A popular app that helps forecourt retailers make fuel pricing decisions plans to switch to using data from the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) voluntary price sharing scheme.
EdgePetrol, which says its app is used by more than 1,000 forecourt sites, will make the change from the end of March when its current provider of comparative data, Experian Catalist, withdraws its service.
The CMA data will give EdgePetrol customers access to prices at over 4,000 sites in the UK, including the big four supermarkets, major oil companies, and top independents. It is a smaller pool than Experian Catalist offered, but more up to date, and with less emphasis on diesel and more reliable on super grades, says EdgePetrol.
It says that many of its users - which include 30 of the Top 50 Indie forecourts - had been concerned that they would no longer have access to reliable pricing information when Experian withdrew its service. “Retailers have been calling us non-stop for the past couple of months asking what they are going to do without being able to see the Catalist data in the app,” says its chief revenue officer Mark Truman.
“The industry is heavily reliant on pricing to make their pricing decisions and without it is shooting in the dark,” says Truman. ”For smaller retailers they are still driving around and looking at competitor pole signs - this is hugely time consuming for them and time is not something they have a lot of.”
The CMA’s voluntary pump price initiative has 14 participants, following this month’s addition of Jet. The scheme will be in place until legislation is introduced to compel all forecourts to make real-time fuel prices available online.
Those already signed up to the CMA service include Top 50 Indies Applegreen, Ascona, SGN Retail, Motor Fuel Group, Moto, and Rontec. On the supermarket side, Tesco, Asda, Morrisons and Sainsbury’s and the Esso Tesco Alliance are taking part. Other fuel suppliers signed up are BP and Shell.
