'One oil' fined €14,000 for over-charging

By Meghann Scully

A Dublin petrol station has been found guilty for a short measure on the sale of motor fuel. One oil located on Ushers quay in Dublin pleaded guilty in the Dublin District court for 12 charges for breaching the legislation of the Legal Metrology Service Act 1996.

Picture from Irish Independent website

The trader was fined €14,000 under section 33 of the act. The investigation and subsequent fining was after it numerous complaints were made by motorists in August of 2010. After investigations and further complaints in February 2011, the station was found to have broken seals and was under measuring motorists. Based on the facts the director of legal metrology proceeded to prosecute the trader.

One Oil is one of Dublin’s busiest petrol stations. It is the final station leaving Dublin city and it does an extensive trade. It was known as one of the more expensive stations but after new management took over in recent years, it became one of the cheaper stations. The station is used regularly by ambulance services and the gardaí.

A measuring instrument is used by all petrol stations to ensure that customers are receiving the correct amount of fuel purchased. One oils motor fuel count was inaccurate and was breaching unauthorized fraudulent adjustment. The petrol station pleaded guilty to short measures of fuel and misuse of the instrument under sections 18 and 28 of the act.

After the fine was handed down Maurice Buckley, CEO of the National Standards Authority of Ireland said “This successful prosecution in the service station sector underscores the important work of LMS in helping to protect consumers from unscrupulous traders.

“During 2010, inspectors from NSAI’s Legal Metrology Service visited almost 4,000 trader’s premises and tested more than 17,000 measuring instruments used in trade, such as supermarket weighing scales, taxi meters where the correct charge or cost to consumers is dependent on accurate quantity measurement. We are not in the business of putting people out of business, but prosecuting persistently non-compliant traders is as important as ever to protecting consumers.”

In 2010 over 8,000 fuel pumps across 1,300 petrol stations were inspected. Over 2,000 warning regarding equipment adjustments were issued to traders.  One trader didn’t take proper measures in fixing the equipment and so 13 prosecutions were made against him, 10 of which resulted in convictions. All of those prosecutions were in relation to non-compliant taxi meters.

Pat Farragher, Director, LMS, said, “Through  our enforcement of Metrology legislation, NSAI’s LMS aims to encourage high measurement compliance in trading transactions, thus ensuring confidence by consumers in the quantities of goods they purchase, while at the same time supporting a fair and competitive environment for businesses through the maintenance of consistent standards for measurement.

“The level of warnings and prosecutions underlines the effectiveness of the compliance culture within the economy underpinned by LMS inspections.”