The price of petrol fell by 1.5ppl in October making for three consecutive months of cuts, data from RAC Fuel Watch shows.

The average price of a litre of unleaded dropped 1.57p to 126.42p at the end of the month from 127.99p at the start. Diesel also came down a similar amount (1.59p) taking a litre to 130.49p from 132.08p.

A litre of petrol is now nearly 3p cheaper than it was at the beginning of August (129.15p) whereas diesel is only 1.55ppl cheaper (132.04ppl on 1 August).

At the end of October Asda was selling the cheapest supermarket unleaded at 121.64ppl, 1.44ppl ahead of its nearest rival Tesco (123.08ppl). It also had the lowest priced diesel at 125.14ppl, 1.54ppl below Tesco (126.68ppl). The average price of supermarket petrol was 123.01ppl – down 1.05ppl, and for diesel it was 126.55ppl – down 1.48ppl.

RAC fuel spokesman Simon Williams said: “It’s clearly good news for drivers that pump prices reduced in October, but it’s disappointing they haven’t fallen further given the conditions were so favourable with the price of oil averaging under $60 a barrel and the pound strengthening to $1.29.

“In the middle of the month we called for a significant cut as we saw petrol was up to 7p a litre too expensive. The supermarkets responded with a round of price cuts, but most only decided to knock 2ppl off unleaded. While this was positive we feel they could have gone quite a bit further.

“As things stand both petrol and diesel are still 2ppl too expensive and should really be reduced. Sadly, we suspect this is extremely unlikely as the wholesale market is now beginning to go the other way which will start to eat into the accumulated saving that should have been passed on to drivers before.”