Anyway, because of my lack of normal mental acuity due to this awful cold (I’ve got to blame something for this embarassing stupidity) I neglected to remove the hose from my car’s gas intake and drove away. The “Ka-lunk clank” of the hose being pulled out and hitting the ground, alerted me that I had done a very. bad. thing. I got out and looked up at the quick release connector dangling from the pump’s upper section and the connector part in my hand, and did not see how I could put it back on by hand (I tried). I apologized to the clerk and left my business card.
What’s the monetary damage for this stupidity likely to be? Just a new connector or more? The house and handle looked fine. The connector also looked fine (ie not sheared or torn) just “dis-connected”.
I would think they should be designed to ‘break away’ in order to prevent worse damage. You aren’t the first person to do this, and probably not the last either.
I don’t know how it works everywhere, of course, but my husband did this (to his great embarrassment and consternation) and the gas station clerk just waved him off. It must happen with some frequency.
I used to laugh at idiots like you, driving around with a pump hose hanging from their car until I did it myself. It’s amazing how easy it is to do that.
I used to stop and get coffee each morning at the station, and one day I broke routine and swiped my card for “pay at the pump”, stuck a nozzle in, cleaned the windows, got my coffee and like usual, after getting morning coffee, drove away. Looked in my mirror a mile down the road and… awwwwww shhhhhhhiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii$#%@.
Drove back, tried to fix it myself, gave up, and did my best impression of an embarrassed loser while the workers laughed at me. It was fixed on my way home that day.
I wouldn’t worry about it. They just plug them back together with a trick that I couldn’t figure out… probably because I was too stupid.
I was rather scared myself as I was pretty sure I couldn’t have afforded to buy them a new pump, which is what I was thinking.
If it connects like compressed air hoses do then you pull back on the outer collar to release the ball bearings which hold it in place slip it back over the nozzel and let the collar snap back into position. That’s it.
The cost depends on your local fire codes. Some cities allow reuseable breakaways, some don’t. The cost for just the breakaway could be anywhere between $10 and $35, depending on type.
Also, the breakaway is there to protect the hose from breaking and spilling gasoline all over the place. It does nothing to protect the nozzle from being damaged. Many times the nozzle is damaged and needs to be replaced also.
I saw this happen a couple of hundred times and I only once charged anyone for any repairs. I just figured it as a cost of doing business.
Just to give you an idea how fire codes make a difference in repair costs:
My City: Nozzle $80-$125, breakaway $35, hose $30.
City Next To Mine: Nozzle $25-$35, breakaway $10, hose $30
Even if it cost them something, they would/should probably tell you to forget it. It’s one of those things that’s going to happen with some frequency in their business, and it makes more sense to simply dial the cost into their prices, and gain some good will by “forgiving” the embarassed customer who had an inadvertant small accident. Sort of like the supermarket not charging you for the jar of mayo you dropped on the floor.
I’m guessing that pumps in the U.S. are turned on and then left to it? Otherwise I can’t imagine any circumstances where it’s possible to forget. Nor have I ever seen it done.
Yes, gasoline nozzles here (Texas, it may vary by state - and we’ve two states, Oregon and New Jersey where pump jockeys are required) have catches for the trigger that allow you to start it pumping and walk away. They shut off automatically when the tank is full, or when you drive off with the hose.
I’ve noticed a lot of gas stations in this area removing the trigger holding-piece, so you can’t just hook it and walk away. It’s REALLY annoying when its cold and you want to wash your windows or check your oil, but I guess it must prevent some of these accidents since you are forced to hold onto the nozzle the entire time. I can’t think of any other benefits, but then, I don’t own a gas station nor do I spend much time contemplating such things!
And I just want to say, I LOVE pay-at-the-pump, especially with credit cards, as they are SO fast and so much better in the winter! I seek out pay-at-the-pump gas stations (with one exception - the Green Guy (Gas-Rite?) on Hwy 6 North, who is just too nice to stop going there!)
For nozzles without the hold-open latch or clip, I was going to recommend just putting some object of the right size in there, like some gas caps. However, this site says NEVER to do that (but they don’t say why): http://facilities.uoregon.edu/safety/policy/fsfuel.html
Well I can think of a few reasons why a just leaving a nozzle pumping away on it’s own would be dangerous. What if the nozzle fell out your car? What if you drove away and the nozzle detached from your car, still attached to the hose, attached to the pump, still pumping? What if the mechanism that automatically stops the flow when the tank is full failed? (That’s possible if you don’t insert the nozzle properly.)
Perhaps they have something that prevent these scenarios? Certainly jamming the nozzle open with an obstruction sounds extremely dangerous to me.
I’ve never seen a nozzle with a lockable trigger in the UK. I suspect they’re illegal.
I did this once, with a pump that did not have a breakaway fitting, pulled the pump off its base and set it on fire! The fire was quickly extinguished by the dry chemical fire suppression system, but it did close the station for a day and require the replacement of the pump. I don’t recall what the total bill came to as my auto insurance picked it up. Real easy to do, I had put in ten dollars worth as my wife was going into the convenience store, I then decided to go in and see what else we needed, and if we could afford to fill up entirely. This was just enough of a disruption of my normal routine that I overlooked the nozzle still in the tank when I returned to the car. This was definitely one of my top five dumbest moves ever, but nobody was hurt and it gets funnier as time goes by, especially now that I am no longer paying higher insurance premiums because of it.
Yep, been there… though unlike most of the folks who have replied to this thread, I was not nearly as nice about it…
My normal routine is to go in, leave a credit card (so I can get other things when I’m done, and put them on the card too), pump and return to pay… this implys that I want to fill the tank. No, I don’t know how much it will take, but just authorize the pump, and I’ll be right back… you’ve got the card. But… the (another language barrier) couldn’t understand this task at 10PM, and demanded a value to prepay. Frustrated, I left, and forgot that (break in routine) I had put the nozzle in first… drove about 20 feet, and notice… being pissed at the moron behind the register, I just coiled it up near the pump, and left. I should have gone in, but I figured screw them.
I pulled out a hose at the very beginning of a vacation once. Sheepishly, I went into the cashier and identified myself, gave her my phone number, etc. Worried about it for quite a while, but never heard anything from them.