Sainsburys offer cheapest fuel in Dacorum as average prices hit six-month high

Many motorists cutting back on car use, according to the AA. And the firm said the extension of the districts in which drivers get a special rural area fuel rebate has failed to kickstart sales at the pumps in some places.

The average price of petrol nationwide is now 117.19p a litre – up from 116.42p a month ago and above 117p for the first time since mid-December 2014.

Diesel is now averaging 121.0p a litre compared with 120.7p in mid-May.

Since the low point for fuel prices was reached on February 1 this year, average prices have risen by more than 10p a litre.

But it is supermarket giants Sainsburys which offer the cheapest petrol in the town with unleaded costing 115.9p at its Apsley Mill forecourt on London Road.

The cheapest you will find diesel in the Dacorum area is 119.9p again at Apsley Mill but also Tesco Hemel Hempstead on Jarman Way.

The prices were taken from a five-mile radius of the town and compared on the petrolprices.com website.

An AA/Populus survey showed that 37% of the 28,080 AA members polled had already started to cut back on car use, with this figure rising to 48% for lower-income drivers.

The rural fuel rebate scheme, previously only available for those living on some of the UK’s islands, was extended on May 31 to around 125,000 people living in remote mainland locations, with those eligible getting a 5p cut in pump prices.

The AA said today that this had led to a doubling of business at a Devon filling station but that some drivers in Scotland had missed out, apparently due to confusion with the scheme.

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