Emir wrote:
That’s one of the areas where EC should act against the monopolistic position of fuel suppliers.
Jujupilote wrote:
If someone brang these practices to the EU Parliament under a « low carbon » perspective, it would be banned in 24 hours.
Careful what you wish for. The EC / EU Parliament solution might just be to ban GA from those airfields.
Emir wrote:
That’s one of the areas where EC should act against the monopolistic position of fuel suppliers.
Funny proposal! What should EC actually do?
Close down every airfield that does not find at least 2 competing fuel suppliers – and of course has the infrastructure for 2 fuel stations/pumps/etc. per type of fuel?
Communize aviation fuel in the EU including expropriation of fuel companies and the airfield infrastructure?
Imposing a civil penalty on every airfield that does not provide an adequate choice of fuel at acceptable conditions (with a bunch of bureaucrats deciding every 6 months what is regarded to be acceptable)?
It’s just a wild speculation, but I’d assume that nothing that the EC could actually do would improve the availability of Avgas to SEP operators significantly….
Malibuflyer wrote:
Funny proposal! What should EC actually do?Close down every airfield that does not find at least 2 competing fuel suppliers – and of course has the infrastructure for 2 fuel stations/pumps/etc. per type of fuel?
Communize aviation fuel in the EU including expropriation of fuel companies and the airfield infrastructure?
Imposing a civil penalty on every airfield that does not provide an adequate choice of fuel at acceptable conditions (with a bunch of bureaucrats deciding every 6 months what is regarded to be acceptable)?
Nice set of interesting proposals from your side 
However, since the governments are heavily involved in selling fuel (special taxes before VAT are almost at level of fuel base price itself), we as a tax payers have the right to be protected from unfair pricing. It’s not the same as in supermarket where I have the option to buy one chocolate or the other. It’s heavily regulated market and buyers protection can and has to be implemented.
BTW When some food and cosmetics producers have been delivering products of different quality across different EU countries, EC intervened and forbid such practice and defined penalties for violation. Another examples are the banks (again heavily regulated business) that are forbidden to hide real interests on loans behind additional fees. There are many examples where government protects tax payers from unfair charges. And I believe many more where it should and unfortunately doesn’t.
Emir wrote:
However, since the governments are heavily involved in selling fuel
They are not at all – they just collect taxes!
Emir wrote:
It’s heavily regulated market and buyers protection can and has to be implemented.
It is not very heavily regulated – at least not in Germany and definitely not on EU level. It is like any other business where you sell a flammable liquid.
Emir wrote:
When some food and cosmetics producers have been delivering products of different quality across different EU countries, EC intervened and forbid such practice and defined penalties for violation.
That is wrong in so many accounts:
- They have not “been delivering products of different qualities” but Mr. Orban just claimed that. And this “Nutella-Crisis” has been in 2017.
- The EU has started an investigation that concluded in 2020 that this claim by Mr. Orban is simply wrong: While the recipes for certain branded food products are different from country to country, one could not find evidence that the quality is actually lower in some than in other countries. It’s just different taste.
- At no point in time did the EU intervene nor does it have any legal basis for such interventions – there is just one statement from the EU commission from 2017 that if the investigation would find out the claims are true they needed to think about creating the legal basis for intervening
Emir wrote:
Another examples are the banks (again heavily regulated business) that are forbidden to hide real interests on loans behind additional fees.
This is not an example for regulating prices at all but rather just one for regulating transparency on charges. BP was extremely transparent – which is why we have this thread…
Emir wrote:
There are many examples where government protects tax payers from unfair charges.
Really? On EC level? Where?
@Jujupilote wrote:
My problem is to visit the main Austrian cities, the bigger airports are by far the most convenient.The airport fees in Austria are quite low though. I remember from both Innsbruck and Graz, that the landing and parking fees were even extremely low (24h parking in LOWI less than 2€ on the main apron!). The most ‘expensive’ part was the approach fee from AustroControl (+/- 13€ for VFR 1.000 MTOW). So that might compensate the high fuel prices a bit. Also, you could consider refueling at another (uncontrolled) airfield on your way from/to those bigger Austrian cities, but that costs for sure some additional time. LOIH offers a very quick turnaround, but I’m not so sure about other aerodromes.
It must also not be forgotten that in Germany, BP fuel is alredy more expensive than they fuel at most of the smaller airfields. Add the fee, and it becomes matter of „if you really absolutely need fuel“.Absolutely, that makes BP-fuel in Germany in general quite unattractive already. Now with the new additional fees, it becomes really a kind of “emergency fuel”. Very very sad.
https://ec.europa.eu/growth/single-market/services/retail/unfair-trade-practices_en
https://www.concurrences.com/en/bulletin/news-issues/february-2021-ii-en/the-croatian-competition-authority-fines-a-mandarin-oranges-buyer-for-unfair
https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/A-8-2018-0267_EN.html#title1
LOWG Update:
A group effort (protest) was made and BP canceled the fees.
What remains is a 60L minimum uplift.
Not perfect, but better than before. Parking is around 5€ per 24h. Landing fees around 25-65€ depending on MTOW (<1000-<2000).
I recommend LJMB as a tech/fuel/nightstop near LOWG if you’re after cheaper fuel.
A group effort (protest) was made and BP canceled the fees.
Good – it shows that some results can be achieved.
I am a bit disappointed that no pragmatic self-serve solution seems to able to be found for those airports. I get it that building an underground tank or even a ground-level one is not always possible (and has maybe negligible ROI), and that the margins might be slim, but why not buy one of those mid-size self-serve bowsers for clubs that have floated around here in some discussions, and attach a debit/credit payment terminal like on almost every gas station? Needs only an electrical hookup, and the big bowser comes around to refill which is more economical than driving the truck around for 30L.
Sebastian_H wrote:
not buy one of those mid-size self-serve bowsers for clubs that have floated around here in some discussions, and attach a debit/credit payment terminal like on almost every gas station? Needs only an electrical hookup,
It is still easily a 100k investment required – who is paying 1 EUR/l more for avgas on the first 100.000l sold to compensate for this investment?
Sebastian_H wrote:
and the big bowser comes around to refill which is more economical than driving the truck around for 30L.
Not from a provider point of view: The fuel truck is around anyways. As is the driver that needs to refill heavy metal or a copter once in a while. It is actually more economical to use this employee to generate some additional revenues with hook up fees…
