I am on the warpath today. I cannot tell you HOW many instances I’ve read of greedy gas stations engaging in obvious price gouging. But here are a few:
This morning at 7:00 a.m. a nearby gas station was selling gas for $3.65. FIFTEEN MINUTES LATER they raised their price to $3.99 (I know this because I drove by at 7 a.m. to take CB to daycare and drove by 15 minutes later on the way home). At 6 p.m. this evening they were officially out of gas and their sign listed $4.09 as their sales price for unleaded regular gas. They raised their prices twice in less than twelve hours.
Down the road from that station, last night a station listed their regular unleaded gas at $3.65. At 7:15 a.m. this morning their regular unleaded was selling for $3.79. Tonight at 6:20 p.m. on my way home I saw they are now selling regular unleaded for $4.39 – they changed it twice in less than 24 hours.
A woman on my local mommy forum said her husband heard a gas station manager on the radio say that the owners of the place he manages called him today (price was $3.60 something a gallon) and told him to go turn the pumps off and put a sign out that says he is out of gas. Then tomorrow turn them back on with a price of over $4.00 a gallon. The man refused to do it. He said he was not going to do that to his long time customers. But that just goes to show you how some people will get around this. They know they can’t change the price several times a day so they wanted him to just turn it off until tomorrow.
Another mom on my forum said the gas station right in front of her house was 3.49 this morning, then 3.61, then 3.99 and is now 4.75 tonight!!
And how about this one from yet another mom: “A friend of mine in Charlotte went out for gas at lunch. When she got in line, the digital gas sign said $3.90. By the time she waited through the line and got to the pump, the gas had gone up to $4.90.”
Another mom: “We were just told by a station that has went from 3.49 this morning to 3.99 this afternoon to 4.19 this evening that in the morning they were raising prices to 5.00.”
Here’s the one that ticks me off the most: “When dh just drove by the BP in Lake Wylie tonight they had bags on all their pumps like they were out of gas. While the bags were on the pumps, dh saw a guy at the station go and raise the prices on all the pumps and signs and then remove the bags to start selling again immediately.”
It’s absolutely unacceptable that gas station owners would take such blatant AND ILLEGAL advantage of the citizens of this country who need gasoline. They are effectively holding us hostage and wreaking havoc on our personal economies in order to make a buck. It’s ridiculous and I am ON A MISSION to make sure every station I read about is reported. For all the stories above (the first two are ones that I’ve already reported to the South Carolina Attorney General) I’ve urged the mom to submit a report to the SCAG with the details. It’s just shocking.
Fortunately, Denis was able to fill up the van for $3.69 (he had to since he was on “E” this afternoon). I still have half a tank of gas in my car. We won’t be going anywhere this weekend except for church, and we’re driving together. Denis will take my car with it’s 1/2 tank to the airport on Monday where it will be parked through Thursday. I’ll then have enough gas to drive to/from work on Friday and park my car through the following Monday. So I’ll go at least 10 days without needing gas in my car. And the van has 18 gallons at its disposal so we won’t need to fill up that vehicle for at least 10 days. With any luck by then things will have gotten better.
But until then? Every chance I get I’m turning in gas stations for blatant price-gouging. EVERY CHANCE I GET.
Good for you!