quote:

Originally posted by Joseph C. McKenzie:
I stopped buying gas from 76 a couple years back because of consistently poor fuel quality.

We've found that here in the Pacific Northwest, Union 76 pretty consistently has the least expensive price on diesel (don't know about gas since we don't really pay any attention to gas prices). So far, we haven't had a problem with their diesel.

I understand now Flying J have changed the credit card policy again starting September 1/08. In order to get the CASH price at the TRUCK ISLANDS, you must have their own FJ mastercard otherwise you will pay a .09 surcharge/gal with any other credit card. This only applies to the truck islands and not the RV islands, everything stays the same there. For people who want to use the truck islands because of the conveience and quickness of getting through, this is going to cost you another .09/gal if you don't have their card.

Toban

Toban,
Where/who did you hear this from?

Its true Gary, I meet the J people at the FMCA rally last week. You can use your own CC at truck pumps, $.09 pentalty. Use the J Credit card and you will save the $.09, and if you use your J travel card you save another $.01, for a total of $.10 per gallon. I signed up there for their Credit Card, not a bad deal since I hate the J RV service areas.

Their in house bank (TAB) card is convenient for those of us who prefer not to go inside before pumping at the truck islands. But be sure to pay it off fully each month since its default interest rate is about 20%.

Jim

I'm beginning to wonder if the J wants the big rig RV market. Without the cash price, using my CC, (that gives me and additional 5%) the J is just another "vanilla" truck stop. Until now, they set themselves apart from the competition.

If I use their CC I the loose 5% cash back on my CC. If I use my CC I loose the cash price. At 65 feet (coach and toad) I am too long to use the RV pumps. I'm not sure the J wants my business.

Flying J is just trying to keep their prices competitive. When you use a charge card at the pumps, Flying J has to pay a discount rate to the credit card company. A 2% credit card discount rate on diesel fuel right now is about 9 cents a gallon. They're just trying to level the playing field so that the credit card companies don't suck up all of the profits. Actually their are tiered rates that a business pays for accepting credit cards. In my business if a customer uses a rewards card I pay a higher transaction rate than a non-rewards card. Those rewards have to come from somewhere. If you have a 3-5% rewards card, chances are the card company is beating it out of the merchant and not paying it out of the goodness of their heart.

I don't see them as not wanting the RVer's business any more than they don't want the trucker's business. By using their own credit card they don't have to pay the discount rates, which helps keep their overhead down so that they can be price competitive.

In actuality, they aren't charging a surcharge. They are establishing the credit price as the regular price and then giving you a 9 cent discount for paying cash or using their own MasterCard. It's all the same. You post the cash price and then add on for credit or you post the credit price and deduct for cash or the Flying J card.

I do know that I won't go through the RV lanes any more. They are way too tight for my rig and they just aren't laid out very well for traffic flow. I guess I'll just have to get a Flying J MasterCard. It's not like I have to use it for everything. I'll just use it for fuel.

When I spoke to the Honchos at the Flying J booth at the FMCA Rally, they seemed to be rather smug. I asked about upgrades to the RV service areas due to them being so tight for larger rigs. They responded with, New J's may get improved RV fueling lanes, BUT, the older ones will remain the same. Reason, we don't want to spend the money for upgrades. Truck isles work just fine for me, and yes, I will take the $.10 thank you.

Mark,
Let's look at this from a customer point of view. With the current program, the J has a competitive advantage and I use them exclusively. With the new program they are no different than their competitor(s); unless I spend $s in the store. Cash price is the cash price. The bottom line is with the new program, I pay more. This makes me feel less loyal to the J.

What the J has done, in 2008, is make changes to their program (for what ever reason(s)) that do nothing to keep my loyality. If I was a J executive, I'd be concerned about this. J executives really need to get their act together and come up with how to retain loyality.

I wonder what percentage of the Js RV customers use the truck lanes vs those that use the RV islands. At 60+ feet I'm one of those that use the RV island. There we do get the cash price with a credit card. I have never considered the $.01 per gallon discount an incentive anyway. 50 to 70 cent per fill-up is not a make or break issue. We get the discount or incentive from the credit card we use to enhance the cash price. On occasion I have taken advantage of the availability of propane and once I found that I had run out of water and resupplied while fueling. (It's on my agenda to upgrade to the See Level tank gages.) The J's changes really have made no significant difference to those us who use the RV islands. For those who go through the truck lanes it appears that you are losing most of your incentive to fuel at the J over any of the other truck stops. Maybe they feel that the RVs using the truck lanes are not that big of percentage of their RV business or that they are going to still get a percent of the RVs using truck lanes anyway, why cater?