petrol pumpDanny Lawson/PA Wire

Coventry motorists flocked to a garage forecourt yesterday morning, after news spread that it was accidentally selling fuel for 13.9p a litre.

So did these drivers do anything wrong? And how can you bag a fuel bargain?

Motoring advice & info


The bargain

According to the Coventry Telegraph, motorists stumbled across the anomaly at a Jet garage on the A45, near the Toll Bar island in the early hours of the morning. One of the pumps was selling petrol for 13.9p - while all the others were selling at 139.9p.

The motorists passed on the news of their good fortune, and huge queues started to build. Many were filling up the tank for less than £10, and saving anything up to £100.

Motoring advice & info



The good news is that unlike the times when crowds form around ATMs that are giving away cash for free, these motorists were doing nothing wrong. The petrol station is simply thought to have made a mistake and mispriced the petrol.

Bag a bargain

Sadly, of course, this sort of thing doesn't happen to most of us. Instead, last month we were facing record prices for fuel. In fact, we face such high prices that many of us are using the car far less than in the past.

Prices are now so high that the OFT has launched a review into whether the pricing of petrol is fair. However, we will have a long wait before we know the outcome of that review.

So how can we bag a fuel bargain? The answer is to shop around. There are wide regional variations - with Northern Ireland around 1.5p per litre cheaper than Scotand, although clearly driving long distances is going to wipe out any savings.

Instead, it's worth being aware of the places you drive past normally, and which of those is offering the lowest prices at any point in time. Websites like petrolprices.com will keep track of things for you, but are worth checking for developments.

As a rough rule of thumb, the very cheapest petrol tends to be from the supermarkets - which the AA says are around 2p per litre cheaper for unleaded than the UK average.

So even if you don't get lucky with a 13p litre - you could get a little bit luckier by doing a bit of legwork.

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