Is petrol really this expensive? (I don't drive but it seems a lot)

[MidnightSun77]

I offered to pay my friend's petrol costs when she visits. It's approx 150miles each way, she drives a very small old car (can't remember the model but it's not one that would use a lot of petrol).

She says her petrol will cost £60. Is this reasonable for 300 miles?

I don't mind paying, but it's more than I expected especially as I'll also be paying for all meals out, drinks, taxi fares, day-trips etc.

Well, I have a small oldish car and it really eats up the petrol on motoreay so I'll say 'reasonable'!

Thanks for advice everyone I'm relieved many think this is a reasonable cost and as a pp said, she may not be used to this type of driving and has overestimated a bit by accident. So I'm going to give her the benefit of the doubt and not query it. I was just a bit startled when she initially said £60 as I'd expected it to be half this, but then I haven't driven for years so not familiar with petrol costs!
To people asking if she's on MN, no she isn't (or I wouldn't have posted this). I just wanted some different opinions (didn't want to pay then end up feeling resentful, or embarrass her by asking for receipt) but since it's plausible it might cost this much I feel reassured.

thats a tank of fuel here - just, I'd be on red arriving home! A tank is a little over £60. I drive a 10 year old picasso

I drive a 2 litre DIESEL land rover and put £70 in it a week. I'll get about 400 miles off that.

I suggested train but she said that would cost more.

If you are capable of posting on MN, you are capable of finding out on the internet how much a train is and corroborating this statement.

Then you can make an informed decision about train v car.

I think it sounds slightly on the high side for 300 miles. Given petrol prices are around £1.20 at the moment, and she is driving 300 miles and 40 mpg is not an unreasonable assumption on m-ways, that would cost £40. However at 30 MPG (which is also not unreasonable for an old small crappy car at high speeds) it would cost £55.

It's not just the fuel though is it, it's the wear and tear and extra mileage on the car also, that you have to take into account.

If your friend is out on her costs, it isn't by the sort of money it'd be worth falling out over, and could easily be a slight miscalculation. I hope you both have a great time.

Tbh if you made this very kind offer to me, I wouldn't really know how much it might cost me so I'd guess and I possibly would err on the side of caution to start with. But then if it turned out to be less then I'd let you know afterwards. I wouldn't be trying to rip you off, it'd be more of a "ooh that's so kind, this could end up costing £60, are you sure that's OK?"

I doubt many 150 mile return train journeys cost much less than £60. Trains are so expensive. Check National Rail though, maybe if very advance you could get a bargain.

my car does 400+ motorway miles for £40 diesel; it is a 2010 1.4l fiesta, so fairly new.

As petrol is cheaper than diesel, I think she's overstated it quite significantly!

I don't think that sounds too far off the mark, there are a number of factors when calculating mpg and not just the obvious, but for and older car with a small engine over 300 miles, you aren't being ripped off by any stretch.

You're not being ripped off, but anyone mentioning wear and tear, I don't think it's for the op to compensate her for wear and tear!!! Helping to pay for fuel in this situation is simply because otherwise the friend wouldn't be able to put in enough petrol to come.

At the moment I have 9 different cars that I use rather than keep as ornaments 7 of them are rather old things around the 20yo mark I like to tinker about with for amusement 2 of them are nice and new.

The only ones that come even close to 35/40 mpg are the new ones.

The old ones fuel wise are much much less economical fuel wise I would say that's a fairly reasonable guess.

My mother also seams to think I can travel from North Wales to Dorset on £21 she's obsessed with fuel usage and is utterly convinced it's doable even in a bloody monster truck ????

Our small, old car would cost similar for that distance. It's almost as bad as my mid 90s Defender, despite being considerably newer (well from this millennium at least) and massively smaller.

The peteol cost sounds roughly eight to me too. And also train fares could very well be the same or more, eapecially if you take into consideration getting to and from the stations.

I've got a 1.9 diesel car and it costs me £20 to do 112 miles on a motorway so depending on roads etc it does t sound unreasonable

We have an old Nissan micra and that would be about right for us.

We have an old saxo and that's about what we'd pay for the same distance. It totally depends on the car!

If the car is older than 7ish years its probably spot on

I have a ten year old Mondeo and it sounds about right to me. My mother lives 120 miles away and the train costs more than the fuel, though I can manage it for less by coach.

if my maths is right that is about 23 miles per gallon (old gimmer...)

my 10 year old 2 litre Mondeo does 35mpg or more even on short runs. So again if my maths is right, that journey will be about £50 in petrol for me with petrol at £1.15 per litre.

it's not the age of the car, it is many other factors. The big one being how it is driven.