Drivers spent £156 million more than necessary on fuel in 'rotten' December
Petrol stations' marking up of prices is being blamed for the rise
Drivers were hit hard in their pockets at the end of 2021, spending over £156 million unnecessarily for fuel, according to the RAC.
The driving organisation say their research shows that the price of fuel dropped by around 2p a litre in December, but that the wholesale price fell a lot more, however - that saving wasn't passed on to consumers.
In December the average price of unleaded fuel dropped to 145.48p a litre, and diesel to 148.92p. However, according to the RAC drivers should have been paying prices closer to 135p and 142p respectively.
Rather than their long-term margin of 6p, the research shows retailers took an average of 16p a litre on petrol and 12.5p on diesel in December making forecourt prices far more expensive than they would have been, had retailers not changed their fuel pricing strategy.
According to the RAC, retailers took a bigger margin on the cost of fuel than they normally do, meaning prices at the pumps didn't drop as much as expected.
As a result, the cost to fill up the tank in a 55-litre car, such as a Volkswagen Golf - would now cost an average of £6 more than it should have been.
The RAC calculated that as a result of the price hikes, over £156 million was unnecessarily spent by drivers, an average of £5 million a day.
Speaking about the research, Simon Williams - the RAC's fuel spokesperson - said that drivers had been exploited.
"December was a rotten month for drivers as they were taken advantage of by retailers who rewrote their pump price strategy, costing motorists millions of pounds as a result. Their resistance to cutting prices and to only pass on a fraction of the savings they were making from lower wholesale costs is nothing short of scandalous," he said.
"The trouble is every extra penny they take as margin leads to drivers paying even more as VAT gets added on top at the end of the forecourt transaction. This means the Treasury’s coffers have been substantially boosted on the back of the retailers’ action.
In addition, the spokesman noted that “the only benefit of the current high fuel prices is the extra incentive for drivers to go electric as those driving 9,000 miles a year could save around £1,500".
The UK is in a period of transition from using cars using fossil fuels to electric cars. All cars running purely on petrol and diesel will be banned from the roads by 2030.