Petrol prices

jiblets1

Not sure if I'm posting this in the right place - feel free to move it.

Can someone let me know who, when the strikes/panic over petrol prices starts, starts the panic? It seems to me that the prices have snuck up to the same point which had the whole country was up in arms not so long ago.

I'm most concerned about the price of petrol at the moment, and am praying for the moment when ASDA/Tesco start competing over who has the cheapest prices.

ASDA have even started a "2p off per litre with our ASDA card" offer, which I can only assume is an excuse to raise the price of petrol there. Tesco has long been doing the same thing with their "5p off per litre when you spend £50" offer. This, in my area at least, only brings them in line with their competitors, and doesn't decrease your petrol prices really.

Please let me know when this is going to end....????

Graham_Devon

Well we all seem to be hovernig round the 99.9p mark at the moment. Forecourts know full well that 99.9p is seen as 'ok' whereas 1.00 is not by the consumer. It may be only a 10th of a penny, but psycologically it makes a huge difference.

As soon as crunch time comes and forecourts decide they can't any longer cope on their margins, then 1.01 will be the norm. They will have broken the barrier and thats that. As consumers, we will start getting more and more worried when it reaches 1.10.

However, once it's gone over the magical barrier of 1.00 average, I doubt VERY much whether it will ever come down below it, not much below it anyway. The forecourts would then have to go through the £1 barrier again.

I hope I'm wrong, but the only reason petrol (diesel at least) on average is now 99.9p is because they are too scared to put it over £1, as the consumer will motor on to the next station.

As for it coming down, have you noticed that we always have these surges of say 5-8p rises, but it only ever comes back down 2-4p? I think the strikes last time were started when the price per litre was actually cheaper than it is at the moment. However, protests now, I think (again, someone correct me if I'm wrong) have been made illegal after last time.

I actually enjoyed the protests last time, and was about time the british did something about it.

jiblets1

Graham_Devon wrote:

I actually enjoyed the protests last time, and was about time the british did something about it.

Yeah I agree. I might be wrong, but I'm under the impression that they've tried to raise petrol prices in America and the American public were having none of it.

The government could step in to help with petrol prices, but will not. I'm sure they'd be more willing to if it got them bonus points with the public....

student100

The high price of petrol is basically down to 2 things... the global price of oil and the amount of tax/duty levied on it by the government.

The first is currently high (although has just fallen slightly) and the second is unlikely to decrease. (At least, if it did, you'd end up paying the government some other way).

Also to do with where you live and how much competition there is locally... here in Bristol there are lots of competing forecourts in close proximity all doing relatively good trade so the price is a few pence lower at the cheapest (currently 95.9/96.9p) than it is in other parts of the country. Although ultimately only a very small percentage goes to the forecourt so they don't have too much control over it. (see e.g. http://www.petrolprices.com/price-of-petrol.html)

Not a lot you can do really... buy a more fuel efficient car or drive less being the main too.

Graham_Devon

What a lot of people don't understand though, and something which would be good for them the whole population to understand is that the government do not take a fixed amount, they take a percentage of an ammount. The percentage is roughly 62%.

So, when petrol goes up, the government get a bigger slice. The government could, if it wanted to, freeze the tax, so when it goes up, it goes up according to how much oil has gone up, not the later and then the government take a slice. Everytime petrol goes up, the government get's more as a percentage.

It's also very bizzare in a way that everything you buy, all the money you earn is taxed at a certain rate and that rate is there for you to see. For instance you pay for a computer, the computer cost you £200, but you actually pay £235 because of the £35 tax.

When you get your wages, depending on your tax status you know you get 10, 22 or 40% taken straight from you.

With petrol, there is no mention of this. Wouldn't it be rather pleasing to see on your petrol receipt:

45 litres @ 38p = £17.10
Fuel duty @ 62% = £27.87

Total = £44.97

But no, you never actually see this tax unless you actively search for it!

I'm also unsure, but I think you may pay VAT on fuel too. So say 38p, plus VAT and then 62% on top as fuel duty, so in effect tax on tax. It might be the other way round though, either way, if they do charge VAT, which hopefully someone can answer, its taxing you on tax!

jiblets1

Good lord I didn't realise that tax on petrol was that much. Nor did I realise the government's slice goes up with the prices. That really is a huge liberty.
C'mon people. There must be something that can be done!!!

Graham_Devon

It varies and I don' know why, but the percentages are:

Normal forecourts
Petrol - 63.2
Diesel - 62.4
Super - 63.7

Supermarkets
Petrol - 63.6
Diesel - 62.9
Super - 65.1

I have absolutely no idea why the tax is higher at supermarkets!

Fuel duty has come down, for example, in January 2003:

Normal forecourts
Petrol - 72.5
Diesel - 75
Super - 74

Supermarkets
Petrol - 74.2
Diesel - 75.9
Super - 75

Also, would you believe that just 2 years ago, in September 2004, a litre of petrol on average cost 87.3. A litre of diesel cost just 81p!

Now, 6 years ago in 2000, a litre of petrol was roughly 75p and diesel 77p.

So you can see how much prices have shot up in just 2 years.

nearlyrich

I think this might go better on the Motoring Board so I will move it there;)

dchurch24

It's so very frustrating, as the Govt. has a captive audience - all the time there is no investment in public transport (which I believe should be state controlled), then they have no incentive to either, lower the tax, or make public transport affordable.

What, as consumers can we do?

arnie&caseysma!

We were in Spain in April and we were paying less in Euro Cents then than what we were paying here at the time. The price in my area has gone up 7p per litre since that time - I wonder how much it has changed in Spain.......

The government here should be forced to reduce tax on fuel. It is basically extortion the amount that we pay on top of our road tax. The government is the main benefactor in almost everything we buy now - it wouldn't be so bad if they pumped the taxes into maintaining the roads and using it to try and find new supplies of oil but it seems that the British are always the first to lose out because of the money grabbers sitting down there in London with their five residences and 4 cars that are changed every month.....(and thats just the 'official cars' never mind their own!)

dchurch24

Yes, and it's not just petrol either.

All the little sneaky ones that get pushed through each budget.

In the last budget, virtually any Ltd that dealt with customer information had to register with the DPA. Not a problem. That is until thelast budget, when suddenly there was a charge of £75 each year for doing so.

Then of course there was the 25 year old car being exempt from road tax - oh, no - that one is sewn up too.

Petrol prices are a discrace. I heard, just thisevening on the radio, that if petrol tax was dropped altogether, that the base rate of income tax would have to be 67% to compensate.

No wonder there is no incentive to invest in public transport.

But where is all the money going - over the past 10 years the roads in my area specifically, are worse than they have ever been. There are dirty great pot-holes, and without exagerating, I am having to replace tyres at a far faster rate now that I was 10 years ago when I worked about 50 miles further away.