem of having to que anywhere, for anything.
*slapping my forehead* the phone que is another thing altogether!
Lilla .
Comment by Mr Nice Guy
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I remember queing back in the early 70s to get into the drive-in theatre with my folks - only to sit patiently for upwards of over an hour (sometimes longer if it was a real blockbuster) and be turned away because the lot was full.
I'm surprised no-one has mentioned the hackneyed (yet slightly crass) near queue joke yet. And BTW - that's about as close as you'll ever get me to telling it here either.
Stay well
Comment by Janet Collins
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The phone queue has to be the WORST! Hasn't come up with the times and REALLY frustrating!
Thanks.
Comment by Janet Collins
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I remember the experiences of lining up at the drive-in movie too!
I don't, however, remember the joke you are referring to...or do I.
You shoudn't do that you know because now I am going to rack my brains trying to remember it......and I know you won't tell me.
Thanks.