I work in a gas station in swampy south Florida in the middle of what we call “Alligator Alley”. We have signs up for all customers to be wary of alligators that might have wandered up out of the water. Today just happens to be a day when this happens, so I am warning customers who come in.

A customer has just paid for gas.

Me: “Thank you, sir. Also, please be extra observant as you go back to your vehicle, as there was an alligator near the pumps first thing this morning.”

Customer: “Bah, what bulls***. They’re not that scary. You locals just keep saying that to sell your alligator tours and T-shirts and whatnot.”

Me: “I assure you, sir, they can be quite dangerous if provoked, which you can do by accidentally going too near one. I am simply advising caution.”

Customer: “If I see an alligator out there blocking my car, I’m just gonna walk right up to it and kick it out of the way. I’mma prove you wrong. What do you say to that?!”

Me: “That I hope you’d be very happy you were right, sir… for about three to five seconds… if you’re lucky…”

Luckily (for him), there was no alligator between him and his car.

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I am working at a gas station in a service station on one side of a freeway. Our side of the freeway is going south, with our sister station a little up the way on the other side of the freeway serving customers driving north.

Two gentlemen have just paid for gas and snacks.

Me: “Will that be everything, gentlemen?”

Customer #1: “Yes, but can you tell us how much further it is to Canada?”

Me: “Canada? That’s at least a thousand miles north of here.”

Customer #2: “Still so far! But we’ve been driving all day!”

Me: “Sirs, just to confirm. To get here, you must have been driving on the south side of the freeway. Did you detour here after driving north?”

Customer #1: “No, we’ve been on this side all the way.”

Me: “Then I am sorry to say, sirs, but you’ve been driving the wrong way. Canada is north of here, but you’ve been heading toward Mexico.”

[Customer #2] slaps [Customer #1] upside the head.

Customer #2: “I told you it was strange that it wasn’t getting colder!”

Customer #1: “Hey! Canada can have heat waves, too!”

Customer #2: “What would you have done when we got to the Mexican border? Huh?!”

Customer #1: “Left you there and turned around!”

They left, bickering, hopefully in the right direction.

The day that this occurs, I know from my previous job working at a gas station that I am going to have to apologize before even getting started with the attendant. I choose a station that I know has multiple tills and a long counter and always has friendly people working.

When I enter, I am in luck: no one is in line, and two attendants are working.

Me: “I need to apologize ahead of time. I am sorry, but all I have today is one dollar and a lot of change.”

I show them my pouch of coins. It’s all silver, no pennies; I’m not that evil.

Me: “Can I count these out of the way of customers?”

Attendant: “I can take you right here. It’s okay; I’ve been there.”

Me: “Thank you so much. I didn’t know what to do. I don’t get paid until Thursday, and I have to get to my doctor’s appointment, and I’m so sorry.”

We work together to stack everything into piles of quarters, dimes, and nickels. Then, the other attendant comes over with a roll and starts rolling them. The final count is $19.50. With gas prices so high, that will get me about 3.5 gallons, enough to get me home and to work until I get paid.

I thank the attendants again for their patience and head to my car at the pump.

I get the nozzle in the car and hit the grade button, and the pump isn’t working. It says, “See Cashier”. “Okay,” I think. “Maybe they needed an extra minute to set the pump.” Sure enough, the pump resets, but it says, “Prepay: $29.50”. I clearly remember both the attendant and me confirming $19.50. As I am pulling the nozzle back out, a man approaches.

Man: “I added some more on there, so you just keep going until it stops.”

I am shocked. Is this real?

Me: “Oh, my God, thank you so much!”

He smiles and walks away. I start the pump, and as I am finishing, the man is back. He sees the amount on the pump.

Man: “Hang on. I added $20.00 to your $19.50; you have $10.00 more coming.”

He walks back into the store as I hang up the nozzle. I follow him because I can’t yet believe this is real. He comes out grinning.

Man: “There’s $10.00 more on there. You’re good to go.”

Me: “Thank you again. What’s your name?”

Man: “[Man].”

Me: “Thank you, [Man]. I’m [My Name, which is also an animal].”

Man: “I love [animals], and I also drive a [car I drive], so we have to have to help each other. Just pay it forward one day.”

Me: “I will! Thank you!”

I returned to my car and added that other $10.00, and the man pulled by to make sure it was on there before he drove off. I returned to the store with tears in my eyes to also thank the attendants, who were grinning back at me. There is caring in the world, and it is okay to accept it and say thank you when it comes your way.

A customer comes in one night.

Customer: “I want $20 on pump ten.”

I make a quick glance outside and see there was a car there, before ringing him up and moving on to the next customer. A moment later I hear the call alarm. This happens when anyone lifts the pump handle, mostly when someone can’t follow instructions and attempts to lift the pump handle before using their card, but also if you lift the pump handle on a pump that you haven’t prepaid on.

Because I don’t feel like making my drawer short, I never assume. It’s one thing if a customer tells me the wrong pump number, and someone else gets their gas, and quite another if I assume the customer gave me the wrong pump number, change the pump, and it turns out I guessed wrong. I just wait for the person to come back in – usually realizing their mistake, and then transfer it over to the pump they tell me.

Oh, but not this guy… no. He storms back in exclaiming angrily:

Customer: “Why can’t I get gas?!”

Me: “Well, are you at pump ten like you told me you were?”

Customer: “I don’t know! I saw the number ten and I thought that’s where I was!”

Me: “Sir, please look outside, and tell me the number on the pole, on the side your vehicle is on.”

There’s a pole behind each pump unit, that has a pair of red metal signs with numbers attached to them. The number to the left corresponds to the side of the pump to the left, and so on.

Customer: *Finally looking.* “Uh… eleven.”

Me: “Okay, are you sure?”

Customer: “Yes!”

Me: *Transfers prepay.* “Okay, you’re all set; have a good one!”

Was I being condescending as his complaint to corporate claimed? Sure, I was. But if you’re going to come back in, acting like your f***-up is my fault, and need that much hand-holding to let me fix it, you kinda deserve it.

When I was in college, I worked evening shifts at a gas station. I typically worked at least four nights a week and would be the only employee on shift at that time because most of the night was too slow to warrant more than one staff member. That being said, there were some rushes, typically at the start of the shift when day-shifters got off work and came in for gas and about three-quarters of the way through my shift when overnight workers were stopping for coffee before heading into work.

As this shift was primarily worked by me, and I was a reliable employee, when we had new employees start who would work my nights off, it was my job to train them.

On one such occasion, after a couple of weeks of training [New Hire], my boss let me know that she wanted to make the transition to the new hire working alone. With this in mind, I was asked to essentially not work for the last evening of training her and to only observe and be available for questions. This allowed [New Hire] to get a feel for what the shift would be like alone while still having me as a safety net, and it let me see if she was really ready to work alone and report back to my boss.

The problem with this was that I really struggled with not jumping in to help. I could appreciate the benefit of just letting her figure it out unless there was a big issue, but in practice, I just wanted to take over because A: I wanted things done right, and B: it was really boring just observing.

Knowing this, my coworker who was on the shift before me and [New Hire] hung around to chat for a while after her shift and encourage me to let [New Hire] handle the initial rush. This is where we met the second problem with this plan: I still had to keep an eye on things, and there are only so many places to do that from, so I was still behind the counter near a second register with a closed sign up.

Customers understandably saw me there and expected me to assist and/or thought I was being a lazy “kid” just talking to my coworker. I tried to politely redirect people, letting them know my register was closed and the other employee would assist. I even said a couple of times that I was just training and there to answer questions as some snide remarks were made.

Finally, one customer decided he was going to make me do my job, I guess. He walked up to the register next to me, pushed the closed sign out of the way, and deposited his items on the counter. He didn’t say a single word but made it clear he was not moving.

Trying to not make a big deal of it, I just quickly checked him out in hopes I could put the sign back and keep directing people to [New Hire], but the damage was done. Most of the line moved over to my side, including people I had already directed to [New Hire].

I understand why people thought I should be running a register, but really, if a register is closed, you don’t get to decide to open it or decide what the employee’s job is at that given time.