"Fuel Prices" option in TomTom PLUS

[rkrmpg]

Perhaps this TomTom PLUS service icon has always been there but today I saw an icon that says "Fuel Prices".

When I click on this icon I get a red screen with the message "You have not joined this service. Yo can join using TomTom HOME".

I cannot seem to find anything related to fuel prices on TomTom Home.

I did a search on the TomTom web site and did not find anything related to "Fuel Prices" but doing a Google search using "tomtom" and "fuel prices" i get two results but the link and cached link does not have anything.

Am I missing something on TomTom Home or on the TomTom web site? Can anyone provide more details?

Using TomTom GO 720 version 7.221 and TomTom Home for OSX version 1.6 Build 020.

 

[neojohn]

hi rkmpg,
the reason why you didnt get it is because it is a subscribed service for tomtom plus....you have to pay to get it... i dont remember how much. but i'm sure you have to pay to get access to it.
i have home 2.1 and if you go to the add/update page of home 2.1, you can see option for paying for the fuel prices in the 2nd page or so.

 

[rkrmpg]

At the same time I posted this question here about the Fuel Price option I also asked this question on the TomTom support web site.

My question to TomTom was "I have a "Fuel Prices" icon on my TomTom but it says I need to enable that using TomTom home. On TomTom Home it says "This item cannot be installed on this kind of device". Is this really not available on the Go 720? If it is then what is the cost and is there a trial on this?"

The response from TomTom was, "The fuel price icon is not available and there is no scheduled ETA at this time. You can check back in the future to see if an availability date has been set. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you."

Today I received TomTom News as an e-mail message. Toward the bottom of the e-mail message there was a section called "This month's top FAQs".

The number two question in the e-mail FAQ is, "What is the Fuel Prices Service?" The newsletter links to http://www.tomtom.com/support/index.php?FID=6614&Lid=4

Since the Fuel Prices option is not available to the MAC TomTom Home users can someone please check to see what happens when they click on this with the PC version. Does it say it is available to US TomTom users? I am on vacation and do not have access to a PC this week.

Thanks

 

[RogerD]

According to TomTom CSR and TomTom Support web site, Fuel Prices via TomTom Plus Services is NOT available for the GO720. I know their website is poor when it comes to updates, did I get the correct answer from the CSR too? Does anyone know differently?

 

[thor01]

Interesting... as I also saw a banner at the bottom of TomTom Home which I clicked on and installed Fuel Prices on my GO720. It is now available under Plus Services on the device, and when searching Gas Station POI's it shows their prices.

 

[thor01]

Interesting... as I also saw a banner at the bottom of TomTom Home which I clicked on and installed Fuel Prices on my GO720. It is now available under Plus Services on the device, and when searching Gas Station POI's it shows their prices.

**UPDATE**

It seems although it is installed on my GO720, new updates to the fuel prices via TomTom Home does not work. According to TomTom Support, its the software on the GO720, and they are working on an update for it, so it should be available and working in the near future. I didn't try updating prices through my phone yet as my data isn't setup. Regardless Tomtom support was very nice and refunded my money.

 

[FlyGuy]

Fuel price updates don't work for me

**UPDATE**

It seems although it is installed on my GO720, new updates to the fuel prices via TomTom Home does not work. According to TomTom Support, its the software on the GO720, and they are working on an update for it, so it should be available and working in the near future. I didn't try updating prices through my phone yet as my data isn't setup. Regardless Tomtom support was very nice and refunded my money.

Fascinating! I have exactly the same problem on my 920. I have spent a couple hours on the phone with three different support people, trying to get my fuel prices to update.

The first support person explained that prices are changing so fast, their fuel pricing vendors can't keep up, so the prices will be somewhat our of date. He could not explain why my fuel price screen said "last update 9 days ago", yet the unit had been downloading updates almost every day.

The second one explained that the stations don't update their prices everyday, and it might take two or three days for a particular station to update. She could not explain why my fuel price screen said "last update 9 days ago", yet the unit had been downloading updates almost every day, and the prices were AT LEAST 9 days old (20 to 25 cents out of date) for all of 50 or so stations in my area. She hung up on me when I pointed out NONE of the stations had updated in 9 days, and insisted on talking to someone that understood how the updates were supposed to work.

The third said similar things to the first two at first, but quickly realized they didn't make sense. She said a reply from headquarters would take a couple days, since it was late Friday. I'm waiting, and quite disappointed, because the fuel prices is big reason I went with TomTom. I use ~1000-1200 gallons a year in my motorhome, so saving just 10 cents a gallon adds up.

 

[schuess]

Fuel price updates don't work for me

Fascinating! I have exactly the same problem on my 920. I have spent a couple hours on the phone with three different support people, trying to get my fuel prices to update.

The first support person explained that prices are changing so fast, their fuel pricing vendors can't keep up, so the prices will be somewhat our of date. He could not explain why my fuel price screen said "last update 9 days ago", yet the unit had been downloading updates almost every day.

The second one explained that the stations don't update their prices everyday, and it might take two or three days for a particular station to update. She could not explain why my fuel price screen said "last update 9 days ago", yet the unit had been downloading updates almost every day, and the prices were AT LEAST 9 days old (20 to 25 cents out of date) for all of 50 or so stations in my area. She hung up on me when I pointed out NONE of the stations had updated in 9 days, and insisted on talking to someone that understood how the updates were supposed to work.

The third said similar things to the first two at first, but quickly realized they didn't make sense. She said a reply from headquarters would take a couple days, since it was late Friday. I'm waiting, and quite disappointed, because the fuel prices is big reason I went with TomTom. I use ~1000-1200 gallons a year in my motorhome, so saving just 10 cents a gallon adds up.

I have the exact same problem on my recently purchased 930. I was expecting something like gasbuddy.com. Instead I get a message that the fuel price were last updated 15 days ago even though TomTom Home shows me downloading the new files everytime I hook it up to my computer. Guess I will be asking for a refund.

 

[FlyGuy]

The third said similar things to the first two at first, but quickly realized they didn't make sense. She said a reply from headquarters would take a couple days, since it was late Friday. I'm waiting, and quite disappointed, because the fuel prices is big reason I went with TomTom. I use ~1000-1200 gallons a year in my motorhome, so saving just 10 cents a gallon adds up.

I contacted TomTom using their support questions on the web, and they acknowledged there were programming problems affecting the gas prices subscriptions, that they were working to correct them, but did not give a time when it would be corrected.

 

[Gilbert]

I've been monitoring gas prices for about 8 years now. What I've found locally is that some stations are constantly the leaders. IOW, what you pay there is pretty much as cheap as you can for that day and time within a certain radius.

When travelling, there are some lines from where gas will sudenly drop or increase. For instance, for lower Ontario, Trenton divides an East-West fuel price difference. When not having gathered much price data on a long trip, I usually go to FlyingJ or other trucker spots. Chances are high they will have the cheapest price within a large radius. Then there are some who say you get what you pay for and second tier gas stations don't have as good gas and you would get lower mileage out of a gallon. My experience does not collaborate to that theory but it is very difficult to get identical conditions (temperature, wind speed and direction, car speed, tire inflation, traffic etc) to be able to draw meaningful conclusions.

As for a subscription for a fee, I strongly doubt I would go for one unless I was proven the data was extremely up-to-date. Increases are happening so often and quickly these days that I question the whole pricing of gas. Gas companies are making record increasing profits year after years. I know the barrel cost is increasing on the market but the gallon I'm pouring in the tank was bought months ago at a much lower cost and it did not cost the refining company the amount of money I'm paying to get it to the service station (excluding taxes of course). Some blame the speculation but somewhere someone is making huge profits and I can't see any competition except for raising prices and profits!

 

[Robm]

This seems to be a very important option now with the gas prices being what they are

 

[momcat1]

Fuel Prices subsrciption now does work on Go 720. I subscribed, and downloaded the software and it works. I do have a little trouble getting updates sometimes. It says it is updated and continues to show monht old prices. After updating the data 7 times most of the stations were accurate. Support could not explain how some local Mobil stations were still showing old prices.

 

[will381796]

Anyone have any idea about what the source of the fuel prices are? Do the gas stations report directly to some central database or are the fuel prices derived from individuals submitting gas prices they see to some website?

 

[FlyGuy]

Anyone have any idea about what the source of the fuel prices are? Do the gas stations report directly to some central database or are the fuel prices derived from individuals submitting gas prices they see to some website?

According to TT, they use information from two companies (Inrix and Opis) that compile pricing from credit card sales. Check out their sites. Nominally, the information is a day or two old by the time we get, and it's generally been accurate for me, except for some errors:

* the station is not where they say it is, but is in the area
* Some stations simply don't exist or are out of business, and these can be detected without driving there just because the gas price is shown 30 to 40 cents lower than the stations around it
* the station is there, in buisness, but is shown with a badly wrong price (this is rare)
* some stations that do exist are not shown. I've noticed this particularly with Shell stations (my favorite), and often, but not always, it's new (less than a year old).

Unfortunately, there is no way for the user to correct the fuel price database via Mapshare. I hope this changes, as it would make the service more useful.

 

[momcat1]

They started updating the fuel prices in the last half of June. Generally the data is good data, but they told me they are not responsible if the station operators do not keep their reporting up to date. In my home area there are half a dozen or so stations that are still reporting 6 month old pricing. The subsription costs $14.95 for US and Canada for a year.

 

[cputrdoc]

Push the point, with cash

I wrote support and asked if there was some way to restrict the fuel price list to prices received within the last 24 hours. That would eliminate gas stations that don't frequently report in or that have gone out of business from the listing. They responded that no, there is no way to do this currently. When I pushed the point and said I would unsubscribe unless I could tell what's truly the lowest price in the area, they said they would forward the comment to product managers as a feature suggestion, and offered me a refund on the service.

...so I took them up on it and the refund is being processed. Yes, I know the gas stations that are $3.98 are from last month's, but I can't tell about the prices that are listed as $4.46. That's a bargain around here, but still plausable. Then I arrive and it's $4.68. ...and I'm thinking, why did I waste gas to find this place?

Anyway, point is, money talks. TomTom makes a lot of money from after-market services. If the service is earning reasonable revenue, they'll have no reason to invest in improvements. If they start seeing refunds, there will be motivation to treat the feedback seriously and do something about it.

 

[FlyGuy]

...so I took them up on it and the refund is being processed. Yes, I know the gas stations that are $3.98 are from last month's, but I can't tell about the prices that are listed as $4.46. That's a bargain around here, but still plausable. Then I arrive and it's $4.68. ...and I'm thinking, why did I waste gas to find this place?

They do give the phone number, so a call to the suspect station might be worth it. In 5000 miles, I've found the prices have been within a penny, except for a couple of clearly wrong ones, and one in the wrong location. A call gets the facts.

 

[momcat1]

They do give the phone number, so a call to the suspect station might be worth it. In 5000 miles, I've found the prices have been within a penny, except for a couple of clearly wrong ones, and one in the wrong location. A call gets the facts.

That's fine IF there is a phone number. In our area most of them do not show phonenumbers in the fuel database.

On a good note, TomTom started daily gas updates. So for the stations that do report their latest prices, the accuracy is pretty close. The ones that were not updating before are still not updating.

I just wonder what we'll run into when we travel.

 

[netdoc]

Level 2

I have the fuel update as well. After several calls to tech support I finally figured out that the updates are downloading, you can see them in your tomtom home directory, but they are not being loaded to the unit. They sent me a link to clear my cache. That didn't work. They also had me rename my tomtom directory, that didn't work. They escalated my call to a level to tech and I am awaiting the phone call back from them. I will let you know what they find out.

 

[FlyGuy]

I have the fuel update as well. After several calls to tech support I finally figured out that the updates are downloading, you can see them in your tomtom home directory, but they are not being loaded to the unit.

The fuel price updates did not work for me until my 920 was updated to the version 8 software. Since then, it's worked properly.