Last Thursday saw the first signs of the current petrol price hike. Over a few days only a small number of petrol stations increased their prices so I felt it best not to make the announcement at that point in time as the price increase was happening slowly. Letting people know too early means they can jump the gun and get petrol too early in the price hike part of the cycle.
The petrol price hike is now well under way and the price is hiking to around 165.9 for unleaded petrol.
In the last couple of months we've seen the petrol price hike increase prices by over 35 cents per litre above the gate price (think average wholesale) which is currently 129.0. For the last couple of years the price hike has been between 25-30 cents so we're now consistently seeing higher margins on petrol which is a concern, but not much we can do about it. Except of course, avoid the high prices as best you can.
We can expect the current price hike will result in most of the service stations increasing their prices by late this week, to early next week.
My tank is literally on empty so I've timed this top up well. For those using the 7 Eleven Fuel App keep an eye on the 7 Eleven Fuel prices and lock in a price in a few days time. Remember you can be driving around Melbourne, using public transport, or even be interstate (I once locked in a price in Sydney whilst sitting on the aeroplane) and if there's a cheaper price, you can lock that in and top up, up to seven days later. It's a good way to give you that extra boost on a lower petrol price and take you closer to when prices have dropped considerably.
For example petrol prices drop from the highest to the lowest over about a month. Sometimes shorter, sometimes longer. Let's say you fill up weekly. If you fill up just as the price has nearly peaked at a low priced petrol station, that's the first week of petrol. Using the 7 Eleven Fuel app to get the cheaper price one week later, that takes you to the end of the second week. At this point the petrol will have dropped by around half the price hike, or between 10-20 cents per litre. For a 50 litre tank that means you're saving around 35 cents per litre in the first week, around 25 cents in the second week giving a saving of around $30 which adds up to around $390 a year (13 x 4 weeks). Then shop around in the third week as there can be quite a difference as prices have spread out and you're likely to save around 10 cents a litre saving another $65 a year. Then you're ready to fill up again when the price is low. A possible saving of $400-$500 a year per car just by knowing when petrol prices are hiking.
Kelvin Eldridge
www.PetrolPricesMelbourne.com.au
UPDATE: 27/08/2019
I thought I'd point out a couple of interesting things that's happening with the current petrol price hike.
The first is how incredibly slow the price hike is occurring. It's around a week and a half since the first petrol stations started to hike their prices. Why I can't be sure, but perhaps it's because the Victorian school holidays are around three and a half weeks away and hiking the price too early means prices are going down when people fill up for holidays.
The second observation is whilst some petrol stations are hiking to 165.9, since there's been a delay, some are now hiking to 155.9. That means there's already a 10 cents per litre price difference in the market. As of today there's still around 20 per cent of petrol stations selling at the old low price so there's still time to fill up at the lower price. There's also a few 7 Eleven petrol stations offering the lower price that you can still lock in, but they are spread out.
It will be interesting to see what happens as we approach the school holidays.
