The BP Agent at Inverness EGPE only takes BP Cards – no other payment method.
But Highland Aviation have a bowser, filled by the Agent, and sell to GA, any card.
Unfortunately HA is closed due to Covid-19, until late April.
I suppose it must make sense because I have seen quite a number doing it. But perhaps they combine it with going to lunch. It’s not something I do personally so I I don’t really know the ins and outs.
gallois wrote:
Most non based ULM or LSA owners find it cheaper on most occasions to call a taxi and nip down the supermarket with their collapsible fuel cans. 20 litres can take you a long way in some ULMs or LSA’s.
Wow. I would for sure have thought that the taxi would cost more than whatever is saved, plus I wouldn’t have been sure that the taxi would accept to transport filled fuel cans.
@Peter asked "how much would this improve if your airfield had Customs/Immigration?
Not a lot would be the answer as firstly most passing Brits call into La Rochelle LFBH rather than LFFK. The only advantage we have over them is zero landing and parking fees.
Our biggest non French fuel trade comes from Swiss and German aircraft visiting the the Atlantic coast and they either don’t need or will have already cleared customs/immigration.
“The bottom line is that GA airfields make c. €0.30 / £0.30 per litre on 100LL, which is quite a lot of money. ”
We make €0.10 per litre.
Further depression to sales of AVgas comes from the fact that many modern aircraft are more efficient and use less fuel.
Secondly the switch to diesel and Jet fuel.
Thirdly the huge switch in terms of numbers round here to mogas.
Most non based ULM or LSA owners find it cheaper on most occasions to call a taxi and nip down the supermarket with their collapsible fuel cans. 20 litres can take you a long way in some ULMs or LSA’s.
The only reason many larger (and I say that advisedly, because many are not large at all but do get the occasional CAT) still have an Avgas facility is because of the clubs or owners based on the airfield. I know of very few airfields that sell a commercial amount of Avgas, outside of this to bother selling it at all.
We are fortunate in Sweden to have an independent supplier of both 100LL, unleaded 91/96UL and JET A-1 – Hjelmco Oil. They lease fueling stations free of charge to clubs and small airfield operators. The club/airfield is then responsible for operating the fuel station.
E.g. in Malmö/Sturup, the local club last year got two fuelling stations from Hjelmco, one for 91/96UL and one for JET A-1. Thus they could avoid the €50+VAT hookup fee from the “official” refueler.
If that is possible here, it should be even more possible in continental Europe with its larger number of airports – also where airports are more concentrated than in sparsely populated Sweden.
@gallois, how much would this improve if your airfield had Customs/Immigration?
The bottom line is that GA airfields make c. €0.30 / £0.30 per litre on 100LL, which is quite a lot of money. It is 5x to 10x more per litre (depending on who you ask, and there is a tendency for people to disingenuously talk about net profit because it makes them sound much more charitable 
) than petrol stations make, but of course they turn their stock around much faster.
So how to get the volume up? If say your GA scene is mostly flying day trips, people will probably not be buying much fuel when away from base (unless yours is significantly cheaper). So how to attract what is called “passing trade”? French airfields which lost Customs/Immigration in the two big waves in the past decade have reported a 30-50% loss of business, so maybe approaching the local police? People passing through will buy way more fuel, because almost nobody stops for fuel unless they have to. But then TOTAL is no good; you need to accept normal credit cards.
Various previous threads on this – example. A new fixed installation will almost never make sense. Certainly not below ground; I know someone in the business and even for petrol stations the costs are silly due to compliance (it is still done, due to lack of space). Above ground is the only practical way and a mobile bowser is the best way.
The problem here may be elsewhere, however. If you host a TOTAL or AIR BP franchise, how much do you make per litre? One sees this play out in Greece. If AIR BP turn up, they finance the whole installation. But the airport isn’t going to get anywhere near €0.30/litre.
In most business scenarios, total independence is the best way. That way you make the most money, as well as having the fewest people screwing you around. And anybody can buy avgas in bulk. The gotcha is the investment. No free lunch 
[The following not aimed at clubs, but at businesses established at airports where the likes of Air BP and Total operate quite profitably]
OMG, People who want to earn money selling fuel have to do some work and invest to do it, shock horror! The poor things! Oh, the humanity!
The reality is quite simple. Airports are local monopolies, and handlers as well as fuel suppliers are monopolies on these airports, or at best two suppliers with no competition; and the oil and fuel industry have in the past aptly demonstrated subtle and not-so-subtle tendency for price fixing.
A monopolist prices in a way that maximises his profit, and the only things that make them lower their prices is (a) regulation and (b) being at a point where further price increases actually lower profits.
So the only way this will change is if the airports kick them because they are losing landing fees from certain aircraft (regulation), or because they realise that they can sell more (with next to no variable cost except the fuel itself) by changing prices.
To change from non self service Total to a Self Service Total AVgas fuel pump, as I have written before, we were quoted circa €60,000.
On top of that someone would still have to be responsible for ordering fuel, seeing it in, and regularly checking the filtration system and the specific gravity, and changing the prices on the fuel pump every time the price goes up or down.
The fire extinguisher equipment also has to be in place, maintained and inspected regularly, also at a cost.
So our saving would be that an unpaid volunteer club member would not need to be present to refill aircraft that just happen to pop in.
With the amount of Avgas we dispense and with the margin made it would take many more than 2 years to get such an investment back.Even though we have 2 very busy maintenance facilities on our airfield. We also have regular high level intensive 1 and 2 week aerobatics training courses a few times a year.
The amount of Avgas sold has also reduced a great deal since the club bought its DA40 tdi.
For that we installed our own diesel reservoir and pump for club use only (can’t remember the cost). This is refilled as needed.(I am not sure whether our contract is with Total or a small independant supplier.)
So if we have say 1000 litres of diesel in our reservoir and say 3000 litres (just a figure plucked from the air) in the Avgas reservoir, the club has had to put upfront running stock costs alone of around €8000, not insignificant for a small club.
Snoopy wrote:
There are 5 or 6 of the „Mauser“ type fuel trailers at LOWG for Mogas and even Diesel from flightclubs, charter companies and ATOs.It’s about 20k for the trailer, and rent to the airport (?).
Just as a Gedankenexperiment, I looked quickly at the tank solutions offered by Maul, such as the 2900L one that can be also installed stationary (and the three-in-one container solution would probably be very nice as well). Attaching a payment terminal to energise the fuel release should not cost extraordinary amounts either (in the end rural gas stations manage with much lower marging on each litre sold, but of course a bit higher turnover), so the 100k number of Malibuflyer seems a bit high, I would have expected 20k-30k for such an installation (single 2900L + payment terminal). I obviously grok that neither the airport nor the fuel vendor can run as a charity, but if you don’t need a full-time fuel attendant the investment probably pays for itself after the first or second year.
@Sebastian_G wrote
I am a bit disappointed that no pragmatic self-serve solution seems to able to be found for those airports.
There are 5 or 6 of the „Mauser“ type fuel trailers at LOWG for Mogas and even Diesel from flightclubs, charter companies and ATOs.
It’s about 20k for the trailer, and rent to the airport (?).
I believe the problem could be approvals to act as a commercial vendor for fuel vs. strictly only self use.
In practice someone from the above groups comes airside with their personal car, hooks up the trailer, takes it to and fills it up at the nearest gas station and returns it. I don’t know if this constitutes some dangerous goods transport and if this is actually legal. From an economic point of view it must make sense though.
