A part-time cleaner says she has been banished from a petrol station after claiming she was charged for phantom fuel she hadn’t pumped.

Nicky Watson has used the same Esso station at Tesco Express on London Road, Larkfield, for a quarter of a century.

The 44-year-old, from Aylesford, said the counter jumps to anywhere between 9p and 34p before she even begins filling up her car.

She said: “I was watching a video on Youtube and it was about a guy saying he was being ripped off by a petrol station.

“He put the pump into the tank and gave it 20 or 30 seconds without filling the car up and 34p suddenly popped up.

“I thought ‘surely they don’t do that in this petrol station’. Eight out of 10 times it has resulted in discrepancies.”

Miss Watson noticed the same thing then happened to her and asked staff at the Tesco chain to watch the fuelling process in a bid to prove her point.

Staff have now asked Miss Watson to frequent a different station for refuelling after growing tired of her complaints over the “discrepancies”.

Miss Watson, of Forstal Cottages, said: “I told them about it and they haven’t done anything and I asked one of them to come out and see it happening.

“They have had enough of me in there. I have spoken to Tesco and I got a generic letter and I am waiting for Esso to get back to me.

“You just don’t know if something in that machine isn’t adding money to your bill. I like to collect my clubcard points but now I have to go to another petrol station.

“I wouldn’t mind but I have used that garage for 25 years and been spending anywhere from £20 to £48 each time.”

A spokesman for ExxonMobil said: “All pumps on sites are calibrated annually to ensure they dispense correctly and are subject to checks at any time by Trading Standards and Her Majesty’s Customs and Excise.

“The station manager at Larkfield Express has tested all the pumps on site personally, and has been unable to reproduce the concern raised by the customer – no charge is made until the trigger on the pump nozzle is depressed and fuel is released into the hose.

“The site serves hundreds of motorists every day and we have received no other complaints of any kind about the pumps.”

The story comes days after KentOnline investigated Facebook claims that a Herne Bay garage was short-changing customers.