I have a somewhat interesting accidential drive-off story.
I was intending to pay by credit card, but the pump had a note saying you had to pay inside. OK, no problem. I filled up to the tune of like $35, and went in to pay. I told the clerk “the blue van” (there was 1 other vehicle, a white van out at the pumps at that time. She ran my card, without a word, and handed me the reciept. I was pre-occupied, signed it without looking at it , and left.
I ran a couple errands, and came home. My dad was GLARING at me when I came in, and asked if I had stopped to get gas. I said yes. And he started YELLING at me, what was I thinking , to only pay they $4.00 for a tank of gas???
Huh?
The idiot clerk had rung up the WHITE van’s gas purchase of $4.00 on my charge card, and realized it AFTER I left. And then called the police. Who came by my house looking for me.
Dad went and paid the difference, but MAN was he pissed! I don’t think he ever believed me that it was a total accident.
I worked at Superamerica gas stations about 6 years ago. If someone picked up the pump, I would hear a beep and the pump number would flash on my screen. I would then authorize it and when the customer hung up the pump I would hear another beep and the amount would show up under the pump number on my screen. We didn’t have cameras outside either so plates had to be written down on a piece of scratch paper. If someone drove off you already had their plate number so it wasn’t too big of a deal. We would just put it into an envelope and send it off to corporate ever weekend. I’ve been told they would just send letters asking for the money but generally didn’t go after them unless it was a larger amount. If you didn’t get the plate or it was wrong we just ate it. Sneaky people hung up the pump but not on the sensors or dropped it on the ground. That way don’t hear the ending beep and it gives them a couple of seconds to get away before we noticed.
I spent some time working in a convenience store a few years ago and usually when someone drove off without paying, we’d look out the window and say, “shit, the boss is going to bitch about that” and then pretty much forget about it.
To put it quickly–the console inside the gas station makes a noise when the nozzle is picked up off the pump, and also when the nozzle is hung back up on the pump. For the second reason–some people stealing gas would leave the nozzle on the ground when finished, instead of hanging it back on the pump. Some gas stations still don’t require pre paying; these are usually away from larger cities and major highways. Most drive-offs occured at around evening rush hour, when there’s the most cars around.
Where I worked did have video and we would report it to the police, but often the car was a new/used purchase without plates (just a temporary back window sticker that was unreadable); sometimes they simply had no rear plate, sometimes the plate was too dirty to be read, often they had plates that we could read but (police would tell us) there was no good address on file with the car’s registration info.
~
I don’t see how this could have happened, unless there’s a completely different system there than we have in the States.
Since the gas prices skyrocketed after Sept 11 and then again after Katrina, I haven’t seen a single station that lets you pump before you pay. Cash customers have to go in and prepay or you have to use a credit card at the pump.
Every modern gas pump/cashier system I’ve seen here, even when you could pay after you pump was set up to not allow anyone else to pump gas until the previous transaction was closed out–you’d pump your gas and the pump would be shut down until you paid for it and then the process would start over again. If it was never paid for, the pump couldn’t be used again until the cashier reset it and at that point, they’d know that the fuel was stolen. [Then they’d check the videotape to get a license number or a picture of the person–see next paragraph]
The gas stations here all have video surveillance to catch that sort of thing. Now they use the video to catch people with stolen credit cards, since there’s nothing to sign on the pay-at-the-pump credit card stations. When the credit card is reported stolen, if the person purchased fuel at the pump with the stolen card, they can identify them through the video.
I haven’t seen a non pre-pay pump in years. I think the last one I saw was in North Carolina in the late 90’s.
I remember this clearly because it was the site of one of my more brain dead moves. I filled up and only then realized I’d left my wallet at home. No cash. No credit cards. Not even my drivers lisence. I walked in to tell the cashier what I’d done, and there was a state trooper standing and chatting with her. I had to fess up right in front of him that I was driving without my lisence (or any identification).
Luckily, he just laughed. The cashier said I was a regular (I was) and she trusted me to come right back. I only lived a few blocks away. But, man, I was scared for a minute.
