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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

'Detained' at petrol station for not having my bank card

491 replies

Willowcat77 · 31/07/2019 07:39

Yesterday I stopped at my local village petrol station to refuel. I was on my way to pick up my DS for an important hospital appointment. I am a regular customer as it is the only petrol station/shop in the area and always get my car MOT'd there. My DP has been a customer/friend of the owners for over 20 years.

I went to the counter to pay but then realised that I'd left my bank card at home. The shop assistants knew me by sight so I said I'm really sorry but I'll need to go home to get my card, my house is only 5 minutes down the road. The assistant told me no, I would have to phone someone to pay for me and that I was forbidden to leave the premises!

I was very taken aback, but I phoned my DP. Unfortunately he wasn't answering his phone so I had to leave a voicemail. There was nobody else I could phone in the area. I was very worried about missing the hospital appointment, so I tried to reason with the shop assistants. I explained the situation and offered to leave my phone and £20 cash as security whilst I fetched my card. My petrol bill was £39. They knew I was local and my DP and I have spent 1000s of pounds there over the years.

They refused, saying if necessary I would have to stay there all day until my DP came to pay for me. They said this was "the rule". I wanted to speak to the owner but he wasn't in. I have ASD and am easily panicked. I was getting later and later for the hospital appointment and could feel I was having a proper ASD meltdown. I was getting so distressed I couldn't even redial my DPs number any more and had to ask them to do it. Eventually, after about 20 minutes, DP unexpectedly arrived and paid for me. I still feel very upset and that I can't ever go there again out of embarrassment.

My DP has since found out they did something similar to an older lady recently who was also local and a regular customer.

Aibu to feel I was treated badly and to make a complaint to the owner today? What were my rights in this situation? Could I have left to get the money?

OP posts:
JoxerGoesToStuttgart · 31/07/2019 13:32

What you have to realise is that law only matters if it is enforced. I used to work in retail, and workers having to pay when cheques they'd accepted bounced was a reality. It sucks. Unfortunately people in these kind of low-paid roles do not have the money to take employers to court. If they tried they would lose their jobs. And again, when that happens they can't afford to sue for dismissal, and anyway, that doesn't matter when you don't have a job with which to earn a living, or any prospect of one because you need a reference.

This is normal life, outside of the middle class arena.

  1. I am very definitely not middle class Grin

  2. all your points above are irrelevant. Workers don’t have to pay. It isn’t legal. They may feel under pressure to pay, they may do it to avoid the stress of losing their job. But they don’t have to. I’d far rather anyone reading this thread knew their legal rights than go on thinking they had no choice.

MidnightAtTheOasis · 31/07/2019 13:56

This government website doesn’t suggest that it’s illegal to dock workers’ pay for walkaways. Heavily restricted yes, but not illegal.
-www.gov.uk/understanding-your-pay/deductions-from-your-pay

Deedee248 · 31/07/2019 14:00

Possibly because some people don't have family or have friends with a spare £40 to hand.

You don’t need to have it to hand. I rarely have £40 in cash on me either. I’m talking about paying over the phone with a card.

Nobody has responded to that. Maybe it can’t be done. Seems like an obvious thing to me.

EBearhug · 31/07/2019 14:03

The garage nearest work once refused to let a woman go, because she had forgotten her bag. It was getting a bit heated, not least because another guy in the queue kept shouting at the till staff about how they were being unreasonable with some racist overtones. I paid for mine, and suggested if they and she were okay with it, she could leave her car and I could give her (and her child, as it turned out,) a lift back to hers to get her bag. They weren't keen, but accepted it if the carea didn't leave.

It was within walking distance, (we were back within about 8 minutes,) but I can see why she wasn't keen on doing it with a tired child each way. I also understand why they were being as they were - it's the last petrol station on the main route out of town before you're on a busy motorway, and I expect they do get get people deliberately driving off without paying. But they showed no ability to adapt to the situation at all, and it was obviously distressing for the woman. They were focussing on payment, but not adapting to a simple solution. If someone has accidentally left their card and phone behind, keeping them there gets them no nearer being able to pay, especially as hardly anyone knows phone numbers off by heart these days.

Prestoli · 31/07/2019 14:04

This happened to me once, the guy behind the counter just asked that i left my mobile phone while i go get my card

Sosadinside · 31/07/2019 14:09

@Deedee248, I tried this at my local Tesco. I’d left my purse at home (40 min round trip - we live in the blinking boondocks). For background, I shop there at least 5 times a week, know most of the staff to say hello to, spend £££s there every year - and the stuff I had that day was less than 20 quid’s worth.

Nope. Got a complete ‘computer-says-no’ blanking. Apparently they “didn't have a system in place” to take a card payment over the phone, and to let me leave with the shopping and pay later the same day would clearly have caused a rift in the fucking time space continuum, such was the amused and astonished reaction to that request.

By contrast, the only other time this happened was when I was doing a big birthday thing for my sister and had shopped at a Waitrose that I visit once in a blue moon. I gave them my address and they let me leave with £200 of food and booze on a promise that I’d pop back within 24 hrs and pay for it. Which I did. If I could afford to shop there all the time, I would!

Sorry you had such a stressful day, OP. Your DH has done the right thing in letting the owner know. The staff may have just been following protocol, but their treatment of you was shit.

BeckyWithTheSplitEnds · 31/07/2019 14:12

Deedee248 Are you being deliberately obtuse? What if the person doesn't know anyone with 40 spare on a card? I live in HA - not sure which of my neighbours I could phone in a bind tbh.

Sosadinside I've had the same. :( Drove 45 mins to Tesco - spent a blissful 60 child-free minutes up and down every aisle... no card. They wouldn't take payment by phone. 45 minute drive home and no food.

Sweetpea15 · 31/07/2019 14:15

I used to work for Shell garage. There is a form you can fill in with all your contact details etc and an agreement that you’ll come back within 7 days to pay. BUT they don’t like to use it and so first we’re supposed to ask you to ring someone else and sort an alternative method of payment. We’re supposed to only tell you about the form as a last resort.

You weren’t treated great, and it could have been handled better but they were also just doing what they were told.

sonjadog · 31/07/2019 14:18

I'm glad your DH is following it up. They need to rethink their policy on this one.

I have driven off without paying twice in my life. Once they ran after me and caught me before I got out on the road (they were understandably very angry and I was very apologetic), and the second time, they rang me at work and went straight back and paid. I didn't know any of them but I live in a small town and one of them knew where I worked. They were understanding and I was, again, very apologetic.

Deedee248 · 31/07/2019 14:28

@BeckyWithTheSplitEnds
Deedee248 Are you being deliberately obtuse? What if the person doesn't know anyone with 40 spare on a card? I live in HA - not sure which of my neighbours I could phone in a bind tbh.

No I am not being deliberately obtuse. Most people who go into a garage expect to spend at least £40 on fuel. I didn’t mention neighbours. I actually said family or maybe a good friend. Obviously you wouldn’t want to embarrass anyone who couldn’t afford that, but if you could ring a spouse or a parent or sibling (anywhere in the country) and they could pay over the phone, that was what I was wondering. However another poster has indicated that she tried this and was told it was not possible, which is an answer to my question.

BeckyWithTheSplitEnds · 31/07/2019 14:30

Some people have nobody.

EBearhug · 31/07/2019 14:33

I am unsure how petrol stations lose out if someone drives away. Unless they have false number plates surely they can track the owner of the car down

I would assume the costs of this will take at least the cost of a tank of petrol and probably more.

probstimeforanewname · 31/07/2019 14:35

Not sure why they can't take payment over the phone, they'd just put it through as a cardholder not present transaction.

feellikeanalien · 31/07/2019 14:47

This happened to me in our local Morrisons.

I had taken my purse out of my bag to renew my library books online before leaving the house and had forgotten to put it back.

The guy was really nice, took all my details and I signed a form giving me 24 hours to come back and pay.

He said that it happens quite a lot.

Deedee248 · 31/07/2019 14:49

@probstimeforanewname

Not sure why they can't take payment over the phone, they'd just put it through as a cardholder not present transaction.

Exactly! That’s what I thought.

HaileySherman · 31/07/2019 15:20

I would absolutely complain to the owner/manager. That was completely unreasonable. I'm not sure whether or not it was legal to do, but I think in your situation I would have written my details for them and left anyway. I can't imagine any court upholding any charges, even if they could bring them about. I'd be ready to drive 100miles out of my way to never give them a cent of business again!

beanaseireann · 31/07/2019 15:30

Very poor customer service on their part considering you and dp are long time customers.
There should be a bit of leeway for a regular customer who doesn't make a habit of forgetting their card.

Cohle · 31/07/2019 15:36

I'm amazed so many people expect petrol stations to be totally happy to let people wonder off without paying.

How can you expect great customer service from businesses when you're not actually a paying customer?

Ritascornershop · 31/07/2019 15:40

I know this isn’t the point, but I’m kind of surprised you can physically get petrol without paying first. After a clerk tried to prevent someone from doing a gas-and-run and the clerk got run over and killed, our petrol pumps (in BC, in Canada) have been reconfigured to not release petrol till your bank card goes through.

And they were being ridiculous to detain a long-standing customer.

Lemonlady22 · 31/07/2019 15:40

yep....let you drive off and then not pay......its then deducted from member of staff's pay packet

beanaseireann · 31/07/2019 15:43

If you read the original post, the OP is local, in a small villlage and both she and her dp use the garage all the time and get their cars MOT'd there.
I think therefore there should be leeway.

Lemonlady22 · 31/07/2019 15:45

small businesses cant afford to lose money and also have their own rules....and its small businesses which take money back from staff for allowing it to happen

Anyonebut · 31/07/2019 15:48

@Ritascornershop, that is what I was saying earlier. The onus should be on the station owner to put a system in place to avoid this, I have seen different sorts at different petrol stations, not on the employees under threat of having their pay docked.

cookiemonster3 · 31/07/2019 15:49

Standard procedure is to note your reg, fuel amount, name and address and have you sign a form to you will pay within x days or you will be reported to the police for theft.

Their actions were complete wrong and illegal. Take your custom elsewhere.

Sosadinside · 31/07/2019 15:56

@Cohle, the OP is a paying customer of this business. I’m surprised you can’t see the difference between allowing ‘people’ to ‘wander off’ and actually showing a little bit of kindness and flexibility to a known person who lives locally, regularly puts money in their tills and is hardly going to skip the country.

Good customer service is about a lot more than just smiling as you take people’s cash.