The cost of having a regulated fuel price monitoring app would be recovered in less than a tankful of fuel for every registered vehicle in the ACT under the current price difference paid between Canberra and Sydney.
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As inflated petrol prices continue to squeeze household budgets across the country, Australian Institute of Petroleum data revealed the Canberra weekly average price of standard unleaded petrol in the ACT last week was 181.8 cents per litre, over 10 cents higher than the Sydney average, and five cents more than the NSW average.
Escalating fuel prices in the wake of the Russian invasion, increased shipping and transport costs and the rise in demand as state borders open up and road travel rises, reached such a cost-of living pressure point last month that the federal Government introduced a 22.1 cent per litre cut in the excise that it collects, effective for six months.
While prices fell after that Budget announcement, there are now clear signs that Canberrans are failing again to get a competitive price at the pump.
Fuel pricing in the territory has long been a sore point with Canberra motorists, with an ACT Assembly inquiry into the issue convened in 2019 to identify ways of making the market more price-competitive.
Just 10 months ago, the ACT government pledged to implement recommendations from the inquiry as prices began to rebound from the peak of the pandemic.
One of the key recommendations, supported by the NRMA, was the adoption of the FuelCheck app introduced in NSW in 2016.
However, the ACT government has resisted this move, citing "prohibitive" costs - with an introductory cost in the ACT of $1.3 million - and noted there was "is already a high degree of retail fuel price transparency in the ACT available from free, publicly accessible apps".
NRMA spokesman Peter Khoury described the ACT's estimated introductory cost of the app as "curiously high", and said "even if this was a true cost, then it would be recovered in no time".
"This really is a no-brainer for the ACT; it's working really well in NSW because it puts the onus of transparency right where it should be: squarely in the lap of the oil companies," he said.
"The platform to support the app is already built, all they [the ACT government] need to do is to pick it up and provide the supporting legislation.
"In NSW, retailers are required up update their pricing on the app within 15 minutes of it changing on their pricing boards, otherwise they get fined. And that's already happened in NSW."
"In a market like the ACT, which has the least competitive fuel price market of any of the capital cities, it just makes sense."
Cross-border discrepancies on pricing were evident in a spot check on local region prices on Monday when in a like-for-like comparison, FuelCheck listed the price of 91 unleaded at the BP service station on Yass Rd, Queanbeyan, at 167.9 cents per litre while the BP Watson on the Federal Highway had the same fuel listed on its price board at 173.9 cents a litre.
Only six of the 58 retail service stations in the ACT are non-aligned to major fuel companies, with Costco at Majura and Metro Petroleum (Fyshwick and Mitchell) identified as regularly offering the cheapest prices. Costco offers fuel-only, pay-at-the-bowser dispensing, and does not operate around the clock.
In April 2020, petrol prices in Canberra were considerably higher than in Sydney and most other capital cities, back in the heady days when prices of over $1 per litre were seen as exorbitant. These prices sparked a warning to fuel retailers from Chief Minister Andrew Barr that he would introduce regulations if the price gouging was not addressed.
