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I once managed to drive to Northern Ireland from Cheshire to do a weeks work without taking my wallet. Fortunately the hotel knew me and agreed to forward the bill to my home for rertrospective payment. This still left me with fuel and other incidental expenses. Again I was very fortunate in that a customer of mine kindly loaned me some cash to tide me over. I had initially discovered the situation on the ferry when attempting to buy a coffee. Not a good feeling. Now I always "hide" a spare credit card in the car. Just as well really, as only last year I set off to drive to Italy in the same condition but was saved by my secret flexible friend !
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Our local paper has a front page report today on the marked increase in 'drive outs' in recent weeks, including petrol attendants being injured as they try to stop the miscreants.
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Every since I first started spending money on things as a child, one of my "secret" fears has always been going into a shop to buy something and, either not having any money to pay for it or, not having enough money to pay for it. It's still a fear to this day, too, I don't really know why.
As it happens, I've never, to date, gone into a petrol station and found I haven't any money on me to pay. I have a religious checking system before filling up, wallet in pocket, money and/or cards in wallet, and absolute certainty that I'm using the correct filler from the pump. I never deviate from this system and, to date, it's never let me down.
Additionally I do carry money hidden in the car, but nothing like the amount required to buy a tankfull of fuel. I can't even remember how much I carry hidden in the car, it's so long since I've been to the area where it's hidden, but it's probably soemthing like £20; it's all in coins for long livety!
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Happened to me - filled up £20 before realising that I might not have my wallet. Went in and explained but they weren't too chuffed. Said that I could call my wife who could give card details over telephone but they refused that (any idea why?).
Filled out a form which was basically a drive off one/no intention to pay and was told to come back the next day.
Fortunately was next to a warehouse I use and borrowed £20 off one of the workers.
Felt that they were all a little too inflexible but I guess that they have a lot of people who have no intention of paying and scam them.
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>>Said that I could call my wife who could give card details over telephone but they refused that (any idea why?).
The ability to process a cardholder not present transaction (which that would be even though you're there!) is not something that all credit card merchants have. Banks will not grant that right to high risk places, which petrol stations are due to the amount of fraud. I suspect rather than them being awkward they simply couldn't have processed it
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What's surprising is how many backroomers have done this. What a bunch of scatter brains!
For the last four years I have been using unmanned pumps so it's impossible to fill up without pre-paying. However I lent my debit card to my wife recently and pulled up at the pumps to find she hadn't put it back in my wallet. I do carry credit cards but rarely use them and don't know the PIN numbers so I had to return to base which was mildly irritating to say the least since I have to make a specially journey to this station.
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Actually one the funnier variations on filling station forgetfulness ( in hindsight anyway ) was an incident which happened to some good friends many years ago. My Scottish pal and his then very new French wife set off one Friday night to drive from their home in London to visit his parents in Edinburgh. They stopped for a loo / fuel break at Leicester services. He gets back in the car completely forgetting that he has his new wife with him and carries on up the road alone. After a long evening and night of sheer panic all round ( pre mobile phone era ) the resourceful girl turns up safely in Edinburgh having used a combination of taxis, an aeroplane and their joint bank account to get herself to her destination. Ooooh that cost him in so many ways ! ;-)
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I recently suffered a mental 'black hole' and could not for the life of me remember the pin number. I was close to home and had to ring for the good lady to come out with her card. However I would go through the embarassment of the incident a hundred times rather than face the domestic authorities again after having been woken and forced to go out at 5.30 on their day off.
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I wonder what the official answer would be from the various fuel giants.
Scenario - you have filled up your car with fuel and you realise that you have left your cards/money at home.
There is no one at home, nor anyone else that you can turn to. Home is, say, 15 miles away. Would they let you drive away to go home to get your cards/money?
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I presume Pugugly can confirm, but I don't think they actually have any right to hold your car. I for one would just go and get payment, the chances these days of being stopped are slight. Most police can tell a rogue from a 'doh' so I'd not worry. And as someone had said, if you had the intention of paying, is the law not different?
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I've never done this- always pat myself down before starting to put the fuel in. I'm a little OCD about making sure I have my wallet, keys, phone etc.
On a related topic, I filled the car last night on way to guitar lesson (red light on, not enough to get to my destination). Fair queue for that time of night, out nearly into the road. Generally, people were being sensible, lining up behind a rank of pumps, rather than selfishly waiting at the forecourt entrance for the next one to come up. What I found surprising and always do is that people leave their car at the pump before queueing to pay. I have always, when the station is busy, moved my car to the parking area (where available & there is one at this station) to let someone else start fuelling & reduce the queue. In the 15 minutes or so I was there, no-one else did this. Am I the only one? Is there something wrong with doing this? You sometimes get a bit of a look from the attendant, but they are always ok when they realise what I'm doing!
Be interested to hear what y'all think.
Edited by Webmaster on 12/06/2008 at 14:42
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It is against petol station policy to offer credit to you - so theortically you should siphon the petrol back out of your tank and everything should be fine.
The petrol stations obvously feel the above is impractical and they offer a credit facility in unusall circumstances.
If you and they accept the terms and conditions for the petrol/credit transaction (say returning in 24 hours) the police should not be involved at all.
The problem comes when you remove some of their property that they still own - the petrol station has not supplied you with the petrol at that point. The station thus has a right to get the police involved if you drive off without paying if they have not provided you with a loan faclility.
If you can't come to an agreement on the short term loan, the solution must be to siphon your tank, give them back the petrol in buckets. Thus the garage can't say you have taken anything away from them and the police won't get involved either.
The petrol station have no right to hold your car - but they have the right to the petrol in it.
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In US you pay before you fill and virtually all pumps are either credit/debit cards if unmanned (a surprising number are manned).
This has always struck me as eminently sensible.
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In US you pay before you fill ........
What happens if you pay for more than will go in the tank?
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>> In US you pay before you fill ........ What happens if you pay for more than will go in the tank?
Tough. I remember in New York this worked really well - no interminable wait at busy petrol stations with queues at the tills - it's about time they were more widespread here.
Wouldn't need the ludicrous expense of preventing 'driveoffs'.
Was caught out once [in sardinia, I think] by unmanned petrol station/hire car needing to be brimmed. Pump just stops and keeps the change!
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Being lucky in that I still use a local 'village' type of petrol station, I've managed to simply ask that they wait until I return with the money.
I've done that twice in the last ten years and have always gone back within the hour.
Makes me feel quite nostalgic! I remember when driving was fun and every village had their own little petrol station (well, sort of)
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My father used to pay his petrol bill once a month. The attendant would simply make a note in a book of his purchases and he would pop in at the end of the month to settle up.
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theortically you should siphon the petrol back out of your tank and everything should be fine.
No it wouldn't be fine - they'd have some of your petrol in with theirs, and you would still have some of theirs.
The petrol stations obvously feel the above is impractical and they offer a credit facility in unusall circumstances. If you and they accept the terms and conditions for the petrol/credit transaction (say returning in 24 hours) the police should not be involved at all.
The police should not be involved in any case, if you don't try to steal petrol.
The petrol station have no right to hold your car - but they have the right to the petrol in it.
Not AFAIK.
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Stranded overnight in Cairo without money in the 70s, I went to see the British Consul, a bearded bloke, to borrow a fiver. It was like getting blood out of a stone. After musing for a while about a fund he had for 'distressed British dependants' - the half-Egyptian children of departed Brits for the most part - he finally parted with a personal loan of an Egyptian fiver, smaller than the sterling one I had requested, telling me scornfully that when he was travelling he always kept a $100 bill sewn into the lining of his clothes for such emergencies. I didn't bother to tell him that if I had ever had a spare hundred bucks in my clothes I would have spent it by now.
The fiver paid for a cheap hotel room and breakfast. In the evening I was befriended by two Copts, a civil servant and a grocer who were cousins, nice chaps who took me to a huge theatre with fat old belly dancers on stage and gave me a smoke of hashish. Cairo was very nice then in a rundown sort of way.
Back in London I thought it worthwhile to pay the fiver back, fearing that an unpaid debt might catch up with me at some future awkward moment. Spent at least an hour and a half haunting the very grand corridors and staircases of the Foreign Office before I could find someone to accept a fiver (sterling) and give me a receipt for it.
Just ask for the British Consul. He or she may give you a hard time, but will reluctantly help in the end.... :o}
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I always pat down before filling up to ensure I have my wallet. I also pat down when leaving the house.
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I'm sure our forum friends with law enforcement knowledge will be able to confirm or deny whether this is an urban myth but I was once told something interesting about this.
Apparently, "professional" pickpockets stake out locations where people "pat down" such as when entering shops / filling stations or airports / railway stations. Tells them which pocket to pick.
The most extreme example I was given is that where there is a sign saying something like "Beware Pickpockets". The subliminal automatic reaction is to check that you still have your wallet. Thief only has to stand near the sign for a while to select a suitable victim.
Horrible world sometimes eh ?
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Druggies Substance misusers do it as well when locked on by Cops. An Officer of my (professional) acquaintance uses it to bump up his Stop/Search stats when he's struggling.
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