This happened back in the 90's so I'm sure things have changed a bit since then.
One of the guys I went to high school with worked the swing shift at a gas station in our town. The shift was 11pm-11am. It was a small town so the gas station rarely had any business after midnight. I guess the guy got bored and started reading all the manuals the manager had in his office.
To this day, I'm not even sure how he did it, but he managed to change the price of gas/gallon on two of the four pumps down to 5 cents a gallon. Then he proceeded to call all his friends and family to come fill up for almost nothing. He reverted it back sometime around 5 or 6am. It took the station a few months to figure out what had happened, but by then, we both had graduated and were on to college. I remember running into him at a bar when I was home and he told me the whole story.
When I worked there (before he was working the night shift) I remember there was a box on the floor by the cash register which displayed the price of gas. It had a sizable chunk of cables going in and out of the box, along with some buttons on top near the display. The manager at the time told explicitly not to fuck around with that box, its a federal crime and I will go to jail. I'm guessing the guy figured out how to change the price from that box.
The manager always has power to change the price of gas. At the big chains the manager is required to drive around and note the price of all the other stations and then apply that to some other formula to decide what price to mark. If any station doesn't everyone in town figures out where the low price is and that station runs out of fuel and has to pay for an expensive emergency delivery. This is why stations in the same area all have the same price.
Your story is from the 1990s, just based on the state of technology we can assume that the pump prices were set at a computer inside the station that wasn't networked. The computer probably had a modem that called headquarters once a day to upload information, but the manager directly edited the prices when there was need to change prices.
Note that the manager drives around to look at the posted prices on all stations around. The manager is not allowed to talk to the managers of each station as this would violate federal monopoly laws (this does happen all the time, but legally they cannot do it and that is policy any chain will have - they may or may not ignore a manager ignoring the law depending on if they think they would be caught).
Because the phone company as a log of who called who, and if the feds see that record they will assume illegal collusion. No sane franchise will allow a phone call in their policies as that policy is allowed in court as evidence they are talking to the other station. If you drive and write down prices that is the easiest way to stay legal.
I'm sure gas stations do illegal collusion all the time in some towns. However it is illegal and so at least some station managers will not do it and all company policies will say drive.
One of the guys I went to high school with worked the swing shift at a gas station in our town. The shift was 11pm-11am. It was a small town so the gas station rarely had any business after midnight. I guess the guy got bored and started reading all the manuals the manager had in his office.
To this day, I'm not even sure how he did it, but he managed to change the price of gas/gallon on two of the four pumps down to 5 cents a gallon. Then he proceeded to call all his friends and family to come fill up for almost nothing. He reverted it back sometime around 5 or 6am. It took the station a few months to figure out what had happened, but by then, we both had graduated and were on to college. I remember running into him at a bar when I was home and he told me the whole story.
When I worked there (before he was working the night shift) I remember there was a box on the floor by the cash register which displayed the price of gas. It had a sizable chunk of cables going in and out of the box, along with some buttons on top near the display. The manager at the time told explicitly not to fuck around with that box, its a federal crime and I will go to jail. I'm guessing the guy figured out how to change the price from that box.
To this day, I still have no idea how he did it.