Shelf shortages

[spanish_lad]

I don't really understand it.

If 6 months ago the cost of running your truck all day was say, €150 and you are self employed, you get all the iva back on the fuel, so they charge say €300 for the days work.

If now the fuel costs €200, and they still get the iva back, and they charge €300 for the days work, it means they make less profit.

If their base costs have gone up (the price of diesel) then charge enough to cover that so that the profit is the same? Charge €330 instead of the €300.

If the price of fuel has gone up due to the war in Ukraine, driving about beeping and causing disruption is not going to make any difference, the companies will just find other drivers who are willing to move the goods?

[qe2ex]

I don't really understand it.

If 6 months ago the cost of running your truck all day was say, €150 and you are self employed, you get all the iva back on the fuel, so they charge say €300 for the days work.

If now the fuel costs €200, and they still get the iva back, and they charge €300 for the days work, it means they make less profit.

If their base costs have gone up (the price of diesel) then charge enough to cover that so that the profit is the same? Charge €330 instead of the €300.

I imagine many of these drivers have contracts negotiated a while back, and if the contract says 300 per day, that is what they'll get paid, regardless of whether their cost has now increased fro 150 to 200 or 250. That is, unless the contract includes clauses related to the cost of fuel, which, since they are honking and annoying the rest of us so much, I guess their contract does not.

[costakid]

local bus company near us in the UK that does the school runs work on 15% profit margin as cut throat business. Fuel has gone up over 50%, how long will he survive? At this rate and looking at the age of his fleet i think skint in next few weeks.

[Wicksey]

Went to get a new gas tank today but the BP station in Torrox had sold out of all butano. No idea when the next delivery may be. We didn't drive around looking as it was a Cepsa tank and we have mainly Repsol around us. We do have a spare Repsol tank so we may end up taking both out next time we go out in the hope of finding some.

[katy]

Seems to be a worldwide problem. Doubt if its just Ukraine crisis. There was a report on El Pais in English with same issues happening in the USA. Next thing the travel industry will be adding surcharges especially cruises.

[Wicksey]

Our shortages problems here are also due to the hauliers strike. Our local fruit shop had bananas though so we'll survive for now!

[spanish_lad]

Went to get a new gas tank today but the BP station in Torrox had sold out of all butano.

The BP in alhaurin had about 10 left a minute ago, I felt bad taking 2 one for us, and one for dad.

He said "don't worry, we will get more tomorrow"...

[Wicksey]

Mercadona and Lidl had a fair amount in today (although not the catfood I needed, nearly all dry cat and dog food were sold out in Mercadona) and a fair selection of fruit and veg. Still no gas in though. I noticed things were more expensive. The catfood was priced at about 60c more than previously and the wine I usually buy was more too.

[Free at Last]

It is reported in the press that an agreement between the Government and transport sector representatives was reached in the early hours of this morning on the financial help to be provided to bring an end to the protests (including subsidising the cost of fuel by 20 centimos per litre) so hopefully the shortages should ease next week.

https://elpais.com/economia/2022-03-25/ ... porte.html

[Wicksey]

The shops weren't too badly stocked on Wednesday and we managed to get the last gas tank from the garage yesterday. Hopefully things will start to get back to normal if this agreement all goes through.

[olive]

It was only milk in short supply yesterday. Only Puleva products available. Presumably they have their own in house haulage. I feel sorry for the farmers- you cannot just switch cows off.

[1bassleft]

Maxi Dia must have deliverers more strident. Last week, it looked like the locusts had been in and, a few days ago, the normal fruit and veg section was just a row of collapsed plastic trays where the produce would normally be. Not quite so bad in Maskom and Carrefour but I hope that FaL's post is a sign that things will return to more normal.

[Wicksey]

I've heard that Mercadona have their own supply chain as there was barely any shortages in there apart from animal food. A lorry was just delivering more stuff as we were leaving, so it's not been so bad. I am fully stocked with everything we need this week now and hopefully things will ease if they do end the strike.

[chrissiehope]

Here in UK, I went to Lidl today, & there were quite a few empty shelves - no tomatoes(apart from baby plum ones), some medicinal items were things I had gone in for, can't remember what else, but gaps were noticeable..

[Pamela1]

Where i live in the Uk the local Morrisons store has never had fully stocked shelves in the past 2 years. Before covid/brexit there was never a gap to be seen.

[1bassleft]

Yes, I was stuck in UK through most of 2020 and practically all of 2021 and I can vouch for the Morrisons (more so than others, for some reason) scarcity. Mineral water, bizarrely, was about as easily transported as an oligarch's yacht. The odd 1.5 litre of something but mostly packs of lunchbox 330ml bottles. Apart from HGV driver shortages, I have no rational explanation for UK springs turning dry (although other basics were clearly missing).

Given that the locust-shelves in Malaga province have coincided with very noticeable protest drives here of the camiones, it does go to show how much we rely on truckers to get what we come to expect actually landing within walking distance of our domiciles. I know a bit about their abysmal treatment in the UK, and have started to read about fixed-price deliveries in ES that take no account of fuel price increases, so I do have a fair bit of sympathy for their plight.

[Free at Last]

It seems the agreement reached a couple of days ago may not bring an end to the protest as many of those taking part say they will keep the protests going as they are not happy with the terms agreed, and don't consider them to go far enough. The new measures are not supposed to come into effect until 1 April anyway, and the subsidies involved will have to be claimed so it could be ages before they would see any benefit. I too feel sorry for them.

https://www.malagahoy.es/malaga/Camione ... 33114.html

So we will have to see whether the shelves are better stocked during the coming weeks. I shop at Mercadona and have also found them to be pretty much fully stocked, although we couldn't get a pack of 3 kitchen rolls yesterday morning (although they did have the packs of 6) nor any salted peanuts (there were very few other nuts either). Certainly nothing we couldn't manage without.

[olive]

I wonder the same about Amazon. Next day ( often “ free” ) rural deliveries. We are used to the various carriers having a specific day of the week for our area. The pressures on the carriers must be immense.

[spanish_lad]

Check the YouTube documentales about amazon delivery drivers. Anyone with a vehicle can do it, and they get paid per package etc. Not sure if that's only in the USA or its in Europe as well.

[spanish_lad]

https://youtu.be/TlcP2aTOp-Q its called "amazon flex" and the opening scene is a queue of 20-30 cars waiting to fill up with packages .