Some folks in Michigan found a unique way to get around the high price of fuel.

Several customers of the Meijer chain of gas stations discovered that if they put their driver’s licenses – which have a magnetic strip much like a credit card – into the pay-at-the-pump machine, it would dispense the gas just as if it had read a credit card, media outlets reported.

More than 100 people tried out the free gas scheme, some filling up as many as 15 times.

"It probably started with a small group, and then word spread out," Pittsfield Detective Lt. Steve Heller told The Ann Arbor News. "It ended up being thousands of dollars."

However, they won’t get off scot-free. The magnetic strips did contain the offenders’ driver’s license numbers, which the pumps recorded. Police say they are using the numbers to track down the gas thieves.

"No matter how this started, whether it was a prank or something else, a crime is a crime," John Zimmerman, a Meijer spokesman, said to KATU TV.