Find Good Gas Prices
Everyone wants to save money when buying gas for their vehicles. Finding the best price is one part of this.
Steps
- Don't be brand-conscious. Buy where you can get the best deal. There isn't any significant difference between any of the regular gas brands. In fact, all the brands fill their tanker trucks at whatever refinery is closest and the only difference between "brands" is a few gallons of a proprietary additive package that gets mixed with the fuel after it is loaded. All additives must meet OEM and EPA performance standards so the only real difference between brands is the audacity of the superior performance claims.
- Use a fuel with the lowest required octane. Low-octane "regular" gas is usually all that is required. Octane is only a rating of the fuel's resistance to engine-damaging pre-ignition ("knock") in high-performance engines (that few people have). Low octane gas is less expensive and a better value if that's all your engine requires. Check your owner's manual to be sure. Modern high-performance cars will sometimes recommend higher octane fuels because they are engineered to use those fuels.
- Remember that engines need less octane at higher altitudes. If your engine does not "knock" on regular, paying more for a higher octane rating is a waste since the increased octane makes no significant improvement to gas mileage and it is no better for your engine.
- Apply for a credit card which offers gas savings when you use the card for purchases. This works in much the same way that some credit card companies allow you to earn frequent flier miles when you use their card for purchases. For example, BMO-Shell cash back Master Card offers 3% cash back of your purchase gas and any commodity from Shell stores and 1% cash back for any purchase from any store. In addition, by giving $45.00 annual fees you will get basic road site assistance. More than this $45.00 you can earn from cash back. Furthermore, Shell also gives Air Miles in addition to above.
- Join a loyalty club. Some gas stations, department stores and grocery stores offer lower prices when you present their membership card. Keep your eyes open and verify that their prices are really lower than other stations in your neighborhood.
- Check the web for deals. With the ever increasing gas prices, use the Internet to find the cheapest gas near you. Some of these sites even offer text messaging capabilities, where they will send you the a text message with the location of the cheapest gas in your area. But don't drive miles out of your way or wait in excessively long lines (your car gets 0 MPG while stopped and idling.) just for a cheaper station, or you will defeat the purpose.
- Buy gas on Wednesday. Gas prices are statistically the cheapest on Wednesdays, but this is only statistically true over a large number of days. It won't be true every week.
- Buy gas three days before a holiday. Gas prices almost always go up for holidays.
Warnings
- Don't get crazy in your search for cheaper gas stations. If your car has a {{safesubst:#invoke:convert|convert}} tank and you find a station that is 10ยข cheaper per gallon, your savings is a maximum of $1.50. But if you get {{safesubst:#invoke:convert|convert}} to the gallon, and drove {{safesubst:#invoke:convert|convert}} each way to that station, you have already used one gallon of gas to save $1.50, which at $4.00 per gallon would actually be a loss of $2.50.
- Be careful of credit card interest rates which may negate your gasoline savings. Also verify that the stations you use don't charge higher prices to credit card customers.
- When you sign up for the 'loyalty' cards at your nearby store, realize that they do that to track your spending for their own benefit. That is not to say that you don't get a lot out of it. The savings can be substantial.
