Frustrations of a gas station employee.

[csquared]

I was working at a gas station when the price topped a dollar, the first time. I was scarred to death to change the sign.

We also had to do "half price pumps". We could not set the price over $0.999. So instead of setting the pump for say $1.029, we set it for $0.519 and you had to double the amount on the pump. And, of course, signs all over the place. Simple right? Unless you are blind, illiterate and an SC. "The pump said $5.00! I only have $5.00!" The back room was looking like a pawn shop.

[DrFaroohk]

I get people who think I control the prices. No, I just hang the stickers. Now, I do know how to get into the system and change individual prices and I suppose I could change a bunch of things to a penny. However, I kind of enjoy the whole steady paycheck thing.

lol...reminds me of a local gas station once went to change their prices to something like 3.30 a gallon, and accidently did .330 a gallon. it took them like 3 hours to figure it out (no one was going to tell them obviously).

[aurelemsrealm]

There was a case reported in the local papers last year about a woman throwing her hot coffee at a convenience store clerk in a fit of rage. Apparently, the woman threw it right in the clerk's face. The woman was charged with assault as the manager and several customers were witnesses. I don't remember the specifics, but I remember that much.

[blas]

I have the utmost sympathy for gas station employees. That was one of the hardest customer service jobs I ever did. It wasn't the worst, but it was definetly the hardest.

When people would accuse ME of raising gas prices and ripping them off, I'd have to bite my tongue hard to resist saying "Do you really think me, a widdle 19 year old girl, has the ultimate control of gas prices? And do you really think if I were making these kinds of profits, I'd be standing here in this shithole serving jackasses like you?"

[wolfie]

I was working at a gas station when the price topped a dollar, the first time. I was scarred to death to change the sign.

We also had to do "half price pumps". We could not set the price over $0.999. So instead of setting the pump for say $1.029, we set it for $0.519 and you had to double the amount on the pump. And, of course, signs all over the place. Simple right? Unless you are blind, illiterate and an SC. "The pump said $5.00! I only have $5.00!" The back room was looking like a pawn shop.

It doesn't show where you're posting from, but I'm assuming the U.S. Some jurisdictions don't allow "half price pumps", so when independents with mechanical counters in their pumps exceeded the capacity of their (purchased a few years ago) gizmos that allowed prices to go up to $3.99/gallon, they had to hang out a sign "sorry, we can't sell you any gas". What I don't understand is why they couldn't get the gearing in the pump modified to run the "volume delivered" 4x as fast, put labels over every place that said "gallon", and start selling gas by the quart. Of course, they'd need a few signs that said they were doing this, and why ("our mechanical pumps won't allow prices over $3.99/unit, we can't legally set the unit price at half the actual price and multiply it, our sales don't justify replacing the pumps, so it's either do this or stop selling gas"). The big sign outside could still (probably) show the price per gallon (to avoid SCs who found out the "cheap gas" was a price per quart after filling up). After all, AFAIK, the quart is a legal fluid measure in the U.S.

It's interesting that back in the '70s, the Canadian government tried to shove metric down everyone's throat (some people might consider it to have been a "force feed" at the opposite end of the digestive tract), going so far as to lay charges against places still using Imperial measure (of course, the smart way would have been to redefine the gallon as 8 litres, the pound as 500 grams, etc., and file short measure charges against anyone using the old units). Of course, even the ultimate "you'll get my gallon jug when you pry it out of my cold, dead hand" types quietly went metric - when gas hit $1.00/gallon, and their pumps couldn't handle prices over $1.00/unit.

[csquared]

It doesn't show where you're posting from, but I'm assuming the U.S.

US. Is was back in '79-'80 time frame. I was still living in northern Illinois. The State passed emergency legislation to allow the half price pumps until the gas stations could upgrade. These pumps actually had a mechanical price set. The control box had three dials for each pump. 10th, 100th & 1000th of a dollar. The new system was electronic. We only had to replace the control box. Nothing in the pumps had to be replaced, that I know of.

I have heard about the $3.99 limit, but I have not seen any place that had that problem. Every place I can think of had prices over $4.00. These days, you would think that it would be a software upgrade. Anyone here sell fuel delivery systems and can explain this?

The big sign outside could still (probably) show the price per gallon (to avoid SCs who found out the "cheap gas" was a price per quart after filling up). After all, AFAIK, the quart is a legal fluid measure in the U.S.

Posting quart prices... That would be an invite to suck!

Of course, even the ultimate "you'll get my gallon jug when you pry it out of my cold, dead hand" types quietly went metric - when gas hit $1.00/gallon, and their pumps couldn't handle prices over $1.00/unit.

You can keep your gallon gas can. Litres/Liters fit very nicely.