As I understand this, it's not the station. This is regulated by the bank backing the card. It's actually for your protection. The dude in the station is supposed to look for ID to ensure the card isn't stolen. Which is as we all know is BS, no one asks. The back of my card does not have a signature - it says "Ask for ID", no one does.

Back on topic. Yesterday I needed to refuel. There are 2 Global stations right next to each other separated by a small neighborhood road. The 1st station is primarily for cars, sells diesel and has a store. The 2nd is supposed to be for tractor trailers. Diesel only, 1 pump per island side. For giggles I filled up (~$140.00) at the 1st station and because of this thread drove through the 2nd station. The diesel pumps were "prepay". No credit card reader on them. I wonder if this has something to do with all those different ways tractor trailers pay for their fuel? I was at a truck stop once and it asked that I 1st insert all kinds of different cards. Can't remember the names of them. Wound up going in and pre-paying.

 

I contacted Discover Card and they said it wasn't them that put the limit on the dollar amount.

 

It's a strange station. It's neighborhood style, but has two lanes for tractor trailers, and a lane next to those for all the "other" diesels. They don't have a diesel pump out with the gas pumps. There are a few stations that are closer that sell diesel, but i go to the one I go to because they are a higher volume diesel seller than any of the others. I figure this helps lower my chance of tainted fuel.

 

Another thing to be wary of, is if you are filling your trucks up at Truck Stop style stations, you are paying for commercial rate fuel! In Arizona that is 8 cents per gallon difference, not sure of the rest of the country. You have to go inside, after pumping, to get your refund.....pretty ridiculous, but it is what it is.

 

In my experience, it's a truck stop thing to pre-pay. People may be getting up to $1000 in diesel per fill-up and it keeps them from eating the bill if something goes wrong. Now if you have a fuel card, they will most likely work at the pumps, but a lot of truckers will still go in and get an extra receipt.

I avoid the big truck stops for diesel for this inconvenience, and for the $0.10-$0.30 or more premium they charge on diesel over other filling stations. (The big fleets get a big discount) I will however buy DEF at the truck stop pumps since it's less than half the cost of buying it in a box. I go though 5 to 10 gallons a week of it, (Company "hot shot" pickup) so it's worth the headache if there's no line.

 

I too was avoiding the truck stops. Now, I hit Flying J/Pilot and use the credit card I got through Good Sam Club. I get the cash price plus a discount.

 

 

Before I went diesel I used 2 fuel pumps at a time. One to fuel up the truck and another to fuel up the equipment in the trailer. Of course this only worked at stations that had 2 pumps inline with one another like Quick Trip Stores. The problem I had was I needed to activate 2 pumps without a credit card because I needed to go inside and purchase a few other things and make only one payment either with cash or a credit card. This wasn't an issue until the prepay system went into effect.

One of the employees recommended I get a "pump start card" for myself and another one for my wife. A pump start card is just a card with a magnetic strip that is linked to your drivers license info. If you start a pump with a pump start card and don't pay they know who stole the fuel. I would start one pump to fuel the truck with my pump start card then go to the rear pump and use my wife's pump start card to fuel up the equipment. When finished I would go inside and make one transaction with one receipt either with cash or a credit card.

I can remember my credit card cutting off at $100 back when fuel was $4 a gallon. Trying to put 40 gallons of regular unleaded in my old truck was over $150 at times.

 

Someone isn't being truthful. My bank told me it was for my protection. MasterCard said it wasn't them. To Joe/GA's point, every station attendant I ever asked says it's the banks. I would sure like to know because as someone with a 50 gallon tank in their truck it is a PIA.
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I have always thought my card at the pump would limit me to $75. I generally will pay inside. I fill up at speedway a lot and have their fuel card, points card, and merchandise card. I will prepay whatever I need, $80-120 or what ever, on the fuel card. Then I swipe the fuel card at the pump. If you are traveling around and don't have the same type of station to fuel at, which I do at times (I will fill up at Holidays, Pilots, ect when I am on the road - I reference the GasBuddy app quite a bit) this isn't ideal.

Truck stops with the commercial fuel islands have a different type of payment system. There is a speedway down the street from where I used to work that I would fill up at all the time. The commercial pumps used to take my credit card. That station grew and they rebuilt. The new commercial island is bigger with new pumps. I went through there at 2am coming back home once and tried to fill up - they no longer take cards at the pump - either personal credit cards or their own fuel cards. That was a PITA - prepay inside to come out and find I still can't pay at the pump. So I left my cards inside and the attendant manually turned on the pump somehow.

I have a special fleet card (EFS) for my semi. It works at all truck stops and private terminals. I don't know what the deal is, but it appears to work the same as a regular credit card just asks more details (hub miles, control number, truck number) to process. I would be curious if you can get this type of card for private use. I am not sure the pilot cards that others have mentioned are on the same level, those sound like they are specific to pilot or wherever. The one I have is not.

 

The station attendants haven't got a clue how the business runs! The station is protecting themselves. Some business systems have exceptions for different cards, where the risk is lower.

Some of the stations have started to reject multi swipe too. At the pump.

Walk inside and the rules change.

 

 

Only times I've ran across them in Texas was at dedicated truck stops when I had a dual tank company truck and often times another 100 gal. auxiliary tank or 2 on the flat bed. So as mentioned above, for the stations protection and instead of running the card a million times I get that. Otherwise in my 3/4 ton now, never ran across a prepay. Seems like a strange concept in this self service station world we live in haha

 

In the end it's all about protecting the gas station owner. They still pay the fuel company for every gallon they receive, whether the end customer pays for it or not. Fuel is a low margin product for the station owners so a set back of $20/$50/$100+ hits them directly.