The hill I will die on: Britons love saying thank you – I think we should ban the phrase | Sangeeta Pillai
NEWS | 07 February 2026
You get a coffee. The barista tells you how much you need to pay. You say thank you. They take your card for payment. They say thank you. They give you the coffee. You say thank you. They say thank you for your thank you. Then you say thank you for their thank you. By this point, the words “thank you” have lost all meaning, and both parties are exhausted by the pointless stream of politeness. Growing up in India, I learned that thank yous are only for distant strangers, and that close friends and family get offended if you thank them. I would say thank you to a speaker delivering a formal talk but never to a friend helping during a crisis or a family member making me dinner. But living in the UK for two decades has forced me to adopt our incessant “thank you” culture. I now find myself saying thank you at least 10 times a day and sometimes many more. Nevertheless, there are some British “thank yous” that I would ban completely, if I could. The passive-aggressive thank you when you have forgotten to do something minor, such as holding a door open for someone. The word is usually lobbed at the back of your head as you walk through the door. It’s loud and pointed – and meant to shame you in public. It’s the least genuinely thankful thank you in the world. Then there is the presumptuous “thanks in advance” in a work email or a letter from the bank, which assumes that you will do the writer’s bidding. Being thanked before you have agreed to anything is like being given a command – you are expected just to roll over and follow someone’s diktat like an obedient dog. Let’s not forget the dismissive “thank you” said with a clipped tone and grim face, usually at work meetings as soon as you have delivered what you think is an excellent presentation or made an intelligent point. It took me years of working in the British corporate world to understand that this usually meant: “Shut up, your point of view is totally irrelevant to me!” There is also the automatic “thank you” reflex that defies all logic. If someone bumps into me on a crowded bus or tube, I automatically say thank you. Clearly I am completely British now. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying that we shouldn’t thank those who help us. The problem is that we thank too many people, often mindlessly, and innumerable times a day. Thank you, shop assistant (whose job it is to help you shop). Thank you, bus driver (who is getting paid to drive the bus). Thank you, cafe owner (whom you are paying for the food you have ordered). By what feels like the hundredth thank you of the day, the words lose their very essence. You end up feeling more resentful than grateful – and it’s adding to the climate crisis, too. Research by UK energy supplier Ovo says that Britons send 64m one-word “thanks” emails a day. If we cut back by just one email a day, we’d save more than 16,433 tonnes of carbon annually, the energy equivalent of 81,000 flights from London to Madrid. Things came to a head when I found myself muttering “thank you” to the self-checkout machine at my local supermarket after buying tomatoes. The week before, I had said thank you to the ATM while it spat out my cash. That’s when I decided: no more never-ending loops of thank you for me. (I’m aware that they might take away my UK passport for this heinous cultural crime.) The next time you find yourself vomiting out your 99th “thank you” of the day, ask yourself this: is that one thank you too many? Would your thank you recipient maybe thank you more for just saying nothing at all? It will seem difficult and awkward at first, but one day this advice will change your life. Just (please) don’t thank me for it.
Author: Sangeeta Pillai.
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