Almost out of gas (Thanks IKE)!

[gt350mike]

I just got off the phone with my wife (I'm in Williamsburg, VA & she's in Huntsville, AL) and she told me there was a "run" on fuel in Alabama and some gas stations ran out of gas. But don't worry about the gas stations.....they raised the !@#* price .40 to .50 per gallon before they ran out! I've been told that the prices have only increased about .15 to .20 here in Williamsburg for gas, and diesel is as high as $4.49.

I guess a big "THANK YOU" needs to go out to the f'ng media for blowing Ike way out of proportion (I was hearing that Ike was going to be "at least a 4") and another shout out needs to go to the oil companies for fanning the flames. I do realize that the oil rigs had to be evacuated and it may take some time for them to go back on-line, but I don't recall availability of fuel and/or price gouging being an issue with previous hurricanes. Is the Southeast experiencing fuel supply issues because Ike hit Houston directly or is there another issue(s) that is driving this problem???

[Oh Haha]

Same here in Michigan. rat bastard gas stations increased prices so people flocked to fill up causing traffic jams and tie ups.

We were averaging around 3.65 for the past week or so. This morning most in our area were up around 4.39 for regular.

And our customers wonder why a freakin' Snickers bar costs more this year than last year. duh.

[Mule]

Maybe we should plow Houston under along with N.O. That's show those dumb asses that live near the water!

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by gt350mike

I just got off the phone with my wife (I'm in Williamsburg, VA & she's in Huntsville, AL) and she told me there was a "run" on fuel in Alabama and some gas stations ran out of gas. But don't worry about the gas stations.....they raised the !@#* price .40 to .50 per gallon before they ran out! I've been told that the prices have only increased about .15 to .20 here in Williamsburg for gas, and diesel is as high as $4.49.

I guess a big "THANK YOU" needs to go out to the f'ng media for blowing Ike way out of proportion (I was hearing that Ike was going to be "at least a 4") and another shout out needs to go to the oil companies for fanning the flames. I do realize that the oil rigs had to be evacuated and it may take some time for them to go back on-line, but I don't recall availability of fuel and/or price gouging being an issue with previous hurricanes. Is the Southeast experiencing fuel supply issues because Ike hit Houston directly or is there another issue(s) that is driving this problem???

Put the blame where it belongs, and that is not on the "big, bad ole oil companies". I have no idea what you mean by fanning the flames but I'm pretty sure it is wrong.
The oil rigs are not a cause of your gas prices or supply problem.
There are a whole bunch of REFINERIES in the hurricane path and most of them had to be shut down to ensure the worker's safety. The refineries in that area can make up to 8 million gallons of fuel a day (each). If they shut down 5 or 6 refineries to try and keep employees from getting hurt or killed, then that is not fanning the flames. It is common sense.
Besides it's a moot point, with all the electrical outages in that area even if the refineries decided to try and keep running they would have been knocked down in an uncontrollable manner when they lost electricity, and that is even more dangerous. Bad things can happen when you pull the plug on heaters and reactors all the sudden.
It usually takes 3 to 7 days to get one back up and fully operational and on test if it's shut down in a controlled manner, which takes about 24 hours. if it gets hit by a sudden power outage it can take up to a month to get one fully operational again.

When the refineries shut down that created a temporary fuel shortage until fuel can be re-routed by pipeline to that area. In the meantime, THE GAS STATION OWNERS AND OPERATORS saw a chance to cash in and jacked up their prices. Not the oil companies, the gas stations. 92% of which are independently owned or operated. Independent distributors probably had their hand in the cookie jar too, buying up fuel on the wholesale spot market and then sitting on it to drive up the price.
The guy who lives down the street from you and owns the corner gas station or distributorship ripped you off, not some big bad oil company.

[Por_sha911]

If the idiots don't panic and line up to top off, then there's plenty of gas for everyone. When people panic, the stations jack the prices up because they know that folks will pay it.
Now here's the kicker: I know people that stood in line for 15+ minutes to fill up "before the prices go up" on Friday. OK, you might save 30-50 cents per gallon times maybe 10-15 gallons. That means you saved $3 and maybe 7.50. In the meantime, you wasted a gallon of gas sitting there idling. As a result, net savings is possibly $3.50 on the high end or you might have actually lost money (and time) on the low end! Brilliant.

Separate rant:
If all the environmental wackos out there want to save the planet and cleaner air then ban all drive-thrus except for drug store prescriptions or elderly and handicapped! That will save millions of gallons a year and some folks will actually have to get off their fat azz to get their super-sized McCardiac Meal, movie, or latte.

Rant over. I feel better now.

p.s. This is not aimed at you Mike, I'm just frustrated that you have to suffer for other people's selfish stupidity.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Keep your cars fully topped off at all times and you'll never have to worry...

[Rick Lee]

Is there really a law against "price gouging" and if so, what defines it? Seems to me that you should be able to charge whatever you want for any product. If your supply is threatened or cut off and you don't hike prices, you'd be out of product very quickly. Why is this a problem? Has anyone ever been successfully prosecuted for price gouging?

[kstar]

Thank you, Sammy, for that post.

[Jagshund]

It doesn't matter if the refineries are leveled by the hurricane; the point is that there is NO WAY every station in the Southeast was topped off with the "new" fuel that would cost them more $ in the last 12 hours. This is station owners getting greedy by raising their fuel prices due to the potential increase in price/lack of fuel. Sonny Purdue, our village idiot, actually did something smart today by instituting "gouging" watch statewide.

Although the NEW fuel that will be delivered will be worth more due to the lack of supply, and the 'old' fuel is ostensibly worth more as it sits due to the increase/lack, the owners are not going to take a hit by selling the old fuel at the old prices. This is why we have every reason to be outraged at the instant rise in prices.

[Mule]

Up like a rocket, down like a feather.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Station operators make very little.

In fact some of them have their prices set by the oil company directly (I worked for a Mobil station years ago that was this way - every morning the prices would come in from corporate and we'd have to change them to what we were told to set them at). Might be different for independently-owned/franchise stations versus corporate-owned but the point is a lot of times the local guy has no say over the pricing and even in the cases where they do, the profit margins are very, very slim.

They make a helluva lot more off selling sodas and Fritos than gasoline.

[Dixie]

ONLY .50 a gallon? You're lucky.

Here in S.C. gas was $3.46 a gallon at 8:00am. By 4:00pm it was $5.75 a gallon.

I saw it coming the minute the local TV talking heads started saying, "there's no need to panic. If no one panics over IKE potentially destroying all those refineries in Texas, we'll have *just* enough gas to get by. SO DON'T PANIC!!!!!"

[Rot 911]

A few years ago when this happened the Missouri AG went after the gas stations for price gouching and levied some pretty substantial fines. Prices today are the same as they were last week.

[David]

I talked to a contractor buddy of mine who's driving around fixing all his friends and customer's crap that took a hit. He said there's folks all over driving around without a care in the world not doing anything. Meanwhile there's no fuel to buy so they're just wasting what gas they have. I offered him beer and booze to check on my house. He said he'd check on the house but he didn't need booze because everyone he helped was giving him bottles. So I told him he could have my lawn mower fuel and the gas in my wife's car. He said he'd head right over

[steve185]

They used the hurricane as an excuse to raise the price of gas here in Canada and we have more oil than we know what to do with. Someting is fishy for sure.
Steve

[gt350mike]

Originally Posted by Kurt V

A few years ago when this happened the Missouri AG went after the gas stations for price gouching and levied some pretty substantial fines. Prices today are the same as they were last week.

My dad lives in Naples, FL and he told me that pricing was fairly stable because FL anti-gouging legislation after Hurricane Andrew. Around Petersburg/Colonial Heights I saw diesel ranging in price from $3.82 to $4.39 (I saw $4.49 in Williamsburg) so its hard to say who within the supply chain is cashing in on the frenzy.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

My earlier point is that I'm willing to bet the price gouging is occurring at the wholesale level (refinery to local distributorship or local distributorship to stations) rather than at the level of the gas station. If I had to guess, I'd say the "fear factor" and natural speculative tendencies of the bidders who are bidding on refinery deliveries (not sure if these are futures per se or not, but I know they're bid on against competitors) are driving the prices up.

Part of this is legitimate supply/demand re-balancing though. Restrict supply, price goes up. However I think it's overstated in terms of the dollar amount and is being blown out of proportion, like it always is.

Keep buyin' them big dumb SUVs and pickups there bubba...