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Punctuality is the characteristic of completing a required task or fulfilling an
obligation
An obligation is a course of action which someone is required to take, be it a legal obligation or a moral obligation. Obligations are constraints; they limit freedom. People who are under obligations may choose to freely act under obligations. ...
before or at a previously designated time based on job requirements and or daily operations. "Punctual" is often used
synonym
A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are a ...
ously with "on time". An opposite characteristic is
tardiness.
Each culture tends to have its own understanding about what is considered an acceptable degree of punctuality. Typically, a small amount of lateness is acceptable—this is commonly about five to ten minutes in most Western cultures—but this is context-dependent, for example it might not the case for doctor's appointments.
Some cultures have an unspoken understanding that actual deadlines are different from stated deadlines, for example with
African time
African time (or Africa time) is the perceived cultural tendency in parts of Africa and the Caribbean toward a more relaxed attitude to time. This is sometimes used in a pejorative sense, about tardiness in appointments, meetings and events. This ...
were times for some types of casual or social events arrival time is implied. For example, it may be understood in a particular culture that people will turn up later than advertised. In this case, since everyone understands that a 9 p.m. party will actually start at around 10 p.m., no-one is inconvenienced when everyone arrives at 10 p.m.
In cultures that value punctuality, being late is seen as disrespectful of others' time and may be considered insulting. In such cases, punctuality may be enforced by social penalties, for example by excluding low-status latecomers from meetings entirely. of punctuality in
econometrics
Econometrics is an application of statistical methods to economic data in order to give empirical content to economic relationships. M. Hashem Pesaran (1987). "Econometrics", '' The New Palgrave: A Dictionary of Economics'', v. 2, p. 8 p. 8 ...
and to considering the effects of non-punctuality on others in
queueing theory
Queueing theory is the mathematical study of waiting lines, or queues. A queueing model is constructed so that queue lengths and waiting time can be predicted. Queueing theory is generally considered a branch of operations research because th ...
.
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Etiquette
Queueing theory
Time management