Yikes, you mean that this type of incident occurred at more than one airfield on the same day
Your description matched so closely to the event I witnessed that I assumed we were talking about the same location. Sorry to "muddy the waters".
I must confess that its was only after getting my PPL and gaining wider experience of A\G/AFIS/ATC that the true distinction between them became clear (having trained at a weekday A\G, weekend AFIS field). My experience on Sunday suggested that the presence of the FISO, and the many and varied interpretations of what a FISO can/can't do by the pilots, added to the general confusion and it was only after the AFIS service terminated and the field switched to unmonitored A\G that the pilots "sorted" themselves out.