An infusion pump for (50) transferring fluid through tubing (66) of an administration set (64) connected to the pump, where the pump includes a housing (52) and a pumping mechanism (62) mounted to the housing. The pumping mechanism includes a plurality of pumping fingers (80), a motor (96) for sequentially, reciprocally moving the plurality of pumping fingers, and an occlusion sensor (90) configured to detect reverse loading of the tubing to the pumping mechanism. In operation, the occlusion sensor causes at least one of a triggering of an alarm (61) and prevention of the operation of the pumping mechanism (62) when the sensor detects that the administration set tubing is reverse loaded to the pumping mechanism.