Fuel market
Extremely fast price changes at petrol stations under criticism
An evaluation of the petrol prize.de portal can be found thousands of prices that were only a few minutes. The cartel office also sees too quickly fluctuations. Contradicts the mineral oil industry.
The fuel prices at German petrol stations fluctuate quickly. Too quickly, says the comparison portal petrolpreis.de, which accuses the industry to only offer a thousand times prices for a few minutes and thus lead “consumers behind”. The cartel office also criticizes that quick fluctuations make consumers difficult to orient themselves. The Association of Fuels and Energy rejects the criticism.
The basis of the current allegations is an evaluation of petrolitreis.de. The portal evaluated the price data of the good 14,000 petrol stations in Germany from 12 to May 18, which they have to report to the market transparency at the Federal Cartel Office. According to its own statements, the portal found that more than 11,000 petrol stations reported prices during this period, some of which were valid for less than 15 minutes. With 3,851 petrol stations, the portal even registered individual prices that were not even 5 minutes.
Petrelpreis.de sees this as a “misleading of customers”. This would be lured to the gas station without chance to maintain the specified low price. The portal therefore calls on consumer protection associations to demonstrate petrol station operators.
Mineral oil industry rejects allegations
The Fuels and Energie Economic Association, which, among other things, represents the large mineral oil companies, rejected the allegations as completely unfounded. The market transparency center is “for complete transparency of petrol and diesel prices on the German market”. That is good for customers. “Because in a highly competitive environment, the petrol stations compete for every driver over the price, which leads to the strong price fluctuations.”
However, the Federal Cartel Office also sees the rapidly fluctuating fuel prices critically: “The frequent price changes at the petrol stations make it more and more difficult for consumers to make a price comparison with the help of our market transparency for fuel and to organize their fuel behavior in order to save money,” said President Andreas Mundt at the request of dpa.
The cartel office had already devoted itself to the topic in April after it had counted an average of 22 price changes per day at the German petrol stations in the first quarter. 8 percent changed their prizes more than 35 times, some even more than 50 times a day – mind you on average on average from the entire first quarter.
Cartel office for further investigations
The authority encourages further examining the effects of the frequent price changes at petrol stations. Building on this, adequate regulatory steps can be considered. However, these would be upset by the legislature.
In the past, the cartel office has pointed out rules, among other things, how they apply, for example, in Austria or parts of Australia: the number of price changes is limited to different ways. At that time there was no recommendation in this direction. Experts are also controversial whether the strong fluctuations may not lead to lower prices as in Germany.
ADAC: Current situation still justifiable
At ADAC it says that the increase in price changes is carefully observed, but the current situation still evaluated as justifiable. “Although a high number of price changes can make orientation more difficult for consumers, there are unchanged tank times during the day that everyone can use for themselves,” says a spokesman. “The simple rule of thumb is still that refueling is a lot more expensive in the morning than in the evening.” In contrast, prices or other interventions in the market may be counterproductive, the traffic club warns.
dpa
Source: Stern
