Once the envy of the nation, Adelaide petrol prices have gone south

In January, Adelaide petrol prices were cheaper than every capital city apart from Brisbane. By December, unleaded was the most expensive in mainland Australia.

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In the space of a year, Adelaide’s unleaded petrol price has rocketed from second-cheapest to second-most expensive.

In January, Adelaide, with an average price of 123.5c/L, was ranked just above the cheapest capital Brisbane, on 122c/L.

By December last year Adelaide’s average price had jumped to 156c/L and also climbed the rankings to second-most expensive behind only Hobart on 157.5c/L.

The figures were revealed by the RAA on Tuesday as it continues a battle to have a government-backed real-time fuel pricing app on the market.

RAA spokesman Mark Borlace said it was more important than ever for motorists to be able to log on and find out exact prices, backed by government information.

“What has happened recently in Adelaide is that the peaks in the regular unleaded cycle have been extended for more days by the retailers,’’ he said.

“The last cycle was extended for almost a week and regularly they are high for about five days now, rather than just a few days.

“This was especially noticeable in December.

“There is no clear reason why this is the case, but it may be that some of the larger stations found that their traffic did not drop off when they hit the peak so they kept it up there for longer.”

Mr Borlace said the current price trend was downward, so motorists should hold off buying, but beware a spike in prices around Australia Day when retailers tried to cash in on the long weekend trippers.

A number of private providers currently have apps available, with the most reliable called MotorMouth, because the data does not rely on motorists providing information.

Mr Borlace said capital cities which had government-backed real time fuel pricing — Brisbane, Sydney and Darwin — were all now below Adelaide on price.

The State Government promised real-time pricing would be made available to app developers during the 2018 election campaign, but has not yet implemented the reform.

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