Derrel Green retired 15 years ago from the big seat at the front of an RTD bus, but he still drives a route most days--only now the ride is a glistening silver Toyota Highlander and the stops are a series of gasoline stations near his West Covina home.
Green is on the lookout for pump prices that he can feed to a free Web site that helps consumers find the best deals on gasoline.
Green is a devotee of www .gasbuddy.com, but there are a few other such Web sites and thousands of other such volunteers. These are people willing to burn precious petrol in the monitoring of tens of thousands of gasoline prices nationwide so that fellow motorists can save a few dollars per fill-up.
"To me, it's a hobby," said Green, who routinely sees price differences of 20 cents or more per gallon among the retailers he surveys. "I kind of got hooked."
The Internet would seem to be the perfect forum for this kind of activity. Like a band of traveling coupon-clippers, these gas price "spotters" join together to find the best and worst fuel prices posted each day in communities across the country.
It is a service with noble intentions but with perhaps a limited audience. Because as much as Americans enjoy grousing about the price of gasoline, we are less likely to do something about it, gas experts say.
"I don't think consumers care as much as they say they do," said John Umbeck, an economics professor at Purdue University who has studied gasoline marketing. "In today's society, the price of time is just too important."
Still, there is no disputing that gasoline prices can swing by a dime or two per gallon in the space of only a few blocks. Such differences are what drive these gasoline price sites and irk the gas spotters, an enthusiastic bunch with a pronounced skepticism about major gasoline producers.
The oldest is the regional gas price survey conducted each week by the Utility Consumers' Action Network, a San Diego-based consumer advocacy group. The survey is so well followed that retailers have been known to wait until after the survey is posted each Tuesday (at www.ucan.org) before they raise prices.
UCAN uses its pricing survey to push its argument that gasoline is priced unfairly in the San Diego area and that lack of competition keeps prices higher there than in Los Angeles.
The group also hopes to jolt visitors to the gasoline section of its Web site into becoming more savvy shoppers, said Michael Shames, UCAN's executive director.
