Petrol Price Fluctuations

Now as petrol gets more and more expensive, its really key to pour petrol on the right day of the week to maximise savings. In the past, petrol was cheapest on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. By the time Friday rolled around, prices had gone up in anticipation of people pouring petrol for trips on the weekend. Petrol prices on the weekends were even higher, cashing in on petrol about to travel.

Despite claims by petrol stations that they charge whatever the suppliers charge, there is a clear trend that they increase prices during certain days of the week to earn as much as they can. In fact, some days the prices vary from morning to afternoon. Usually its cheaper in the morning, so as you drive past a station you see the price is low. You then decide that since you are late for work, you will pour after work. Then as you drive in after work, you discover that the price has already gone up and curse yourself for not pouring in the morning. However, since you are low on petrol, you pour a few dollars worth anyway.

Lately, I've noticed that petrol prices are cheapest on a Tuesday. Its also cheaper on a weekend too, I guess to encourage business since everyone is taking less trips on weekends now. This means that on a Tuesday, such as today, there are massive queues to pour petrol. Today when I was driving home from work, there was a long queue so I thought I would pour petrol later in the night. I just came back from the petrol station and even at 9:30pm, it was still very packed. Even with my shop-a-docket 4 cent discount per litre, the price was still over a $1. Its getting so expensive to fill up a whole tank now, even with a small car. I remember when I first started driving that a whole tank would cost me less than $20, now its more like just under $50. And I haven't been driving for that long, so petrol prices have soared pretty quickly.

Just a few weeks ago, I was at the petrol station and a small incident just reminded me how expensive petrol is. I thought I had put $20 of petrol into the tank, right down to the last cent. When I went to pay, the cashier said $23. I said that I had only poured $20. He said that I had poured 20 litres and must have misread the meter. It turned out that I did pour 20 litres. Someone else in the queue joked that in the past, if I had misread the meter, the amount of litres poured was always more than the cost, so you always had enough money to cover the fee. However, that has changed nowadays with petrol over a dollar per litre.

Soon it may not be economical to drive a car anymore. Until then, I just have to drive around less and pour my petrol on a Tuesday and crowd with others just to get the best price.