Wetherspoon customers have lambasted the company after the pub chain banned punters from drinking at the bar.

Some pubs have introduced the measure, they say, as a means of better organising their service, but the move has not gone down well with some customers.

The Roebuck Rayleigh, Essex, is one pub that has introduced the measure, with a sign on the bar stating: “No drinking at the bar.

“Once served, we kindly request that you move away from the bar area.”

One local, retired builder Alf Spencer, 71, told The Sun: “I used to stand up at the bar but we’re told not to now.

“It’s always been a nice way to enjoy a pint and chat to the bar staff and the other locals. But I can see why they do it.”

The move comes in the wake of a similarly fury-inducing decision to introduce queues at the bar for those waiting to order drinks rather than the traditional scrum and eye-contact technique mastered by many over the years.

The pub has however defended the rule, claiming that its introduction has nothing to do with health and safety.

The manager hit back: “At Christmas there were 500 people here.

“We need people to move from the bar when it’s that busy. It’s not health and safety. This is for service. It is an organisational thing.”

When asked about the backlash to the rule change, the manager replied: “It doesn’t really matter if some people are unhappy about it. We have a zero-tolerance policy for abuse in our pub.”

Not everybody was left angry by the rule change.

Scaffolder Micky Graham, 64, told the Sun: “The real problem is, like any good English person, they see people in front of a bar and they get in line patiently.

“The issue is it gets confusing for people. It gets very busy here. And if there is a group of people just standing there at the bar.

“It’s a problem. We used to come here and stand at the bar, but it’s a food place now. It’s not like it was back in the day.

“People come for dinner. But there’ll always be people who don’t like it.