Ive just been told bya mate who does nights out and is on one tonight their base is in the midlands and he is in the Devonshire area with less than half a tank of diesel not enoughto get him back .
His Keyfuels card was refused for reasons unknown to anyone but the bill payer.
What would you do in this situation would you use your own cash or debit/credit card knowing the company wont give you it back until next months wages?.
Or sit and wait until they sort it out when you are on the red?.
If they suggested finding a garage that will accept a credit card over the phone for payment wouldoyu go in and out all the garages until successful?.
Or run out of fuel thumb a lift home and just drive home in your car?.
if he knows the company are gonna give him the cash back and aint gonna go down the pan then put some in on your card, if not then park the thing up where he at or turn around and head for home.
It would depend on the company I was working for, if they were sailing close to the wind, I would let them sort out the card payment and book a night out where I was.
Once bitten, twice shy
On the other hand it could be just a card reader fault or the card has expired, then I would stick £20 in the tank
Diificult one, I think this one comes down to the personal relationship you have with the gaffer, and trust. I have worked in a similar situation, One boss I called and knew well, and paid out of my own pocket and got it back in cash and a drink another… I wouldnt leave a dog end in an ashtray because I knew he would smoke it, and parked up until he got it sorted.
Not knowing the people involved, I wouldnt want to make a decsion, thats one that the guy has to evaluate for himself.
I have put fuel in my truck before, that has been paid for out of my own pocket. For some reason my Esso fuelcard wasnt working , i think it was a problem with their system, not my card. Card didnt work at 3 different sites, and i was close to empty about 130km from the depot.
So i found the nearest 7-11 and put $25 in the tank. I knew i would get the money back, and didnt have to wait long at all. Next day i handed receipt in, and got the cash on the spot One of the joys of working for a company like FedEx.
I did an agency job when i was working in england, I was given a BP fuelcard and was getting low on fuel so pulled into Oxford services (iirc) , proceeded to fill the tank up and went to go pay on the fuelcard. Turns out this particular BP garage didnt take the BP fuelcard. I rang the gaffer, he said pay for it yourself, and we will get you the money back. I turned round and said ‘no way mate- im not using my own money and going weeks without it, find some alternative payment method’. A few minutes later he rang back with the company credit card details.
Yea, I’ve paid £400 on my debit card for diesel, £150 to Volvo for repairs in Spain and all sorts of other stuff because of duff or expired cards but I have a good employer, there are plenty I have worked for where I wouldn’t ■■■■ in the AdBlue tank to get the truck home.
The last company i worked for eventually had no fuel cards so we had to make sure we had full tanks before leaving yard, At first i used to put a small amount in as long as i got cash when i got back to base. As it became apparent how close to the wind it was sailing i used to make them transfer the money into my bank account which would sometimes take half a day
As an ex employer I wouldn’t ask an employee to do that, a good employer would make sure that all cards are current, if for some reason it is a system fault then I would get the driver to fill at a place where I could make a payment by phone, cards are not refused for no reason at all, the main one is NO MONEY.
as has been said its horses for courses
and you need to judge the risk of getting your money back promptly.
on a similiar vein
when i worked for Brits the phone convo went like this
after a long week and heading for home on a Friday night.
TM- were are you
me - A428 near St Neot
TM- we need you to go to Harlow
me - WTF
TM -driver has fueled up and card didnt go through he needs too use yours to pay
and your the closest
Me - WTF give me his phone number
D2 - hello its me
Me - can you get the phone number of garage your at
D2 -ok
me - hello mate Steve from Brits can you take my card over the phone for our driver thats got a duff card i can give you our office number if you want to confirm is ok
Fuel man - yeah no problem will take about 5 mins to do it maually
Me - great
now why couldnt the bloody office do that
they would have me driving miles in the wrong direction wasting my life for 300 litres of fuel
well done to the Shell station for helping out a ‘foreign’ mob
another… I wouldnt leave a dog end in an ashtray because I knew he would smoke it, and parked up until he got it sorted.
