ROCK ISLAND, Ill. -- One week was all it took for the manager of a Git-N-Go gas station in Rock Island, Ill., to decide that all gasoline customers need to pay before they can fill up their cars.
"In the first five days of November, there was over $300 of drive-offs," store manager Heather Kisner told Quad-Cities Online. "It's really ridiculous. It's like we had no choice."
Reaction from customers has been mixed, she said. Some don't like having to come into the station to pay because the pumps don't accept credit cards, [image-nocss] while others don't seem to mind coming in. If a customer complains, Kisner said, she simply tells them there's nothing she can do.
Drive offs usually happen at busy times, Kisner said. Though there are usually two people in the Git-N-Go at any time, it can be hard to keep an eye on the pumps when it gets busy. "That's when they get us, when it gets really busy," she said.
During a bad week in early November, Kisner said, a man filled up his car with $43 worth of gas and then waited for a car to pull up in front of the building sideways that made it difficult for her to see the man and then the man drove off.
At a Shell station in East Moline, Ill., four of the station's eight pumps are prepay-only, though there has been talk of making all of them prepay.
"When it's prepay, sometimes customers get so mad," said Crystal Gooch, a part-time employee, adding that customers sometimes come from a nearby gas station to the Shell station because all the pumps at the other site are prepay only. "I have a lot of customers say they won't go anywhere that's totally prepay."
At a Gasland store in Moline, Ill., all the pumps are prepay-only, despite customer complaints, to prevent drive-offs.
"They complain always," said Paul Jarnail, who has managed Gasland for seven months. "We can't do anything."
Jarnail said he sometimes opens the pumps so customers don't have to prepay, but knows that's not the best idea.
"I open the pump, but I take the risk," he said.
Scott Lohman of Moline was filling up his red GMC Yukon XL at a nearby Jewel Express.
"I pretty much use a credit or debit card each time," he said. "I like it because you don't have to go in."
Lohman said that when gas stations started making pumps prepay-only, it irritated him a bit. "It was a nuisance when it happened," he said. "I've become accustomed to it now."Members help make our journalism possible. Become a CSP member today and unlock exclusive benefits, including unlimited access to all of our content. Sign up here.