Just curious about fuel pump prices

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Azzura

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Topic # 154454 28-Oct-2014 19:04

Being still relatively new in NZ.

How far does the price of a barrel have to drop before we start seeing prices drop at the pump?

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Reply # 1163882 28-Oct-2014 19:14

Depends on the exchange rate.

Inphinity

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Reply # 1163887 28-Oct-2014 19:16

Sometimes it has to stay down for a while, as the fuel companies tend to use the "Well, it was more than that when we bought the fuel that's currently at the pump" line - of course, it'll go up straight away when it goes up.

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Reply # 1163888 28-Oct-2014 19:17

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The price goes up immediately if crude gets more expensive.
The price goes down very, very slowly if crude gets cheaper.
The profits go overseas.

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sbiddle

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Reply # 1163897 28-Oct-2014 19:27

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Sideface:
The profits go overseas.

That depends what you define as "profits" and what you define as "overseas"

If you buy it from a service station then that's privately owned then some of that profit stays in the local economy.

If you buy it from a Z (NZ based but dual NZX/ASX listed company) then 40% of those profits go to Infratil (a NZ based but dual NZX/ASX listed company) and the NZ Super fund. Any other profits are returned to shareholders, the vast majority of whom are based in NZ and Australia. The biggest chunk of any dividends remains in NZ.

If you want to see when fuel is likely to drop or rise look at the MBIE fuel watch website which shows importer margins.

allstarnz

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Reply # 1163925 28-Oct-2014 20:05

here is the report that sbiddle refers to http://www.med.govt.nz/sectors-industries/energy/liquid-fuel-market/weekly-oil-price-monitoring/Graphs.pdf

Some interesting things I note in there. The importer margin on fuel is really high right now, suggesting we are actually paying too much for petrol right now. Also, we pay the second highest price for fuel in the world excluding taxes (p7). Seems to go against the argument that there's no money in selling petrol

gzt

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Reply # 1164735 29-Oct-2014 23:07

Sideface: The price goes up immediately if crude gets more expensive.
The price goes down very, very slowly if crude gets cheaper.

I wonder if the exchange rate has the same impact at the pump.

nakedmolerat

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Reply # 1164739 29-Oct-2014 23:14

one thing i was surprised was how same company, within the same town can have price difference.

diesel at the Z station 1, cost me over 10 cent more than the second Z station 1 km away. that is about $8+ different per full tank. both of them are on my way to work, i just go to the cheaper one now.

moral of the story, it is worth to keep an eye on the displayed prices.

Batman

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Reply # 1164742 29-Oct-2014 23:25

Sideface: The price goes up immediately if crude gets more expensive.
The price goes down very, very slowly if crude gets cheaper.
The profits go overseas.

This. Is. Black Gold.

Swype on iOS is detrimental to accurate typing. Apologies in advance.

tardtasticx

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Reply # 1164757 30-Oct-2014 03:14

nakedmolerat: one thing i was surprised was how same company, within the same town can have price difference.

diesel at the Z station 1, cost me over 10 cent more than the second Z station 1 km away. that is about $8+ different per full tank. both of them are on my way to work, i just go to the cheaper one now.

moral of the story, it is worth to keep an eye on the displayed prices.

Never understood that either! Down the road from me (mahia road and great South road intersection) Caltex, mobile and gull are selling 91 for $1.989/L where as about 3 k back up the other end of mahia, literally like 1km from the wiri oil terminal/refinery, it's about 25c+ more expensive per litre at all the stations.

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Jase2985

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Reply # 1164759 30-Oct-2014 05:27

because all the other stations are following gull, they lower their price and the nearby stations lower theirs to compete. The ones further afield dont need to because they know that most people wont drive that extra little distance to fill up so can still charge the normal price, so they make ~$7 a liter more per tank on average.

reven

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Reply # 1164767 30-Oct-2014 06:51

tardtasticx:
nakedmolerat: one thing i was surprised was how same company, within the same town can have price difference.

diesel at the Z station 1, cost me over 10 cent more than the second Z station 1 km away. that is about $8+ different per full tank. both of them are on my way to work, i just go to the cheaper one now.

moral of the story, it is worth to keep an eye on the displayed prices.

Never understood that either! Down the road from me (mahia road and great South road intersection) Caltex, mobile and gull are selling 91 for $1.989/L where as about 3 k back up the other end of mahia, literally like 1km from the wiri oil terminal/refinery, it's about 25c+ more expensive per litre at all the stations.

its now at $1.88 there :) they never list the premium/95/98 prices though...

sbiddle

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Reply # 1164772 30-Oct-2014 07:24

nakedmolerat: one thing i was surprised was how same company, within the same town can have price difference.

diesel at the Z station 1, cost me over 10 cent more than the second Z station 1 km away. that is about $8+ different per full tank. both of them are on my way to work, i just go to the cheaper one now.

moral of the story, it is worth to keep an eye on the displayed prices.

Gull sell nasty cheap petrol and other companies are forced to match local pricing to compete.

One could argue right now that with the large amounts of petrol being sold in large parts of the Auckland and Waikato regions for 10c - 15c less than other parts of the country, that effectively those outside Auckland are subsidising Auckland.

shk292

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Reply # 1164797 30-Oct-2014 08:32

tardtasticx:
nakedmolerat: one thing i was surprised was how same company, within the same town can have price difference.

diesel at the Z station 1, cost me over 10 cent more than the second Z station 1 km away. that is about $8+ different per full tank. both of them are on my way to work, i just go to the cheaper one now.

moral of the story, it is worth to keep an eye on the displayed prices.

Never understood that either! Down the road from me (mahia road and great South road intersection) Caltex, mobile and gull are selling 91 for $1.989/L where as about 3 k back up the other end of mahia, literally like 1km from the wiri oil terminal/refinery, it's about 25c+ more expensive per litre at all the stations.

It's called competition. Would you prefer a nice cosy price-fixing cartel?

Oblivian

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Reply # 1164826 30-Oct-2014 09:18

Was just in AKL for armageddon, and jaw dropped at the first place I went past to see it was 2.06/l

Down here in quakeville the prices are within 1c of each other over the entire city unlike the greater AKL region. And only now back down to 2.13/l after a 2c drop around the time I went up.

And when they fluctuate you have about 2hrs before one of the other stations follows suit (Z get a memo and tend to do it at once, BP sometimes decide to say they 'monitor' the market and adjust accordingly sometime later or earlier usually)

Still a little rude to tax on 2 tax components though.

Hiamie

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Reply # 1164831 30-Oct-2014 09:34

For what it's worth...

If you want to see the price at petrol stations within about 5Km of your current location, just install WAZE onto your android smartphone. Other WAZE users enter the prices as they top up and the results are available on WAZE.

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