Sector deep dive
Fuel stations and forecourt payment
Forecourts already recognise vehicles. Pay-by-plate trials, fuel cards and loyalty schemes all lean on the number plate, but the plate cannot say who is holding the nozzle, whether they are entitled to the account, or whether anyone intends to pay. Trust App's patented method could close that gap.
How forecourt payment works today
Most forecourt transactions still end at the kiosk or at a card terminal on the pump. Around that core sit several vehicle-centred layers: pay-by-plate trials that recognise a registered vehicle and charge a stored card, fuel cards issued to fleets and presented at the till, and loyalty schemes that identify a card or an app rather than the person actually fuelling. Drive-off prevention relies on ANPR watchlists, pre-authorisation and staff vigilance.
Each layer treats the vehicle, or a piece of plastic, as a stand-in for the person. That substitution is where the familiar problems begin.
Where the plate-only model hurts
A plate read is not an authorisation
Recognising a vehicle on the forecourt says nothing about whether anyone has agreed to pay. Drive-off losses are the clearest symptom: fuel is dispensed on the strength of a plate, and recovering the money afterwards is slow, uncertain and often uneconomic.
Fuel cards are shared and misused
A fleet fuel card belongs to a company, not a driver. Cards are lent, borrowed and sometimes abused, and the issuer and the fleet manager can rarely prove which individual fuelled which vehicle on a given transaction.
Loyalty is disconnected from the pump
Loyalty schemes reward whoever presents the card or app at the till, which may not be the person who chose the forecourt or paid for the fuel. The retailer learns about a token, not a customer, and personalised offers land in the wrong hands.
Disputed transactions are hard to evidence
When a cardholder disputes a fuelling transaction, or a fleet queries a fuel card charge, the evidence is usually a camera image of a vehicle and a till record. Neither shows who was present, so disputes drag on and are often written off.
What matters in this sector
For a fuel retailer or forecourt technology provider, the question is not the technology itself. It is what the forecourt has to achieve, what gets in the way, and what could improve.
What you need to achieve
Dispense fuel quickly and safely, take payment reliably, keep drive-off losses down, serve fleets on account, and turn occasional visitors into loyal customers.
What gets in the way
Drive-off losses and the cost of chasing them, fuel card misuse that is hard to detect, loyalty data that describes tokens rather than people, and transaction disputes that rest on weak evidence.
What could improve
Fuelling authorised before the nozzle lifts, fleet transactions attributed to a verified driver and vehicle, loyalty and offers matched to the individual present, and firmer evidence when a transaction is challenged.
How the patented method could apply
- Authorisation before or during fuelling. A registered customer's vehicle and device verified together at the pump could authorise fuelling against a known account, so fuel is dispensed to someone the retailer can identify and charge, rather than on the strength of a plate alone.
- Account-based payment to the person present. The charge could go to the account of the individual verified at the pump, removing the walk to the kiosk and reducing the opportunity for a transaction to end without payment.
- Fleet fuelling verified to driver and vehicle. A fleet transaction could require the right combination: an authorised driver's device present in the authorised vehicle. Misuse of shared fuel cards becomes visible instead of invisible.
- Loyalty matched to the individual. Recognition of the person present, not just the vehicle, could let loyalty, pricing and offers follow the customer across vehicles, and give the retailer a truthful picture of who actually visits.
Each of these would be built by or with a partner into the forecourt's existing payment and loyalty systems. None of them exists as a Trust product today, and the precise design would depend on the retailer, its estate and its suppliers.
Who we would like to speak to
Conversations in this sector are likely to be most productive with:
- fuel retailers, from major networks to independent forecourt groups;
- forecourt technology providers supplying pumps, tills and site systems;
- fleet-card issuers and fuel card programme operators;
- payment providers serving fuel retail.
This page describes potential applications of a patented method. It does not describe an existing product or a live deployment, and commercial arrangements would be subject to discussion and legal agreement.