You drove and pulled up to the gas station to fill your gas tank. You exited your vehicle, opened your gas tank cover, grabbed and put the dispenser nozzle in. You also had to pay at some point.
How can you forget that the hose is still connected to your car when you drive off?
Thanks for the responses.
TIL: Americans pay first, then fill. Now I can understand how you could easily get distracted once it is in and locked.
To clarify : this is absolutely impossible to accidentally happen in the EU, because the payment transaction isn’t completed until the nozzle is placed back onto its support (that’s when the pump shuts off).
So are Europeans just more honest and ethical than Americans? Or do all gas stations have better theft prevention systems? In the US, there is often 1 cashier managing 12 pumps AND ringing up vice sales (cigarettes, lottery tickets, junk food). In some states there a pumps with no human on site at all.
What’s to stop someone from driving off after filling up in the EU?
In the UK, petrol stations almost always have CCTV monitoring pumps, and can use number plates to identify anyone who leaves without paying. Probably similar in the EU I would think.
That said, it’s also increasingly common to have a pay at the pump system, where you have to use your credit/debit card before you can fill up, with the amount being taken off automatically based on how much fuel you used.
How did it work before automated monitoring?
What’s to stop someone driving cross-country or even just for a 1-off fill up and wearing a hat and glasses and covering their plates with cardboard and tape right before coming and going?
E: someone else in the thread mentioned an attendant will make sure they can see people’s faces before starting the pump
In all EU countries I drove trough, the pump doesn’t auto-start when you unhook the nozzle from the pump. I think the cashier has to manually allow it to start, from their control system/computer.
So I suspect they glance at clients through the shop’s window/cameras, and they don’t start the pump if you look shady (hooded, no plates on vehicle) and they suspect you may run it off.
For example if you ride a motorbike, the cashier sometimes doesn’t start the pump until you remove your helmet / uncover your face (allowing cameras to see your face).
And yes, after filling-up you then need to go pay at the desk. There can be a waiting line if there are more pumps than open cashdesks.
You could easily tank then gun it. But there are cameras everywhere. They have your face & plates.
there a pumps with no human on site at all.
For these we need to swipe a payment method before the pump starts. It locks a sum on your card, say 200EUR, and when you hook the nozzle back it adjusts the payment transaction to only the amount consumed and debits you.
What do you mean by the transaction isn’t complete? Does it hold your card until the nozzle is put back, or do you pump then pay after?
A lot of pumps in the US don’t shut off until the nozzle is placed back on the hook, at least if you pay at the pump. It’s possible that the pump could shut off if you prepay with cash and it hits the amount that you paid, but that’s not as common these days. It used to be possible to pay with cash after pumping, but that’s basically been phased out.
Super tired and defeated from your daily grind
I don’t know. In my country no gas can be paid unless the nozzle has been placed back. The machine registers as “still pumping”, and the gas station attendant sees this and cannot process the payment. Why you would do this any other way baffles my mind.
Yeah, same here (most of Europe).
But I think Americans pay first then fill.
I did it once. You pay first at pump, I went into store to get snacks, came back kids melting down in back seat, dealt with that, got in and forgot all about it. Remembered just as I pulled about 6 inches too far away. Oops.
Any damage?
They made me pay to replace the quick disconnect $50 - but I’ve read mixed reports on them either being easily reconnectable in 20 seconds or one time use replace only. I was embarrassed so I paid the dude. He was mostly just like “oh mannnn really?”.
Ouch. Well there you have it!
Imagine you get back after a long, hectic, infuriating day. You hear your car beep for fuel so you pull into a gas station.
You get out and you go through the motions of filling up your car. It is such a usual procedure you don’t have to think any more. Which is good because you’re using that time to think of choice words to describe your asshole boss.
You go into the station, pay and come back, still very much on autopilot while you think about your boss.
Except there’s one motion you didn’t go through. And now it haunts your gas tank forever. Until you take it off.
I was drunk and couldn’t drive, so my wife took me to get more beer. She asked me to put gas in our vehicle so I did because it was cold out. I noticed the pump behind me had the nozzle sitting on the ground which was hilarious to me. I took a snapchat picture and posted it saying “what a dumbass!” then I went inside to get my beer.
I get back in the truck and I’m having a grand old time showing my wife what the idiot behind us must have done when I hear the “CLUNK”. I was told I turned as white as a ghost. I’d done it. It was my fault.
I went inside, the cashier knew I was drunk (I was being obnoxious). I was profusely apologized and admitted it was all my fault. She went outside with me, explained it didn’t break and that they can reattach it, BUT there’s a charge.
The cashier then said to me “get in your truck and get as far away as possible immediately. I didn’t see you, this didn’t happen, and I don’t know what happened to the camera footage. Have a nice night.”
I hopped in the truck and just told my wife DRIVE. Security came rolling up as we were leaving (by chance).
Cool cashier!
Look at this guy with his functioning brain that never forgets something just by walking 10 feet
Yeah I read it and was like “is this guy asking how you can forget something?”
Good 30% change I forget what I was in the process of doing if I have to walk through a door to get it done.
So… OP…
I gotta ask… why this question? I feel like there’s a story here.
I saw yet another online post of someone driving off, ripping the whole station off the ground, starting a fire…
It has nothing to do with when or how you pay.
It’s all about the lock that lets you leave the nozzle pumping while you go do something else. That’s what makes it easy to forget you have the nozzle in your car, since you’re not holding it for the entire filling process.
In the US and other countries you can lock the noozle and fill up without holding the hoze. In EU you need to hold the hoze to fill up or press a button when you need LPG. It’s pretty hard to forget something when you’re standing next to it. (And still some people manage to do just that)
In the EU the nozzle handle also has a lock-in mechanism. But it looks like the main difference is that in the EU we can’t pay until the nozzle is placed back on the support. That’s what stops the pumping. Until then you’re still paying.
Now I wonder what stops people from just driving off without paying. Is there a camera or something?
Yeah cameras, but also pay at pump systems that preauthorise a card payment then dispense the fuel, then charge whatever it cost (after the pump is placed back in the holder).
Most gas station I’ve been to in the USA remove the little metal plate that allows the trigger lock to catch, so exactly this doesn’t happen. You have to keep your hand on the handle the entire time or it stops pumping.
Do some countries or areas have gas pumps that you just insert and then they pump without you constantly squeezing the handle? The ones I’m used to feel kinda impossible to forget because there is no reason to ever let go of the hose handle until it’s back in place.
Yes, the ones here (California) can be set to keep pumping automatically until the tank is full and then stop.
Aha, then I could easily see myself making that mistake during a tired and stressful day if my phone rang while paying or something.
For anyone curious. this is how those things work.
I assume the only part missing for the european nozzles is the little latch that holds it open.
As a European: we got the latch.
Yep, the pin is removed. There are tools to act as pin available. (Nails for one)
We also have trigger-locks on EU pumps.
But why would you leave the pump before it’s done? Even if you don’t have to hold the handle, what else are you going to do for 20 seconds.
Get out of the cold?
What kind of tank you have that fills up that fast?
Drinks? Piss?
Wisconsin, too.
The USA is weird… You’re in one State and you aren’t allowed to put fuel in your car by yourself then you cross the border to the next State and you can put fuel by yourself AND you can do it without having to hold the nozzle while it’s pumping…
That’s just New Jersey, and if you’re in New Jersey you have bigger problems anyway.
Oh wow, Oregon got rid of that stupid law!
Imagine that, you’ve got people there that had to put gas in their car for the first time in 50+ years of driving!
I bet the mechanics had a great few months.
and you can’t even pay until it’s back in place
Er, you pay at the pump with your card beforehand in most places now
Coworker did it three times. Autopay by the nozzle, fuel cap on other side of the car, not looking at side mirrors, Bingo!
I don’t get this?
So they go out of the car, put the pump in, pumped it, forgot to take pump out, paid, went back into the car, and drove off?
With autopay the payment is done automatically by reading a proximity device on the filling hole, with credit/debit cards you put the card in to activate the pump, not at the end of pumping.
Go out of the car, put nozzle on other side of the car, go back inside the car waiting for it to be done, assume a station worker took the nozzle out, drive, hear a station worker screaming, drive back to return part of the pump.
Why would the fuel cap be on the other side of the car from the filly filly gas hole?
Fuel cap and filling hole on the passenger side and not on the driver side
(On some vehicles)
Not only is that not what you said, but that doesn’t inherently increase the risk of driving off with the nozzle in the car.
Follow-up question for Americans : what happens if you pay for, say 50$ and end up only filling up 40$? Can you go back to the cashdesk and ask for a refund on the difference?
Yes you can, and it is a normal situation to be in.
Depends, if it’s prepay by credit card you only get billed for amount used regardless of how much you tell the cashier. If you prepay by cash you have to go get change.
Most pump transactions are just done by credit or debit card and you are billed for actual use.
My FIL did it three times and his answer was “lol” so iono
Alcoholic? Not playing on the drunken stepdad meme just thinking that’s an alcoholic thing to do.
Possibly. But throwing that out there is ridiculously presumptuous because you have nothing upon which to base that.
“Oops, hah pulled the pump again for the third time chuckles to self”
(for his sake I hope it was drug or drink)
Dude just getting him to remember to close up his garage or truck was hard enough. Fortunately (for him) he spat his sunflower seed shells in there so it was too disgusting to want to rob. Like, he didn’t even spit them in a cup he just gobbed them on the floor. I don’t know how many times we’d roll up and find both his garage and his truck, all the doors wide open and they’d been that way for hours. First few dozen times it’d happened the neighbors were worried, but after that they just ignored it.eyi
My mom can be like that sometimes, she’s always had bad memory lapses in the strangest of times. No drug or drink, and no sunflower seeds or nasty anti-burgular precautions, but once she called me in a nearly empty Walmart parking lot after close because she couldn’t find her car and thought someone had stolen it. She called me when I was about 5 minutes away saying she found it, it just wasn’t where she remembered parking it. In a nearly empty lot.
And I misread FIL as stepdad. That’s a much better life outcome for you 😆
adhd prolly idk
Yeah I haven’t done this with a gas nozzle, but I walk off without stuff I need and which I was just holding basically every day, so I will probably manage this feat of incredible stupidity eventually.
