With the retail price of gasoline RON 97 has reached an all-time high in Malaysia, reaching RM4.70 per liter two weeks ago, the question was not whether fuel sales would fall, but by how much.
Now we have a rough idea. According to Datuk Abdul Wahid Bidin, Chairman of Shell Petroleum Dealers Association Malaysia (SPDAM), sales of RON 97 gasoline started to plummet as its retail price over RM4and is now at least 65% off, like Chinese press report.
“Since it surpassed RM4 a month ago, sales of RON 97 gasoline have dropped significantly. However, this does not really affect the sales of petrol stations, as consumers will switch to RON 95 gasoline,” he said. He added, whether it is RON 97 or RON 95 gasoline, the profit margin the dealer gets from selling gasoline is 15 sen/liter, so even if an increase in RON 97 gasoline leads to a decrease in sales, the dealer will still earn commission from selling RON 95 gasoline.
He added that the increase in the price of RON 97 gasoline will not only affect users, because if people use credit cards to pay for RON 97 gasoline, petrol operators will make less profit. “When customers use a credit card, the operator has to pay a transaction fee of 1% per liter of gasoline, which means the higher the price of gas, the higher the fee we have to pay,” he explained.
Meanwhile, Chairman of the Petroleum Dealers Association of Malaysia (PDAM) Datuk Khairul Annuar Abdul Aziz said that the decline in sales of RON 97 has been going on for a while, starting to drop significantly after prices crossed the RM3.50/litre mark.
“This is nothing new. Customers have already started switching to RON 95 gasoline, so the conversion is not too big. As for how much sales of RON 97 gasoline across the country have fallen, I can’t say exactly how much. Some gas stations that used to sell 2,000 liters of RON 97 gasoline a day, now only sell 300 liters,” he said.
