I always…ALWAYS fill my car’s gasoline tank when I go to a gas station. My sister? Oh, whatever cash she has in her purse. $3. $5. $7. $10. She must go to a gas station about every other freakin’ day.
Drives me out of my mind.
First, I hate stopping for gas. I want to do that the fewest number of times possible. Second…I’m going to drive the miles I’m going to drive. It’s not like I take frivolous car trips. I need to buy the gas anyway…why not buy it once every week and a half instead of every three days?
I guess maybe if someone always pays cash (I pay with a credit card) and only pays with whatever cash is on hand, then that’s what they do.
I do usually $20-25 worth, paid in cash. However much that buys me at the time is how much I get.
My latest trip to the gas station though involved me using my debit card simply because I didn’t have any cash on me and probably wasn’t going to before I ran out of gas.
I fill it every time, on the same logic that Runs with Scissors laid out. The only reason I haven’t done so is if I’m for some reason forced to buy gas in New York, something I’ve only done about seven times in the eight years I’ve lived in New York with a car. Gas is 25-30 cents a gallon cheaper in NJ, where I go often, and it’s something that I’m irrationally cheap about - it offends me to spend the extra few dollars on a tank of gas. I end up putting in just enough to get me over the border, where I fill up properly. I checked the ‘completely every time’ option anyway, as this is so rare that I think it doesn’t count.
The only other reason I could see for filling a tank only partway would be if someone couldn’t afford to fill the whole thing right now. Thank God, I’ve never been in such dire straits.
For me to go damn near anywhere in this city from my house I have to pass at least two or three gas stations so I’m never far away from one if I decide I should put a little more in.
From a using-your-time-most efficiently standpoint it only makes sense to top it all the way off. (Who wants to spend any more time on the ritual of pumping gas than they have to?)
Fill it every time, Not only does this allow me to calculate gas mileage, but I can space out the fill-ups to coincide with visits to an area with cheap gas. (Buy gas in San Francisco? Are you nuts?)
But also, in High School, I did what OP describes: just put in whatever cash I had on hand. I had WAY too many close calls nearly running out, and did run out of gas once too often. No more.
Since I bought my Prius, a teaspoonful or so every couple of weeks.
The QuickStop near me has four pumps in a narrow path from a busy street out the back. If there are cars there you either almost block people leaving the store or wind up with your butt on the street. However it is the cheapest place around, with no penalty for credit cards, so when the pumps are empty or I actually make it to the pump I fill up. The best thing about the Prius is that I’ve cut my visits to the gas station nearly in half.
I fill it up every time so that I’m prepared in case of zombie attack or some other apocalyptic event. There won’t be time to stop for gas once that happens.
I always fill it by choice, though the cheapest place around has a credit-or-debit penalty, so if I’m there and don’t have enough cash to fill it, I just add what I can.
Also, when I drive my parents’ cars (rare now, more common a couple years ago) I tended to throw ten at the tank one week, fifteen another week, never filling but often topping off. I also tended to have cash more often then (I worked tipped, rather than payroll jobs) so it was easier then than now.
Usually I fill it up, because the cheapest place around here has lines about 6-8 deep on ~20 pumps (it’s a nickle cheaper per gallon than other places.) However, I haven’t had time to go there in several weeks, so I’ve been putting in 10-15$ at 7-11.
I remember the first time I realized that I wasn’t sharing a car with anyone anymore, so I may as well fill the tank because no one else was going to put gas in for me. It was one of my “Oh, I’m an adult now” moments. But before, when there was a chance that the tank might be magically filled, I frequently put in enough to get to where I was going & to a gas station afterwards. Sometimes, I’d put in enough for a day or two more, but I rarely filled the thing.
I typically fill it up, and can normally go about 2 weeks on a tank. Sometimes I’ll find that I need to get gas somewhere I don’t want to and then I just put enough in to get me through until later, maybe 10-20 dollars worth.
I put in what will get me around for the week. This is never even close to filling it. Money is tight and if you don’t have extra gas i the tank you don’t do extra driving.
