Here is the official petrol price for November 2018 – with a nasty shock for diesel

The Department of Energy has published the fuel price adjustments for November 2018 – announcing no changes to petrol prices, with another nasty hike for diesel. According to the department both grades of petrol (93 and 95) will see no increase of decrease, while diesel will be going up by between 48 and 51 cents per litre (for 0.05% sulphur and 0.005% sulphur, respectively).

Illuminating paraffin will also see a price hike, going up between 28 cents per litre (wholesale) and 37 cents per litre (Single Maximum National Retail price).

LPGas will drop by 61 cents per kilogram.

• 93 Octane – No change
• 95 Octane – No change
• 0.05% Diesel – 48 cents increase
• 0.005% Diesel – 51 cents increase

While the flat petrol price is a welcome change from the months of hikes, data from the Central Energy Fund from around the middle of October and into November pointed to a petrol price cut of between 10 and 20 cents.

Economists, too, predicted that motorists would get some relief.

According to the CEF’s data, the petrol price showed an over-recovery of 22 cents per litre at the time of changes – meaning pump prices should have dropped by that amount.

However, because the combined cumulative petrol and diesel slate balances at the end of September 2018 amounted to a negative balance of R2.2 billion, in line with the provisions of the self adjusting slate levy mechanism, a slate levy of 21.92 c/l will have to be implemented into the price structures of petrol and diesel with effect from 7 November 2018, the department said.

This completely negates the 22 cent per litre over recovery for petrol, and added a further 22 cents per litre charge to the diesel price.

Slate levy?

The fuel price is calculated on a daily assessment of the basic fuel price, weighed against the basic fuel price structures at the time. The balance of this leads to an over- or under-recovery, which guides the prices higher (under-recover) or lower (over-recovery).

According to Autotrader, these calculations are done for each day in the fuel price review period and an average for the fuel price review period is calculated.

This monthly unit over/under recovery is multiplied by the volumes sold locally in that month and the cumulative over/under recovery is recorded on a Cumulative over/under recovery account (referred to as the “Slate Account”).

A slate levy is applicable on fuels to finance the balance in the Slate account when the slate is in a negative balance.

The table below outlines the official prices from Wednesday.

This article was sourced from BusinessTech; the original publication can be viewed here.