AAARRRGGGHHH!!! $90 fill up

danoid · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 8:17 am

21.11 gallons stuffed in @ $4.26.

Only consolation was the EVIC read 506 miles to empty...

How many out there have hit $100 for a fill?

bdptp73 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 8:36 am

The pump that I go to shuts off at $75.00, so I fill up at half a tank. I don't understand why a station would set limits on fueling up. I would go someplace else but they have good fuel and are the cheapest.

naturist · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:18 am

bdptp73 wrote:

The pump that I go to shuts off at $75.00, so I fill up at half a tank. I don't understand why a station would set limits on fueling up. I would go someplace else but they have good fuel and are the cheapest.

I'm just guessing that it is a CC-at-the-pump deal, and you are paying with Visa/MC/Discover/AmEx, right?

Just so that you will know, the station does not set that limit, the credit card company does, and while I agree that limiting purchases to $75 is a stupid thing for the station to do, they had no voice in the decision, it is strictly the credit card issuer, who, after all, cares not a whit about either you as the customer or the station as a rep, only about their own exposure to possible fraud.

Uffe · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 11:08 am

A fill up here in europe is $150. Lucky for me I don't do that all too often, and lucky for me I find places where the price is better so I can fill up for just $140

danoid · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 11:27 am

naturist wrote:

Just so that you will know, the station does not set that limit, the credit card company does, and while I agree that limiting purchases to $75 is a stupid thing for the station to do, they had no voice in the decision, it is strictly the credit card issuer, who, after all, cares not a whit about either you as the customer or the station as a rep, only about their own exposure to possible fraud.

I've been told by station employees that it IS a station (or at their coprorate level) decision to limit 'loss' of drive aways and people who then call Visa and say their card has been stolen. This way the station feels they lose less money to criminals. Visa doesn't limit purchases at resteraunts or grocery stores why are gas stations special?

My moral objection to this is that these stations automatically think I'm Blackbeard the Pirate for driving up to the pump. So I avoid them.

click23 · **Joined:** Thu May 11, 2006 9:22 am **Posts:** 308

Back around Christmas, or so, a guy was filling up his big rig at a regular gas station, because they had diesel for 10¢ cheaper than anywhere around. I think t he price was around 3.15, and they had a $50 limit on the pumps. He was there for a while.

chadhargis · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 11:57 am

It is the station that sets the limit. The one closest to my house has a $50 limit, the one a little further down has an $80 limit.

As was mentioned above, I simply fill up before the tank is empty. No worries.

Sir Sam · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 12:14 pm

Its the station, some have $50, some have 75, others have a $100(nicest) limit.

flash7210 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 1:14 pm

Again, its the station.

When I fill up the work truck with the fleet card (Voyager) the pump stops
at $75.

I just swipe it again and continue filling.

retmil46 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 1:45 pm

I usually top off once a week, makes it seem less painful that way. Also makes it easier to calculate how much I'm spending per week, per month, and per year on fuel.

Now that I've had the tranny overhauled, the '87 MB is up to 35 mpg. For 200 miles per week commuting, I'm back down to $25 per week fuel cost. (Yeah, I know, time to head for the bomb shelter.)

Sad part is, only 5 short years ago, that would have been $25 per MONTH. :evil:

RTStabler51 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 2:57 pm

21 gallons? Holy crap you take it all the way down! I thought I was bad. My fill ups are usually at the 18.5 gallon mark.

jinstall · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 3:21 pm

lat time I tanked off base it was $167 but it is more now.

clday25 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 4:10 pm

$95.50 on 21.979 gallons of B99..... :cry:

retmil46 · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 4:20 pm

RTStabler51 wrote:

21 gallons? Holy crap you take it all the way down! I thought I was bad. My fill ups are usually at the 18.5 gallon mark.

His tank may not have been THAT empty. One thing I and others have noticed locally since prices for everything went well north of $3/gallon, is that the accuracy of the pumps at some stations are, shall we say, straining the limits of legality. In other words, whatever +/- fudge factor for pump accuracy is allowed by law, some stations have their pumps set well to the "+" side in their favor.

At what used to be my regular station, the one diesel pump I used was shut down for replacement/maintenance a couple months ago. Once it was reopened, I fueled up twice with that pump - once with the CRD, once with the '87 MB. And both times it showed me putting in 2 gallons more than was physically possible in either vehicle.

I promptly started using another station, who's pump's accuracy agreed with the capacity of my fuel tanks, and magically my fuel costs went down by several dollars a week. :roll:

crd liberty · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 4:26 pm

At what used to be my regular station, the one diesel pump I used was shut down for replacement/maintenance a couple months ago. Once it was reopened, I fueled up twice with that pump - once with the CRD, once with the '87 MB. And both times it showed me putting in 2 gallons more than was physically possible in either vehicle.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Time to call in the State, to check the pumps, if that is the case.
They get paid for checking the clickers on the pumps.
Just my 02 is all

Steve

danoid · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 8:45 pm

RTStabler51 wrote:

21 gallons? Holy crap you take it all the way down! I thought I was bad. My fill ups are usually at the 18.5 gallon mark.

I did, and I filled it all the way up the tube. That's the most I've ever pumped into it in 55k miles. That combined with (nearly) the highest price per gallon I've paid gave me quite a shock when I turned around and looked at the pump.

geordi · **Posted:** Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:43 pm

I don't care what the DTE is showing me however, I never get more than 450 miles to a tank. That sucks. I've been driving a lot slower and easier than I used to, and I'm still not seeing these magical "15% increases from reducing speed" that the CNN fuel wonks are always touting. All I see is the cost to operate going up up up up up up up...

coldkj · **Posted:** Thu May 01, 2008 4:49 am

In stations up here where the limit is 50 or 75 bucks, I finish my transaction at the pump, then reinsert my credit card and refill again. Inconvenient, but works. I learned this trick about a year ago when refuelling my motorhome that was towing my CRD.

Joe Romas · **Posted:** Thu May 01, 2008 6:55 am

In the past week there was a news article about a valve or something in the gas pumps or hose that is causing up to 2 gallons registering on the meter before a drop is pumped. It happens as I understand right when the pump nozzle is squeezed :cry:

retmil46 · **Posted:** Thu May 01, 2008 12:25 pm

Joe Romas wrote:

In the past week there was a news article about a valve or something in the gas pumps or hose that is causing up to 2 gallons registering on the meter before a drop is pumped. It happens as I understand right when the pump nozzle is squeezed :cry:

I've seen that happen before, but not to that extent - ie, just turned the pump on and when it pressurized the fill hose it had already registered a couple tenths of a gallon.

But that's not what's happening in my case - I watch the meter on the pump to control my fill rate and minimize foaming, and also to make sure the station isn't trying to give themselves the "empty hose" freebie when I first start pumping.

What I'm seeing is a small cumulative error, where the pump is registering an extra 1/20 to 1/10 of a gallon per gallon pumped - to where if you filled a 5 gallon jug it would register from 5.2 to 5.5 gallons pumped.

Multiply 1/20 to 1/10 of a gallon extra by a 20 gallon fillup, then multiply that by hundreds or thousands of fillups per week - at $4/gallon, we're talking a significant amount of money for even one station.

And it could well be that that much of an error is even within the limits of the law - considering that most state standards for pump accuracy were probably written back in the day of 80 cent/gallon or even 30 cent/gallon gas.

And at those prices, an extra 2 gallons registered on the pump and an extra buck and a half out of their pocket, at a time when 90% of the people in this country could have given a whit about fuel economy, was well below the radar. But now, when such an error could well cost you an extra $10 per fillup.....

AAARRRGGGHHH!!! $90 fill up

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