Great Indian Petrol Pump Fraud

This story was sent as an email to my colleague. This may be useful for you as well… Be aware…

I would like to bring to your kind attention the “Great Indian Petrol Pump Fraud” happening all over Bangalore (and I believe all over India).

Today in the morning, I saw the fuel gauge of my car touching the “Empty” sign, so I thought that while on my way to office, I will fill petrol worth 1000 Rs in my car. When I reached the petrol pump at 9:30 Am today. I showed the crisp 1000 Rs note to the attendant at the petrol pump and told him to fill 1000 Rs. I repeated 1000 to him 2-3 times so that he registers 1000 Rs in his head fill the petrol for 1000 Rs. I repeatedly told him because of the past experience whenever I had asked him to fill petrol worth 1000 bucks at different gas stations, the attendant always filled 200 rs of petrol and said “Sir your 200 rs of petrol is filled” . I used to say I asked you fill 1000 Rs of petrol not 200 worth. He would look at me like an innocent kid and would start filling the remaining 800 Rs of petrol.

But this procedure of 200+800 didn’t stop at one petrol pump but gas attendants at all the petrol pumps followed this weird ritual. I could sense something fishy but not before losing money to this procedure 3-4 times. So coming back to Today’s incident I asked the “Honest” petrol pump attendant to fill the petrol,While filling the petrol my attention was diverted towards the pollution check centre at the same petrol pump but when I looked back at the meter indicator, I was shocked to see the familiar “200″ mark at the petrol pump meter. I told him again why didn’t you fill for 1000 Rs. He said that he heard 200 Rs. So I told him to fill 800 Rs of petrol also. After he had filled the petrol, I got in the car and started towards my office. While on my way to office, I observed the fuel gauge in my car. It had moved from“Empty” first to half and then little further. But from my past experience that when I used to get 1000 rs of fuel filled in the empty fuel tank, It used to come to certain level but today it hadn’t come till there. So I thought SHOOT….I got duped again.

After reaching office I checked the Internet for same Frauds which had happened before my case. I was shocked to find that many other people also faced the same problem of 200+800 and some bikes of 40+60 bucks (these petrol pump attendants don’t leave anybody).I spoke to my boss and a colleague of mine at office they told me of the same incident. I was like … this problem is not only with me but with people all over Bangalore. Basically people all over Bangalore (maybe all over India) are getting cheated in this ingenious fraud which is promoted by our friendly neighbour hood petrol pump owners and their honchos gas attendants.

The ingenious technique these people follow is discussed below in italics

When asked for diesel worth Rs. 500. The attendant filled up only Rs. 100. noticing that I told him to fill for Rs. 500 but by that time he is done with 100 so the attender said he will fill up for remaining Rs.400…that is when he did a trick of as though he is resetting by playing games of hurry burry and continuing to fill and when he is done for Rs. 400 he asked for 500 (100+400) but in reality he only filed for 100+300 as he is not really reset the machine to zero even though it appears as he reset it.

So after reading the messages on the website I went back to the petrol pump ,parked my car in middle of the petrol pump called the attendant and told him that you have cheated me of 200 rs of petrol instead of filling petrol worth of 1000 Rs you have filled the petrol worth only 800 rs ,I told him I am going to sue your petrol pump and I want to write a complaint against the same .He got frightened said “Sorry Sir By mistake i have not reset 200 rs”. He didn’t ask me any more questions and directly filled 200 Rs of petrol.

I wonder that many oil companies talk about going in losses and hence they ask govt. to increase the price of diesel and petrol but in reality petrol pump owners are helping us save lots of oil by asking us to pay 1000 rs but giving us petrol worth 800. What a brilliant way to conserve oil and make profit for petrol pump owners. I guess people should know about the ingenious way in which petrol pumps owners helps us. (Pardon me for the sarcasm)

I don’t know the name of the person who actually wrote the initial mail, it is very descriptive on a number of ways that people may get deceived. Even I have noticed many such incidents a number of times across various petrol pumps. Be careful my friends, I know you too would have a similar experience in your neighborhood petroleum pumps. If you noticed anything different from the above mentioned, feel free to share it. This helps others to know what to do when they go for fueling next time!