JUPITER, Fla. — Robert Ziker took a picture of a Chevron gas station in Jupiter last month, when the posted price on the sign outside showed gas for $3.15 per gallon.
He pulled into the station at the intersection of Alternate A1A and Indiantown Road, parked his pickup at the pump, swiped his debit card, and as he was pumping, he saw, posted right above pump, that regular gas was $4.15 per gallon for paying by credit.
"As I was filling the gas tank, I looked down and I saw $4.15, so I stopped at eight gallons," said Ziker. "After I finished pumping my eight gallons of gas and I was shocked that I paid $34. For eight gallons of gas."
I went back to the Chevron in Jupiter last week and the one by three-inch digital sign above the pump notifies customers it will cost them an extra dollar per gallon if they pay by credit instead of cash.
I asked consumer attorney Thomas Patti if this is legal.
"If they say listen, we're going to provide you a discount for cash-based services, and we're going to charge you a standard price for a credit card, that's seemingly a lawful way to go about it," said Patti, who adds stations must disclose price differences between cash and credit cards.
I stopped by 15 service stations between Jupiter and West Palm Beach and found:
- Five stations charged the same price for cash and credit.
- Seven charged between eight and 10 cents per gallon extra for credit, a common practice to cover service fees. Most showed the differential on their large outside signs.
- When I checked last week, three stations — the Chevron in Jupiter, and the Shell and BP stations on Okeechobee Boulevard near the I-95 interchange — charged customers that dollar a gallon extra for credit cards for the regular blend. At all stations the price differential was on the posts above the pump, but not on the signs drivers could see from the road.
After I questioned managers, I paid a follow-up visit and found the differential at the BP and Shell on Okeechobee Boulevard now just 90 cents a gallon.
The Chevron in Jupiter lowered the differential to 92 cents per gallon.
"As a consumer, I certainly don't like it," said Patrick DeHaan, who tracks retail gas prices and sales trends nationwide through his website gasbuddy.com.
A recent GasBuddy survey showed only four percent of drivers paid cash at the pump.
DeHaan says the practice of charging a dollar more for those who pay by credit could grow if customers don't push back.
"People like using their credit cards," said DeHaan. "Sometimes when gasoline prices are very expensive, people don't want to go around carrying $60, $80, $100 in cash and having to go to the ATM every time to pay for their fill up."
I went to all three stations charging nearly a dollar more for credit.
They told me to speak to the owners who have not called me back.
You might be wondering about using debit cards, which banks tout as the same as cash, and it appears to be a gray area.
At the BP on Okeechobee Boulevard, the debit card cost for gas is the same as cash, but credit card users pay more.
But at the Chevron, where Robert Ziker paid a dollar more per gallon, the manager told me debit price is the same as the higher credit price.
"I definitely felt I was taken advantage of," said Ziker. "I'm glad I was paying attention, because I probably would have filled it up."
I reached out to both the local owners and the corporate offices of BP, Shell, and Chevron to find out what they have to say about the higher per gallon prices for those who buy regular gas at the three stations.
The bottom line: You can usually find the price differential on the signs at the pump, not the larger signs drivers see from the road, which often show only the lower cash price.
