Fragile Fuel Pump @ Petro Racine, WI

Be careful when you're out there using fuel pumps nowadays. I was at a truck stop today fueling up and while I was fueling up the front panel of the fuel pump quite literally fell off as I was trying to pump fuel. Staff at the truck stop began accusing me of property damage stating that they had video evidence that I had deliberately sought to break the panel. As it happens local law enforcement reviewed the video evidence and cleared me of any accusations. That being said there is now a dispute regarding the liability for damages since technically I did come in contact with the apparatus prior to it falling apart. I was informed by truck stop staff that the panel is only held on by One clip and that is what broke, according to them it is a $1500 fix plus labor. So pretty much a junky old pump with a very poor design that fell apart is now going to cost me a few thousand bucks to get fixed because it seems like the truck stop really wants to stick it to me.

 

Petro in Racine, Wisconsin.
Pump 1, my take on what happened is that the part that broke off which if you are facing the panel is at the top right hand corner of the panel. It is one little plastic peg that bears the entire weight of the panel to include the panel itself, hoses, pump handles, etc. it is a pump where you have to remove the pump handle and then pull the plastic lever to activate the pump. When I pulled the lever the pump did not activate and here is where I may have went wrong. I jiggled the lever a bit, pushing and pulling it in and out trying to get the pump to activate. I went in and out of the store at least three times telling staff about it. I even repositioned my truck twice. What ended up happening was that at one point the panel just popped open and upon my trying to close it began falling off. I tried to put it back on and used my foot to brace it, I was accused of kicking the panel which is what they claim caused it to break.

Just to be clear, allow me to repeat, that the local sheriff's department reviewed the security video and cleared me of these accusations. But they did state that because of what I did and did not do in coming in contact with the panel I could potentially be held liable and have to pay whatever amount of money. The truck stop was not going to press charges but it was insinuated that if I did not play ball with them on their terms that I could be taken to court, arrested, etc. they let me know that they got my trucking company's information and insurance.

One question I would like to ask is how old that panel is because the singular peg that was holding the whole thing together, and truck stop staff even informed me that that was literally the only thing keeping it in place, may have had some kind of compromised integrity due to age, exposure to the elements, ETC. I did not apply that much force to it and all I did was move the pump lever around.

I have a belief that they will probably have that panel back on and the pump working in very little time and that they don't really need a new panel but they're going to make me pay for it because it happened to break while I was attempting to use it. I don't have any plans on returning to that truck stop ever again but I might need to get some information collected in terms of whether or not they have the pump back working and the broken panel reattached. The fuel Island there is a bit of a cluster and it has a gated, paid parking lot which compels a lot of people to park their trucks in and around the fuel Island for an extended period of time. That truck stop has a reputation for handing out tickets for all sorts of nonsense in regards to parking. The security guard that I dealt with during this incident was acting extremely aggressive towards me making all sorts of accusations, I'm inclined to believe that he was trying to escalate the situation to compel me to react in a very negative fashion which I did not do.