Petrol Price Debate...

[tony_hetherington]

Just seen on another board I use frequently this post.....

--------------------------------------------------------------------

We are going to hit close to 89p a litre by the summer

Want petrol prices to come down?

We need to take some intelligent, united action, Philip Hollsworth offered this good idea:

This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the "don't buy petrol on a certain day" campaign that was going around last April or May!

The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn't continue to "hurt ourselves by refusing to buy petrol. It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for

them BUT, whoever thought of this idea, has come up with a plan that can really work. Please read it and join in!

Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a litre is CHEAP at 77p

-80p, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control the marketplace not sellers. With the price of petrol going up more each day, we consumers need to take action. The only way we are going to see the price of petrol come

down is if we hit someone in the pocket by not purchasing their Petrol! and we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves.

Here's the idea:

For the rest of this year, DON'T purchase ANY petrol from the two biggest oil companies (which now are one), ESSO and BP.

If they are not selling any petrol, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit. But to have an impact, we need to reach literally millions of Esso and BP petrol buyers. It's really simple to do!! Now, don't whimp out on me at this point...keep reading and I'll explain how simple it is to reach millions of people!!

I am sending this note to a; lot of people. If each of you send it to at least ten more (30 x 10 = 300)... and those 300 send it to at least ten more (300 x 10 = 3,000) ... and so on, by the time the

message reaches the sixth generation of people, we will have reached over THREE MILLION consumers!

If those three million get excited and pass this on to ten friends each, then 30 million people will have been contacted! If it goes one level further, you guessed it... .. THREE HUNDRED MILLION PEOPLE!!!

Again, all You have to do is send this to 10 people. That's all.(and not buy at ESSO/BP)

How long would all that take? If each of us sends this email out to ten more people within one day of receipt, all 300 MILLION people could conceivably be contacted within the next 8

days!!! I'll bet you didn't think you and I had that much potential, did you!

Acting together we can make a difference. If this makes sense to you, please pass this message on

PLEASE HOLD OUT UNTIL THEY LOWER THEIR PRICES TO THE 69p a LITRE RANGE

Action:

It's easy to make this happen. Just forward this email, and buy your petrol at Shell, Tesco, Sainsburys, Jet etc.

Boycott BP and Esso.

---------------------------------------------------------

Now......it caused a big (but I still think healthy) debate on the RS owners board.

My personal opinion - consumer power CAN still exist, it just isn't necessarily utilised with cases such as petrol. The blockades of 2yrs ago may have only been actioned by <100 people, but had MASSIVE country wide support, even though it meant people had no petrol.

Prices are set to rise, and with no DECENT public transport system to fall back on (which is of course the governments aim in raising petrol prices) I think that protests such as this would be healthy.

One thing's for certain......it can't continue in the way it is going!

..........discuss..........

[Matthew_McNally]

hmmm

this pops up every year.

That said - I do not think it is a bad idea, and I am all for consumers exercising the powers they have.

So - I'll boycott Esso and BP - no problem

Anyone else game?

PS - no-one tell them I only ever use optimax.

[torrent]

While I don't disagree with the consumer action being discussed I do believe it's irresponsible to condone mass, unsolicited emailing. Not to mention that it will almost certainly contravene your ISP's T&C's and cause network congestion (if it reached the limits discussed above).

I think you can boycott BP/Esso and it will receive media attention anyway, which will have the desired affect of communicating the message onwards.

Shell it is then :)

[Matthew_McNally]

sorry - was agreeing with the boycott - not condoning the spamming element

[Zee007]

Agree - not sure if it will work, but for me not to use BP or Esso isn't a problem as I always use Shell.... I'm in! :D

[Veece]

Matt,

Do you see any performance gains using optimax ?

I had been using it for the past year to run my M3, as this needed a minimum of 98Ron fuel.

I was just wondering if I should go back to it - I have just been using Safeway unleaded since my defection from the darkside on Sunday.

cheers

Paul

[tony_hetherington]

Yup.....on many of the Owner's Club's boards the majority use Shell anyway.

It's a good point about the spamming element. Spamming I am truly against (*** knows I get loads of rubbish each and every day, be it to my work e-mail or my personal one)......HOWEVER.....I think the route they were going for wasn't so much spamming, but more "send it to your friends, who will send it to theirs etc. etc.". We all receive "Fwd's" each day - funny things which your friends like to send you, and I think they want it to reach the masses that way.

[Matthew_McNally]

Matt,

Do you see any performance gains using optimax ?

Paul

this is completely anecdotal mate - I have no hard evidence - ok? :D

A couple of times I have had to fill up on the motorway - and so have had to use whatever was for sale @ the next service station.

When I fill up with other fuel - I cannot tell a difference between normal (eg BP) unleaded and Optimax.

But - when that runs out, and I fill up with Optimax - I think there is a discernable difference - the car seems more eager, and quieter.

BTW - I never use supermarket fuel - it cheap for a reason (and not because they buy large quatities either - do you think Safeway buy more petrol than Shell?)

[torrent]

Appreciate the "friends" element but I am afraid that sending an email which itself requests you to send to another "10 friends", and-so-on and-so-on is actually construed as spamming and is nearly always prohibited in ISP's T&C's.

I like the idea, don't know if it will work, but it's worth a bash anyway. I am sure the message will get out even without the emailing element (posts like this on forums are a good way for a start).

[altezzaz]

I love this one 'cos BP and Exxon are not the same company. I boycott Esso (the UK arm of Exxon) as they don't put enough solvents in the petrol and the car runs lumpily on their fuel. If I have to boycott BP as well there's only Texaco left in my town who do decent petrol...

[torrent]

BTW - I never use supermarket fuel - it cheap for a reason (and not because they buy large quatities either - do you think Safeway buy more petrol than Shell?)

That's interesting. Is it of a lower grade than what is supplied to the blue chip fuel stations?

Where do the superstores get their fuel from?

I thought it was cheaper as they don't make the same margin on the fuel. They don't need to as it's not their only source of revenue. To be honest they benefit from increased turnover, even if they don't make a lot of margin, it still makes their business look strong and healthy.

Interested to hear what you know on this one as all my thoughts are purely speculative.

[Veece]

Good point Matt,

Safeway just happens to be over the road from me, so it was more ease of use than cheapness. (honest)

I think I might give my new baby a tank of the Amber Nectar and see what I think.

cheers

Paul

[Matthew_McNally]

That's interesting. Is it of a lower grade than what is supplied to the blue chip fuel stations?

Don't think its necessarily the quality of the fuel - more a case of the quality of the additives to the fuel - detergents etc.

[torrent]

Ah, okay.

[Kavey]

Agree - not sure if it will work, but for me not to use BP or Esso isn't a problem as I always use Shell.... I'm in! :D

A sensible choice dude, like me. Shell Optimax is by far the petrol of choice for me - the number of times I've been SWEATING on an orange light trying to find a Shell station, passing all others cannot be doing my heart any good!

KV

[Matthew_McNally]

A sensible choice dude, like me. Shell Optimax is by far the petrol of choice for me - the number of times I've been SWEATING on an orange light trying to find a Shell station, passing all others cannot be doing my heart any good!

KV

Just one more benefit in the Lexus sat nav unit.

Just chose POI (points of interest) - Local POI - lists all the petrol stations*, the distance etc - then gives you directions there!

*as long as you have petrol stations as one of you POI selections

[Kavey]

A sensible choice dude, like me. Shell Optimax is by far the petrol of choice for me - the number of times I've been SWEATING on an orange light trying to find a Shell station, passing all others cannot be doing my heart any good!  

KV

Just one more benefit in the Lexus sat nav unit.

Just chose POI (points of interest) - Local POI - lists all the petrol stations*, the distance etc - then gives you directions there!

*as long as you have petrol stations as one of you POI selections

Good point - though obviously the Tokyo Sat/Nav for my import car wouldn't have helped too much :P

I have toyed with UK SatNav, but the £2500 it costs (is that right) has been much better spent on induction, F-Con and a flywheel :D

KV

[UKPulse]

Interestingly, when you go to a BP garage, you could well be buying Shell petrol, and so on. The oil companies have Exchange Agreements, (quote)...

"The agreements form part of each companies attempts to maximise its geographic coverage of the market, while minimising transport and refinery costs". (The Petrol Industry)

...still, I'm all in favour of boycotting to see if it has any effect :)

[Matthew_McNally]

Good point - though obviously the Tokyo Sat/Nav for my import car wouldn't have helped too much :P

true.

especially if you already have an orange light.

that ain't going to get to Tokyo mate!

:D :D :D