French petrol stations...the plain facts please

[Ash]

Why limit that to a foreign country? You’re a bit of a fool if you leave anything valuable in easy reach in this country…

I’ve traveled through France and other countries a fair few times over many years, agree with the automatic petrol pump thing, though I have a vague suspicion that there is a way to resolve that… might be worth talking to your bank manager see if they can shed any light.

Only problem I had was years ago visiting family in Southern Switzerland, you need to be aware that not all the border gates are open 24x7, I picked the wrong gate and faced a 100-150 mile detour or sleeping rough until morning… didn’t have the fuel to detour so sleep rough and froze my ass off.

border gates ? this is modern europe ive not seen one closed for a few years.
my statement about be carefull was aimed at novice tourer's.us old age traveller's know the risks.in spain on the 06/01/07 a guy and his wife lost a lot of money and p/ports near bilbao because

they forgot they were abroad. poor fecker's.you can get singled out speaking english and having all the gear on.it was just making new travellers aware.there are a lot of misplaced [poor] people around now.10 years ago it was much different.

 

[LiquidLAN]

mmmm... I stand corrected on some of what I've said...

Just got back from a trip to Magny Cours at the weekend and I've now worked out that you can only really refuel at a maned petrol station - not an issue on the GSA but a mate traveling on a Duc Monster nearly came unstuck a couple of times...

I've done some digging around and there seem to be two types of machines in France - the majority only accept carte bleu, this is a credit card system only available to French residences. We did find a machine just south of Paris that accepted UK cards, but not all of them.

Anyway, back to carte bleu... it doesnt look like there is a way to get one unless you've got a French address or you can prove you travel to France a lot... but has anyone seen if you can get "pre-paided" carte bleu? I've found references that a scheme has been started and you can top up the cards on the internet...

maybe its a solution to this particular problem???

 

[Ash]

:
dumb or what.
there i was sitting on my hotel bed in saint lary [France][stunning place] on what i thought was Friday 26/09/08 when i flick on french teletext by mistake and realised it was sat 27/09/08 F**K F**K
we had lost a day somewhere, so what we thought would be a nice day playing turned out to be a 390 km dash/ride to bilbao,we were both half full of fuel so it wasn't upper most in our minds [we will get some on route] yeah rite Sunday in France remember.
no fuel in tarbes, pau, along the N117, luckily a nice French couple let us pay for 5 E's at a supermarket when we got to a big city Bayonne we searched high and low, in the end i re routed zumo to take us along the toll road and found fuel shortly after.
lesson 1 - make sure you have fuel [plenty]
lesson 2 - keep your eye on the days
lesson 3 - use French toll roads for fuel on sunday's
Dumb as a box of frogs and thick as you know what me.

 

[Sharik]

I was somewhat surprised last week to find my recently issued Post Office credit card worked in an unmanned pump in a French supermarket petrol station. Therefore systems may be changing in that UK issued credit cards will eventually operate within French petrol outlets. Hardly a scientific study, it was a one off, I needed fuel with no cashier available so I gave it a try.

 

[Springer]

Cookie and I found a card only station on the infamous Run to Verdun trip and only last week I was using card only pumps at the bigger petrol stations I think things may prehaps be changing for the better.

 

[Ash]

I was somewhat surprised last week to find my recently issued Post Office credit card worked in an unmanned pump in a French supermarket petrol station. Therefore systems may be changing in that UK issued credit cards will eventually operate within French petrol outlets. Hardly a scientific study, it was a one off, I needed fuel with no cashier available so I gave it a try.

i got one of them, no good when i tried nor was nationwide,egg,abbey or capital one cards, lets hope more are changing

 

[cookie]

Cookie and I found a card only station on the infamous Run to Verdun trip and only last week I was using card only pumps at the bigger petrol stations I think things may prehaps be changing for the better.

and i went to bergerac and back a few weeks back and all the pumps i tried took my visa card

 

[Humbug]

I've just returned from 3 weeks in France, Switzerland, Italy and Spain and every fuel station accepted my Mastercard. They even had instructions in English!

 

[swissrob]

never had problems using a uk or swiss credit card in the fuel pumps - wont accept debit/electron/maestro type cards tho.

 

[MMC]

The gaul of it made me laugh!

Fixed it for you.

 

[foolonastrom]

In my past 3 trips to France (Bike, Le-havre-Le mans, Bike Le-Havre to Pyrennese and back) (Car, Calais - Alps and Back), must have filled up about 12 - 15 times, mainly used automatic pumps in supermarkets as they are a good 10ero cents cheaper per litre. only ONCE did I find a pump which wouldn't accept my UK credit/debit card.

Anyone who tells you different is just wrong (sorry all you moderators!).

 

[bowser]

just to put this in perspective, this is not a French problem it is a European one, I was in Holland last weekend and most of their 24hr pump stations do not take UK credit card, but then they one take French ones either, it is starting to change but be aware if you are in the sticks anywhere in Europe a lot of the machines will only take local cards.
All of the manned stations took UK cards its only the unmanned 24 hour pumps.

 

[LiquidLAN]

In my past 3 trips to France (Bike, Le-havre-Le mans, Bike Le-Havre to Pyrennese and back) (Car, Calais - Alps and Back), must have filled up about 12 - 15 times, mainly used automatic pumps in supermarkets as they are a good 10ero cents cheaper per litre. only ONCE did I find a pump which wouldn't accept my UK credit/debit card.

Anyone who tells you different is just wrong (sorry all you moderators!).

sorry, but what a dumb thing to say... and moving on...

ok there's obviously something happening out there then, because when we tried the main type of machine we saw out there of four of us trying severing different cards each, none worked. Like I say we did find one machine outside Paris that accepted UK cards, but it was a different type to all the others we saw.

ok so guys... of all those of you that didnt have a problem filling up at automated machine - whats different about your cards?

are they newly issued?
anything special about them?

the cards I tried where
Goldfish Mastercard issued early this year
and a
Lloyds Visa Debt/Delt Card issued early last year

both chip and pin

from the hunting around I did earlier I thought it was something to do with carte bleu - maybe not... but it would be great to understand what the problem is, it'll be easier than talking all my mates into buying GSA and I dont think I can fit a GSA tank on a Duc Monster even if the owner let me

 

[Ash]

In my past 3 trips to France (Bike, Le-havre-Le mans, Bike Le-Havre to Pyrennese and back) (Car, Calais - Alps and Back), must have filled up about 12 - 15 times, mainly used automatic pumps in supermarkets as they are a good 10ero cents cheaper per litre. only ONCE did I find a pump which wouldn't accept my UK credit/debit card.

Anyone who tells you different is just wrong (sorry all you moderators!).

so i imagined it then !!!!!!!!!!!! i think not

 

[Dansin]

I think some of the automated petrol pumps have/are being updated to accept a wider variety of cards.

In September 07 we overnighted in Bourges and then couldn't use any of our UK cards at at an automated pump on the Sunday. This September we went to the same petrol station (on a Sunday) and the machine accepted our UK Maestro cards.

 

[Daffy]

one word of warning dont leave items on your bike unatended.just think what your doing.your not in your local your in a forign land riding a bmw with ie sat nav,nice gear,GB sticker on back and you speak funny.
LOCK IT OR LOSE IT.

I would go with the above, I have never had anything touched when abroad in Germany, Italy, Spain, Gib, Morocco except by the robbin, Gauloise smokin, garlic eatin, smelly french feckers so lock it or lose it is sound advice.

Preferably go with the advice to avoid france all together.

 

[PETELU]

PETROL FRANCE

Hmmm, a recent trip through france we (3 of us ) tried the credit card trick at unmanned stations ye no luck,maybe carry a can of fuel who knows !!

 

[madman]

I would go with the above, I have never had anything touched when abroad in Germany, Italy, Spain, Gib, Morocco except by the robbin, Gauloise smokin, garlic eatin, smelly french feckers so lock it or lose it is sound advice.

Preferably go with the advice to avoid france all together.

Please do avoid France as we don't want narrow minded fools who think that every foreigner is a thief coming over here!
I have never had my bike touched here in France which is more than can be said of the times that things have been messed with when I lived in the UK. Having said that I would not class every citizen of the UK as a warm beer swilling, overweight thief.

 

[(RIP) Shenzi]

I've done some digging around and there seem to be two types of machines in France - the majority only accept carte bleu, this is a credit card system only available to French residences. We did find a machine just south of Paris that accepted UK cards, but not all of them.

This isn't correct I'm afraid. The problem is a technical one. I'm 99% sure that 'Chip and pin' technology was developed in France and they were certainly one of the first to use it nationally being already widespread at the beginning of the 90s. I don't know the present situation but in the 90s France were the leaders in card technology. When UK introduced the system, maybe 15 years after France, improvements had been made to it which made the modern UK cards incompatible with the older French machines. Now the new machines in France are compatible with both technologies and the older machines will be replaced but it takes time and money and there isn't a real incentive to do so.

 

[(RIP) Shenzi]

Having said that I would not class every citizen of the UK as a warm beer swilling, overweight thief.

Nor should you, some are thin and swill cold beer