Pumps that Jump?

HateLPG

I have recently noticed a worrying trend when filling up my car and have seen two different manifestations of this:

1) I am a bit "old school" and although I invariably pay by card, I am still in the habit of filling to the nearest pound (or tenner). On many ocassions now, I have noticed that no matter how carefully I squeeze the trigger, the pump steadily goes from 95 -96-97-98-99p and then jumps to 01p.

2) I carefully fill up to a certain amount, check the amount as I stop filling and then when I go in to pay, the amount being charged has "magically" increased by 1 or 2 pence. Again, this is not an infrequent ocurrence.

It has ocurred to me that this could be a very deliberate policy in the way the pumps are programmed - it is highly unlikely that weights and measures would pick up on such a thing, and in general, the customer will just shrug his/her shoulders and put it down to "oversqueeze". But I have noticed that this is not an isolated or localised situation - I have now seen it on petrol forecourts from Sussex to Yorkshire (and points in between) and I have seen it happen both on Supermarket forecourts and on the forcourts of the major petrol retailers.

I recently challenged a garage about this and they agreed to charge the amount that was showing when I stopped filling, pretty much without argument. OK, so most of the people behind me thought I was being a bit of a <expetive deleted> for arguing about 2 pence on a sixty quid fill (which just reinforces my argument that most people just shrug their shoulders and accept it), but I have now seen this too often to accept that it is anything but a deliberate policy on the part of the filling stations to try to relieve me of an extra penny or two every time I fill up. If they are doing this on every sale of fuel dispensed across the country, that will very rapidly grow to quite a nice tasty extra chunk on the bottom line. (As, to the best of my knowledge, the stations pay duty based on the quantity of fuel delivered to them and not on the value of fuel dispensed, this will efectively be a duty-free extra penny or two straight onto the bottom line)

Am I alone in noticing this, or am I just being a "Grumpy Old Git"? If there is a demonstrable pattern to this kind of thing, and enough people have seen it, I can't help feeling that it would be just the sort of thing that Martin (or any consumer agency, for that matter) would want to dig into more deeply.

marlot

1) has become a common occurance on digital pumps since fuel went over £1.00 per litre. I assume the fuel is measured in fractions of a litre, and the price displayed is the rounded down price for that quantity

2) what does the pump say when you come out again? I'm wondering if there is a difference caused when the nozzle is placed in the holster. Perhaps a few milillitres of fuel move up the pipe?

Zedicus

This was dealt with on 'Not the Nine O'Clock News' some years back.

TrickyWicky

Yup, I've been a victim of this too. If I do manage to hit it bang on the .00 and put the nozzle back then I'm chuffed. Stand there a few seconds and watch just to be sure. Get in, it's jumped to .01. Go back to the pump, sure enough its gone over - even though I witnessed it clicking off and finalising it before going in.

It's infuriarting.

I don't suppose it's Sainsburys by any chance where you're suffering this?

forgotmyname

My missus thinks i do it on purpose, Well sometimes i might.

HateLPG

TrickyWicky wrote: »

Yup, I've been a victim of this too. If I do manage to hit it bang on the .00 and put the nozzle back then I'm chuffed. Stand there a few seconds and watch just to be sure. Get in, it's jumped to .01. Go back to the pump, sure enough its gone over - even though I witnessed it clicking off and finalising it before going in.

It's infuriarting.

I don't suppose it's Sainsburys by any chance where you're suffering this?

I've noticed it more at Sainsburys than anywhere else - but as I fill up there more often than other filling stations (it's conveniently on my way home from work, and the headline price is cheap), I can't draw any firm conclusion that they are doing anything any different from anyone else.

daveyjp

Just use pay at pump and fill up the tank.

oscarward

This happened to me today, put £30 exactly in ( a novelty).

Released the trigger and waited a few seconds.

Still £30.

Took nozzle out of filler and when I went to put the hose back in it's holster the price had jumped to £30.02.

Annoying isn't it :mad:.

Is it worth arguing about..... not really:wall:.

And yes it was pay at the pump.....

HateLPG

oscarward wrote: »

Annoying isn't it :mad:.

Is it worth arguing about..... not really:wall:.

My point exactly - if it is a deliberate policy, the oil companies know full well that Mr. Average-not-grumpy-guy isn't going to argue over 2p on 30 quid. And people like me just get tut-tutted at by the not-grumpy people when we complain

Heck, if you fill up once a week, that's only £1 a year down, so not a big deal. But, when you consider that according to the DFT there are about 26 million cars and 9 million other vehicles (approx) URL]http://www.dft.gov.uk/statistics/releases/vehicle-licensing-statistics-q2-2011[/URL this clearly equates to many millions of extra pounds straight onto the oil companies' bottom lines, because most of us think that 2p really isn't worth arguing about.

Or, put another way, if this is a deliberate policy, the Oil companies could be stealing 30-40 million pounds a year from the already-hard-pressed motorist (in the UK alone). Multiply that globally, and we are talking monopoly money!

TrickyWicky

Easy way to deal with it... do what I do. If you're paying by cash go a few pennies under.

For £10, put in £9.01. The idea is to cause as much annoyance at the till as possible. Done at peak times the cashier will be too busy to care about counting out your change and will just give you £1 instead.

If not paying by cash just what in £9.98. Strangely it never seems to clock upwards when you're 2p below.

LandyAndy

Hands up anyone who thinks there is a widespread consipracy among fuel outlets to defraud the public by 1p on most fills.


Anyone?



No?




Thought not.