Petrol price war at the supermarket

A pre-Christmas petrol price war has broken out on the forecourts of UK supermarkets.

Asda and Tesco have both slashed the price of unleaded petrol by up to 3p a litre.

Drivers who fill up at Asda will pay a maximum of 103.9p for a litre of unleaded and 105.9p for a litre diesel. Prior to the price cuts, drivers were paying an average of 108.99p for unleaded and 110.26p for diesel.

Asda's commercial director, David Miles, said: 'With Christmas just around the corner, it's a time when cash is tight and we want to help our customers make it go further.'

Tesco has matched Asda's price cuts, while Sainsbury's says it prices on a local level and would remain 'competitive'.

Prices should have dropped 'weeks ago'
The supermarket giants have said they are passing on a drop in the price of crude oil, but the AA has said the retailers were still 'a bit slow' in cutting prices and could have passed on the saving weeks ago rather then wait for Christmas.

Paul Watters from the AA said supermarkets had avoiding passing on savings for as 'long as they could before someone started pointing the finger at them'.

'The supermarkets have done this in the past. They will lead the market and hopefully we will now see the premium brands follow suit.'

The AA also said that the price of fuel will be pushed up again when the rate of VAT returns to 17.5% on January 1.