Doesn't make sense to me....

[Richard]

For the last year, gas prices have been going up. We each might/do have our own ideas as to why.

What I'm finding curious and brought up to my wife yesterday:

Just a week/two ago, gas was roughly, $4.55/gallon. All pumps were open and nobody waiting in line.
Yesterday I filled up and out of maybe 12 pumps at the station, only TWO didn't have their handles covered with a red ("don't use me") cover. Yet, what I found curious is, gas was $4.15.

So I told the wife it would seem to me that if they are literally running out, if they don't have enough gas to fill THEIR tanks, therefore for us to fill OUR tanks, then how is it they've lowered the price by .40/gallon? It would make more sense to me that while they have plenty of gas, the price might have been $4.15 but when they're down to two pumps, I would THEN expect the price to be $4.55 yet it's reversed.

Have I seen too many Columbo reruns or does that seem backward?

 

[Midniteoyl]

That's called price gouging and is illegal. The reason they were running out of gas is *because* the price was $4.15.

 

[Richard]

That price is pretty much everywhere that I've glanced (within pennies). I didn't however, look at any other station to see if they had baggies over the pump handles so I don't know if that is wide spread or not. Might be as simple as they had a (main) pump issue so had to shut down some pumps. I have no idea (nor do I really know the nuances of how the gas is moved from main tank to disbursement)

 

[oosik]

Gas prices may seem like black magic. But you can believe somewhere, somebody is getting rich.

 

[DieselBound]

Sometimes things break. If I were so curious I'd ask the folks there what's up: no certainty that you'd get the real scoop, but at least you'd get some kind of answer (rather than random comments off a web site like this).

oosik, it's kind of a feast or famine thing. Producers took a hit during the COVID "pandemic". Frackers in the US are pretty much non-viable unless oil is fetching a fairly high price (and even then it's very questionable).

 

[Streetcar]

At local stations the delivery truck is a day or two late and some tanks run low and are shut down. Station sets price to be competitive with adjacent stations

 

[Moxie 15]

Has anyone here ever worked at a gas station?
By some of the resposes I have to assume not. All of the pumps at a station are connected to the same tank. There is normally a tank of the low grade and one for the high grade and they are mixed at the pump for the mid grades. So if one pump is out of gas they all are.
It is far more likely that the pumps are out of calibration or in need of some repair.

 

[MossRoad]

We’ve got a local gas station that has about 16 pumps. On any given day, about 4-5 of them have plastic bags over the handles. The pumps are broken in some form or another, not because they are out of gas. Most likely the credit card reader is broken, the auto shutoff is broken and spews gas instead of shutting off, or the pump is out of calibration. So they bag it. My guess is that they get charged a service call for each time the pump tech has to come out, so they wait for several to break to make it worth their while.

Anyhow, that’s all my speculation, but I’m guessing it’s pretty close VS them being out of gas, because the other dozen pumps are still working.

 

[MossRoad]

Has anyone here ever worked at a gas station?
…

Yes. Six or seven years. But it was for airplanes.

 

[jfsawatzky]

Yes. Six or seven years. But it was for airplanes.

Sounds interesting. Where was that? What types of planes?