On Queuing

We Brits are renowned queuers. Yesterday I had two experiences of queues. The first was in the bank to pay in a cheque. When I arrived, there were three tills open each serving a customer, and three of us in the queue. The time taken to serve each person was simply ages. This leads me to think either the staff in the Clapham Branch of the bank are incompetent, or the customers have incredibly complicated financial arrangements, or the two parties have great difficulty communicating. I've used this bank several times, and the staff seem to have no difficulty understanding me, or processing my transactions, so I conclude that people in Clapham have complicated finances. Why this should be, I cannot imagine. Any ideas why people need to spend so long at the bank would be most welcome.

My second experience was in the Clapham main Post Office. Here the queue moved forward regularly and no-one complained when a severely disabled man who fell before he could join the back of the queue was helped to the front and served immediately. It all happened without a murmur. Made one proud to be British, as did the story here about a group who restores a man's car while he was in hospital. Interesting to note that this was the most read story, which shows that people do like good news.