Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit login

> But if you live near enough to a Costco and own a car, the real killer-app is their gasoline. From this alone my membership

Just clone the magstripe on a friend's Costco card for the gas ;)

What I don't understand is why no gas station other than Costco has hoses that can reach around a vehicle.




> What I don't understand is why no gas station other than Costco has hoses that can reach around a vehicle.

Regular gas stations rarely have a line of people waiting for a pump. Costco often does. Managing that queue becomes much easier if any car in line can take any open gas pump, without worrying about which side the tank door is on (or messing with the flow of traffic by trying to back into a spot).


> Regular gas stations rarely have a line of people waiting for a pump.

I can understand the rareness part, but some gas stations are known for being discounters, but I still haven't seen them use it, despite their traffic jams.


Sort of related: I recently found a way to clone Costco's digital membership card - http://blog.zorinaq.com/reverse-engineering-costco-digital-m...


I guess that doesn’t work for gas though...


No, it only works for everything else: in-store checkout, returns, pharmacies...

For the digital card to work for gas, Costco would have to install QR code scanners on gas pumps.


But then I'd miss out on the 4% back from my Costco Visa for that gasoline. And even _just that 4%_ pays for the membership in my case. :D

(My next-best card in terms of rebate on gas is 1.5%, so assuming an additional 2.5% from Costco, I need to buy $2400 in gas to have the full membership covered by just the gas rebate - not even counting the additional savings from the lower price of gas).


How do you write a magstripe card? I thought you needed an expensive writer to do that?


https://www.amazon.com/DEFTUN-MSR605X-Compatibility-MSR605-M...

I guess it's somewhat expensive if you're buying it for this purpose alone, I'm sure you could find a cheaper used one on ebay.


I'd say that's relatively cheap for a hobby, and much easier to find than I imagined. I thought they were $300-$600 since the last time I saw one it was fully mechanical, at a school, and as far as I could see it was the only one.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: