We answered this question in our personal finance feature today:
Question: I am one of the thousands of people who live in Quezon City but work in Makati City. That means I drive some 20 kilometers to work every day, and that’s just one way. I tried commuting but it’s impossible during rush hour. With the price of gasoline going up, travel to and from work makes a huge dent in my budget. Is there any relief in sight for us? – Josephine P.
We all will have to deal with the rising cost of gas, whether or not we are from Quezon City, Bulacan, Cavite, Cebu or Davao. The most terrible forecast I have heard so far is for a full tank to cost P30,000. That’s almost the take-home pay of senior call center agents.
Full tank at P30,000? Goodbye car, hello MRT for many middle-class families. I see a lot of them in the MRT, even now. You can sense which MRT commuters used to bring a car to work. Pretty soon, Josephine’s “impossible” may turn to “no other choice.”
I like the sneaky tricks to save on gas:
- Lighten up the trunk. More weight in your car trunk will make your car work harder, using up more gas.
- At the gas pump, don’t top off the tank. The excess gas may spill and will amount to waste. Just stop filling at the automatic level.
- When parking, choose a shady spot to prevent gas from evaporating under the heat.
- Fill up your tank in the morning or evening when the air is cooler. At midday, gas may expand due to the heat and you will end up getting a lesser amount of gas.
One oil company has seen an opportunity in this crisis. Seaoil is offering a price lock prepaid card at P1,070 for 20 liters, or P53.30 per liter. They are selling the card only from June 10 to 16.
Good or bad deal?
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My article entitled “Inflation, your nest egg’s silent assassin” came out in the Philippine Daily Inquirer (print version) yesterday. It has a link where you can download the retirement worksheet from Augustus J.V. Ferreria.
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For those who are interested in learning about investing in the stock market, the Philippine Stock Exchange has a seminar called “Demystifying the Stock Market” on June 19, 2008, 6:00 to 10:00 PM, at the Trading Floor of the PSE Centre, Exchange Road, Ortigas Center, Pasig City. For more information please call the PSE Senior Specialist/Project Head at 6887537 or 9130054.
22 Responses to “Sneaky gas-saving tips”
Pages: « 5 4 3 [2] 1 » Show All
Pages: « 5 4 3 [2] 1 » Show All
June 11th, 2008 at 11:59 am
the only solution I can see is longer trains! I think the MRT and LRT trains are just too short/small for the present number of commuters.
Trains here in Singapore are 2-3 times longer that what we have in EDSA and I think we have more commuters.
If the current MRT/LRT fare is not enough to upgrade the trains, maybe they should see other sources of income, like advertisements onboard trains.
June 11th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Wow Paetechie, your basement parking must be huge - a 500M driveway! Hehehe.
Carpooling is definitely the way to go - I think ALL company HR offices should start carpool programs.
June 11th, 2008 at 8:08 am
Did you know that gas prices differ from one location to another? A few days ago, unleaded gas in Shell and Caltex Congressional Ave. in QC cost P55.07 per liter. Driving down EDSA toward Ortigas on the same day, I noticed that it’s P53.07 in Seaoil and Shell EDSA before GMA7. Then when I reached Shell Meralco Ave. in Pasig, it’s back to P55.07. At Shell on Kalayaan Ave. in Diliman, it was P54+ per liter. The next day, I filled up my tank at the EDSA gas station.
June 11th, 2008 at 5:34 am
“Goodbye car, hello MRT for many middle-class families. I see a lot of them in the MRT, even now. You can sense which MRT commuters used to bring a car to work.”
But is mass transport really a viable alternative to taking a car to work here in Metro Manila?
I’m amortizing a sizeable amount of money because of the difficulty of taking public transportation to Makati but with soaring gas prices, i’m now caught between a rock and a hard place.
EDSA’s MRT is just too damn crowded!
Outlook: Its possible that illegal shuttle services (FX) will sprout in new locations.
June 10th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
Owning a car now becomes a lifestyle rather than necessity. Buying a car now becomes a question of having a budget for fuel everyday. You cannot convert to AUTO LPG either as their price increase together with fuel prices, so this is not a long term solution and we will eventually see AUTO LPG hitting 50/li. I disagree taking off the VAT on OIL. Higher oil prices mean higher VAT collection, so the givernment must use this for affordable or mass transportation. We may soon become the next Singapore, everyone dependent on mass transportation and cars are for rich people only. The government will soon have to provide subsidized bus and jeeps aside from more MRT/LRT lines. The problem is MRTs capacity to fit in more people, so bigger trains to consider.