The convenience store stations used to prefer the “Pay Inside” function because once they got you in the door, they could entice you with coffee, beef jerky or whatever. When the pump and run problem got too big to ignore, they lost a chunk of customers who just paid, pumped, and left.
Pretty much all the stations around here are pump then pay. Most also give the option of pay-at-the-pump.
Yep. I had a part-time job as a kid working in a gas station. I was taught to ask the driver what they wanted, start the gas, then ROB the engine compartment: check the radiator, oil and battery while the pump was running. When the pump shut off, I would then top it off to an even amount, hang the nozzle, put the cap on, then collect the money from the driver. If it was a credit sale, I would run the card in, put it through the thumbbuster machine, then take the slip out for signature.
Gas at that time was about $0.30 a gallon for regular. Good times.
Around here it changed over in the last 10 years or so. I wouldn’t go to gas stations that required you to pay first because I hated not being able to tank up all the way unless I wanted to go back in and get change. Now that I A)use a credit card and B)It’s the norm, I really don’t care.
I do still remember before everyone made the switch, I pumped my gas, walked in, told the guy I was at pump 8, he said ‘what’, I repeated that I was at pump 8 and he said ‘really? no one at pump 8 ever pays, they just drive off’. That pump is very close to the road and about 15 feet from a major intersection. But it still seemed odd, I don’t know why he didn’t just make that pump or that row pay first. During the transitional time, many of the gas stations made the pumps near the road (or at least the ones where they couldn’t read the plates) pay first.
“Here” being?
East central South Dakota.
Here, in a northern suburb of Minneapolis, you can pay at the pump or pump then pay - until nightfall. Then it’s pay at the pump or pay first. As you get closer to the city limits of Minneapolis stations become all pay first all day/night.
As has been mentioned upthread, used to be an attendant filled your tank (among other things) and you were expected to pay him when he was finished. If you drove off without paying, he’d get your plate and/or other information and call the cops.
Then, in the early 70’s, when the price of gas jumped, a lot of stations turned to “self-service pumps” where the customer could save a few cents a gallon by pumping their own gas. Most stations still had at least one island of “full-service” for customers who wanted the service.
With self-service pumps, the incidence of “pump and run” increased. Some stations quickly adapted their pumps so that you had to pay first and they would set the pump to shut off for the amount you gave them (if you wanted to fill-up, you would have to go back inside to either get your change or sign the credit slip).
Of course, up until the very recent past, most transactions were made in cash, with gas company credit cards coming in a close second and bank credit cards a distant third. Debit cards really did not exist much more than 12-15 years ago.
Sims Station, CA, 1971 … 19¢ per gallon …
After I moved to the Chicago area in 1989, for at least a year or two after that, when I’d drive back up to Wisconsin to visit family, I’d wait to gas up my car until after I got over the state line, as I could count on gas being under $1 a gallon there.
I don’t think that I’ve seen a “pump first, then pay” gas station in at least 15 years. I’m sure that some still exist, in small towns in the U.S., but, IME, every station I encounter requires you to pay first (either pay at the pump, or go inside to pay the attendant before the pump is activated).
You mis-spelled “high trust society”.
No clerk or attendant wants to do twice as much work just for the hell of it. I remember being amazed at my first experience purchasing gasoline in a big city. Pump fuel, then pay? Yeah, no that’s not happening. Thick heavy bars over the windows, improbably thick glass to the ceiling the attendant worked behind, contortions to get change from a $20 bill, the whole thing was surreal.
I grew up in a small town in western New York. The golden age of you-pump-you-pay only lasted about 8 years there, say from 1978 to 1986. Before 1978, all the local gas stations were full service: an attendant pumped the gas, then you paid him. After 1986, all gas stations were prepay then pump-your-own.
For much of that period several local stations has both full-serve and self-serve pumps, but full-serve was so much more expensive that we never paid extra for it.
I remember driving down to Los Angeles from Canada in 2002 and being surprised with my first encounter with a “pay then pump” gas station near Hollywood. I guess the change-over required the automation of the credit-card “pre-authorize then reconcile” procedure built into the pump, requiring a credit card reader etc. on the pump. Otherwise you’d have to go into the store and pre-authorize, then pump, then go back to finish the transaction… Or be really good at guessing what you needed.
But by now, pretty much every pump in Canada is credit-card enabled, and your choice will be pay before you pump or - sometimes - pay afterwards. Everything is usually on hi-res video so they probably ensure they have a good read on the license plate before they allow pump-first.
In 2004 I was driving from Ayer’s Rock to King’s Canyon in the outback, an pulled up at a gas station about halfway, in the middle of nowhere. The old-style pump was locked with a padlock. The attendant came out and unlocked it, saying they’d had too many pump-and-dash so they had to lock it.
Also back then the “pump jockeys” had this little metal change handling device with tubes of quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies strapped to their belts in order to make change.
Maybe, but I do suspect that it’s “high trust” for an older white guy more than some others. Therefore “privilege.”
Ha! My mother-in-law gave us a coupon for a Holiday station over Thanksgiving and my wife asked how it worked, since she hadn’t paid for gas inside the store in 10+ years. The in-laws were apoplectic that we assumed a gas station in Minnesota might require paying first. It’s not like they live in the hellscape that is suburban Chicago, after all. This was in Hopkins, btw.
There about 1 or 2 stations here in my neck of the woods that allow pump then pay. I enjoy reading the police report section of the local newspaper about the pump-n-run incidents. Most of them get caught - security cameras, et al, and an alert police presence. Oddly these two stations are located very close to a major Interstate Highway.
I am blessed to live in a smallish town and when I pull up I wave to *******, and she turns the pump on for me. When I am finished I move my beast to a parking space, walk in, and trade bullshit with other locals, buy some stuff and pay my bill.
I realize this situation doesn’t work in most locales, but I am not usually in such a hurry to gas and go like it is a NASCAR pit-stop.
I remember driving up from Texas into New Jersey. I got out and and took the nozzle out of the pump. Out came the attendant(?) screaming “You can’t do that!!!”. I ask “Why not?” State law it seems. I was puzzled at the time to say the least.
I do love Minnesota. Several of my college friends moved there after school; I remember visiting one of them in the mid-90s, and we wound up at a Burger King in suburban St. Paul for lunch. She wrote a check to pay for her meal (about $4). 
When self-service first started, I think you had to do it that way, as there was no way for the person “in the booth” to set the pump to stop at a certain price point.
Did any state besides California do odd/even? (For those of you wondering, even numbers could also pump on the 31st of the month (or February 29, although I don’t think they ever had odd/even rationing on a 2/29); IIRC, personalized plates without numbers were given one designation, and cars without plates at all were given the other.)
As for exceeding $1/gallon, the only one I remember is when they would set the price per half gallon and mark the money amount as “1/2 Total Sale.”
Free stuff isn’t that old; I still have some San Jose Sharks glasses I got with 8-gallon fill-ups (easy to do when your commute is 40 miles each way), and the team didn’t exist until the early 1990s.
I’m in Oregon, so everything’s still full service. And the credit card readers in the pump everywhere else pretty much eliminate the problem.
But for cash, I HATE the whole “pay first” thing – How should I know how much gas is going to go in the tank? So you have to overpay and then go BACK in to get the reciept and change.