At Asda when i top up i have filled the car and took fuel to £34.99 but when i go to pay it's jumped up by 1p, i know 1p is nothing but it should stop at the gun correct?
If this happens to 1000's of other motorists over a year thats a few quid.
This has happened several times now and not just to me.
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When you go back to the car, what is the reading on the pump then?
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At 1.35/litre 1p buys about one and a half teaspoons full. Does anyone know how the measuring devices on the pumps work?
I would expect to be charged what's on the display at the point the nozzle goes back in the holster.
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At this asda you drive your car to the kiosk to pay, but it showed 1p less than what i did pay.
And not always the same pump.
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The Asda pump doesn't meter fuel by the penny, it meters it by the 0.01 litre and rounds the cost off to the nearest penny.
Each 0.01 litre costs 1.339p, so:
0.01 litre = £0.01
0.02 litre = £0.02
0.03 litre = £0.04
0.04 litre = £0.05
0.05 litre = £0.06
0.06 litre = £0.08
0.07 litre = £0.09
0.08 litre = £0.10
0.09 litre = £0.12
0.10 litre = £0.13
etc.
Therefore there are some cash amounts that the pump is incapable of dispensing, as you have found. They can't dispense exactly £35.00 worth of fuel, but can dispense £34.99 worth or £35.01 worth. The garage won't have any transactions that day for exactly £35.00 of fuel.
The unattainable price points will vary with the price of fuel, e.g. for the last couple of weeks my local garage pump wouldn't hit £30.00 on the head, but this week it did after a price change.
This effect first became an issue when the price went above £1.01 per litre, and will become more apparent the higher the price goes. When it hits £2.00 per litre the pump will dispense in 2p increments.
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The Asda pump doesn't meter fuel by the penny, it meters it by the 0.01 litre and rounds the cost off to the nearest penny.
Thats a lot of pennies rounded off yearly Dave?
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Do we know if it always rounds up, or does it sometimes round down?
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Always up.
I do find the gun triggers stiff so there not easy to get £35.00 on the dot like they used to be, Morrisons are better & shell.
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Are we not getting away (as usual) from the real issue?
Surely they should only charge the amount that is shown on the pump £ display.
The reason that you cannot ever stop on a certain specific amount is explained above - nothing to do with a stiff trigger, (if the swear filter accepts that).
Last edited by: pmh on Thu 8 Sep 11 at 10:33
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>> Do we know if it always rounds up, or does it sometimes round down?
>>
>>
I have used pumps where you key in the amount of fuel you want in cash, I bet they round the quantity down. :-)
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There's potentially another complexity in the amount you pay vs. The volume dispensed. As I understand it, fuel pumps don't measure by volume but by flow rate.
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They measure the volume dispensed by using a flow meter, its the only way it can be done. Nothing sinister or complex in that. Its the same way your gas meter works.
>> There's potentially another complexity in the amount you pay vs. The volume dispensed. As I
>> understand it, fuel pumps don't measure by volume but by flow rate.
>>
Last edited by: Zero on Thu 8 Sep 11 at 16:42
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Weights and Measures say when you put the nozzle back, the hose flexes and more fuel passes into the swelling hose, as it is metered in the pump body, bot the nozzle.
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>> Weights and Measures say when you put the nozzle back, the hose flexes and more
fuel passes into
>> the swelling hose, as it is metered in the pump body, not the nozzle.
The same thing happens to the person who uses the pump before you, so your fill starts off with "their" extra bit of unmetered fuel.
There is a school of thought that says fuel should be bought early in the morning when the contents of the underground tanks are at their coolest and therefore most dense.
Last edited by: Dave_TDCi on Thu 8 Sep 11 at 23:40
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I was told that, being buried underground, the temperature of the tanks' contents actually varies very little over the course of a day.
Tanker trucks are a different kettle of fish. Avoid buying immediately after a delivery of warm fuel in the summer, go for it when a freezing cold tanker has just disgorged its contents in winter.
That's what I heard anyway.
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>>go for it when a freezing cold tanker has just
>> disgorged its contents in winter.
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>> That's what I heard anyway.
>>
And the first acceleration onto a motorway more than wipes out any saving. Life is too short for that penny pinching, burn the oil, the sooner it is too expensive to be used as fuel the sooner we will get an alternative source of power, (Flux capacitor), which will become available and all this battery powered car crap will disappear.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Fri 9 Sep 11 at 15:04
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>> Thats a lot of pennies rounded off yearly Dave?
It is, but it's merely an inconvenience rather than a con.
You're getting £35.01-worth of fuel for your £35.01, the garage isn't overcharging everyone by a penny.
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When I'm World Leader the first thing I'm going to do is outlaw this stupid practice of charging the price of a litre of fuel to a decimal point. I can't see any practical reason for it, it is the only consumer commodity priced like this.
Last edited by: Robin Regal on Fri 9 Sep 11 at 11:08
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I'm inclined to agree with RR at least in principle. However I cannot think of any other . consumer commodity that's purchesed in multiples of up to 100 on the unit price.
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>>>consumer commodity that's purchased in multiples of up to 100 on the unit price.<<<
electricity , gas, oil, ..........................................
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>> electricity, gas, oil
Almost all fuels are charged per unit.
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>> electricity , gas, oil, ..........................................
Overlooked those but unit pricing to three places of decimals widespread - obviously a fuel thing.
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I don't so much mind the decimal point as the fact that it's always "XXX.9" ppl.
Admittedly it's only the same thing as buying something for 99p instead of a quid, but it still irks me.
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The fuel gun con. - Duncan
