Dodgy fuel selling..BBC report

Parisien

This has been highlighted over the last two nights, they reckon 1/3 of fuel sales are affected, doubtless all driven by people unwilling to pay full whack for fuel in NI.

Nevertheless, if this is so widespread, have both the Trading Standards office, Customs and Excise , been complicit and negligent to the public in failing to stamp out, prosecute and jail said fraudsters?

If the proverbial "ulster" dog in the street knows whose responsible, why can't they be named and shamed?

Should/can they be named on here?

BigAl94

There's one between Belfast and bangor (not the A2) that I wouldn't use. On high ground.

ballyblack

Should/can they be named on here?

No. Unless you take a sample and have it tested. Its up to Trading Standards to do this!

Parisien

ballyblack wrote: »

Trading Standards to do this!

It appears, as they have allowed this to become endemic, they are as guilty as the purveyors of same in letting the public down..........why am I paying them to get messed up?

They should be proactive in stopping all this.........and you don't need a license or permit to sell petrol...ludicrous in 2007!!!

Get you finger out TS !!!!

ooo000ooo

I missed this bit last night, anyone know if there's anywhere on the web i can watch it?

nellis10

BigAl94 wrote: »

There's one between Belfast and bangor (not the A2) that I wouldn't use. On high ground.

Took a while for me to work that one out...but I think I know the one you mean...don't accept credit cards or cheques

peterbaker

I missed the report, but the headline of the thread caught my eye as I have become very cynical about practices within the whole fuel retail industry.

One particular aspect which irks me is the fact that we still buy liquid fuel energy by volume measurement i.e. in litres and not by the energy value it contains. I believe that alone creates huge opportunity for very large scale corruption and cartel behaviour.

I am a regular Shell customer. That's because if you seek them out in the right places, their prices have been some of the lowest in the country for the last three years (using pence per litre). I use diesel.

Shell have messed with the heads of their customers on products and pricing almost as badly as mobile phone companies. In the last six months especially, you could not predict from one week to the next whether you local Shell station would be selling Shell Diesel or Shell Diesel Extra or Shell Low Sulphur Diesel, or if the HGV diesel pump dispensed a different diesel to the normal pumps, and no-one seemed to know the difference if you asked. Many times I have seen big "Shell Diesel Extra" posters on a Shell forecourt when the only diesel they are selling that week is actually Shell Diesel.

I am one of those people who tends to notice differences in performance (power and economy) yet I never managed to work out the differences between those labels at Shell. However, I have often noticed sluggishness or improvement after filling up which has been inconsistent with moving from Diesel to Diesel Extra or vice versa.

Now we have Shell V-Power Diesel, and it is around 5% or more expensive than Shell Diesel or Shell Extra Diesel.

At the moment I can tell you that having now tried it three times in two different types of vehicle (one that majors on economy, and another that requires a lot of power) that there IS a noticeable difference between V-Power and the rest.

Fair enough, you might say, but for how long will there be a noticeable difference? And for how long will Shell's "lesser diesels" remain available?

I believe that Shell are just messing around with calorific value (energy value) of their fuels as just another way to ratchet up pricing. I say every pump should tell us the calorific value of the fuel it dispenses.

Something else which baffles me right now is why there is suddenly no price differential between normal diesel and petrol after it has been generally (artificially?) held at around 3p per litre for perhaps a year or 18 months? For years previous to that of course, there was a differential the other way round!

Having just returned from France, I am astounded to have found that the diesel price on the continent is still around 25% cheaper than petrol and is around 75p per litre - less in some places. A straw poll suggested that most vehicles in France seem to be diesel now yet the fuel companies have not got away with increasing prices to reflect increased demand for diesel. So why did that happen in the UK?

My apologies for spewing all this into a thread which might be discussing other aspects entirely, but I thought this might be the best place to air my concerns....

ooo000ooo

peterbaker wrote: »

the fuel companies have not got away with increasing prices to reflect increased demand for diesel. So why did that happen in the UK?

My apologies for spewing all this into a thread which might be discussing other aspects entirely, but I thought this might be the best place to air my concerns....

Diesel is the same price as petrol now because the government increased the fuel duty on diesel a few years back. IIRC when we all went unleaded petrol only, diesel was seen as the new big bad polluter and the tax was increased to save the whales

Mr_Cresote

ballyblack wrote: »

No. Unless you take a sample and have it tested. Its up to Trading Standards to do this!

They already have...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6272217.stm

"The owner of a County Down filling station has been fined £2,000 and ordered to pay compensation of £3,500. Gavin Joseph Vallely of Craigantlet Filling Station, Ballymiscaw Road, Holywood, was charged with two offences under the Clean Air Act.
He was found guilty of selling diesel with a high sulphur content in October 2005.
The case, brought by the Trading Standards Service, is the first of its kind in Northern Ireland."

Paddymcc_2

Anything that gets me cheaper fuel im all for.

The price we pay for fuel is rediculous. You wouldnt even mind that the tax we are paying on our fuel along with our car tax was pumped back into the infrastructure but its most likely paying for some dole scrounger sitting on their !!!! all day.

motorguy

Paddymcc wrote: »

Anything that gets me cheaper fuel im all for.

Even if it means damaging your engine to save a few pence now?