By: Sam Tayo
Despite the exorbitant rate in the increment of fuel price, the bad eggs among filling station attendants have not jettisoned their horrible acts of cutting down on the amount of fuel that customers paid for. Unless you are dutifully watchful, all they need is for you to be distracted a little, then they will pull a fast one on you!
They have diverse tactics and they find it easy to carry out their notorious acts when they are two attendants manning one fuel dispenser nuzzle and also when you appear unsuspecting.
Now, one could come to collect money and try to catch your total attention while the other person sells the fuel. If you’re not watchful enough, the one selling the fuel could swiftly dispense into your tank, cut down on the amount you mentioned, and immediately return the nuzzle to the dispenser. Because you didn’t see the sale, you would not be able to tell if the liters served were complete or not, but the bad eggs among them would most certainly take advantage of your inobservance.
Another one is when you’ve packed by the fuel dispenser, and pulled the fuel tank lever underneath the driver’s seat to open the tank but remain in the vehicle, waiting to be served. If the attendant happens to still be serving other people at that time, and who, incidentally, are not buying much fuel, say 2000 or 3000 naira fuel, they can quickly take the nuzzle into your fuel tank and continue from where they stopped with the last buyer if what you’re buying is much enough to accommodate and conceal the consequent shortage on your fuel.
Also, another fast play from them is this: Let’s assume you mentioned that you’re buying fuel of 10,000 naira, and the attendant starts selling. After selling, say, 1,000 naira, he could stop selling. So when you repeat that you wanted 10,000 and not 1,000, he would say, “Oh, I’m sorry, thought you said 1,000,” and continue to sell. Now, this is where they could play fast one on you. If you are not watching, he would continue from that 1,000 and sell up to 9,000 and stop. Now, you could assume that he returned the nuzzle to the dispenser and started again from zero. But he might not! So here, they rip you up to the value of the initial sale of 1,000.
Always stay alert and make an effort to step out of your car to properly monitor what fuel attendants are doing when selling to you. Leave no room for a dubious fuel attendant to rip you off your hard-earned money when buying fuel.
