Petrol and diesel prices up by 10p a litre since start of 2024

Fuel prices have gone up by 10p a litre so far this year amid warnings of a glaring “pump price gulf” across the UK.

Unleaded went up 3p in April to 149.95p while diesel rose by 2p to 157.76p, new data from the RAC shows. The bump up has taken a 55-litre tank of petrol to £82.47 (up £1.70 in April) and diesel to £86.77 (up £1.10 in April).

The lowest prices for petrol and diesel so far this year were both recorded on 16 January – 139.7p and 147.6p respectively.

The RAC wants the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which is now responsible for monitoring prices alongside overseeing the imminent government-mandated ‘Pump Watch’ scheme, to tackle ongoing issues with “unfair” retailer margins.

The motoring services firm says drivers are getting a raw deal on the UK’s forecourts – as indicated by the CMA’s market study, which concluded drivers were overcharged by £900m in 2022.

Its data for April suggests that retailer margins have increased dramatically, despite the CMA raising concerns about the issue at the end of March. The average margin on unleaded currently stands at 9.5p a litre, whereas margin on diesel has rocketed to 18p, up 6p in April alone. The long-term average margin for both fuels is just 8p.

The RAC’s analysis of supermarket prices at the end of April shows that the differences between the cheapest and most expensive fuel charged by individual brands ranges from 8p a litre to 36p.

The RAC also says that data from forecourts operated BP and Shell indicates a vast difference between their high and low prices at the end of April. For petrol, BP’s price spread was 24p while Shell’s was 28p. The difference between BP’s cheapest and most expensive diesel was 30p while for Shell it was 28p.

RAC fuel spokesman Simon Williams said: “Drivers are once again having to dig deep just to go about their daily lives. Our data shows petrol and diesel have now gone up 10p a litre so far this year on the back of further increases in April of 3p and 2p respectively.

“Some of this is down to the oil price and the pound-to-dollar exchange rate making wholesale petrol more expensive for retailers to buy but unfortunately, it’s also very apparent that retailers are making massive margins on diesel. To put this into perspective, the wholesale price of diesel has been lower than petrol since the middle of April, yet diesel is nearly 8p a litre dearer at the pump. If retailers were treating drivers fairly this gap would be starting to close, instead of getting wider.”

The RAC believes that if the biggest retailers “were to charge fairer margins”, it would lead to fuel prices across the UK mainland coming down to match those charged in Northern Ireland, which are consistently 5p a litre (£2.50 a tank) lower.

It would also end the postcode lottery, along with an end to ‘rocket and feather’ pricing which results in prices on the forecourt going up far more quickly in a rising wholesale market than they come down when wholesale costs fall.

Fuel prices around the UK