They say that the advantage of being experienced is that there are very few situations that catch you by surprise. Having been around the block a few times, when something crops up that seems extraordinary to others you can just give a wistful smile because you've seen it all before and, more importantly, you know how to deal with it.

A couple of years ago one of my friend's daughters moved down to London. For some strange reason, my friend thought I was the right guy to ask for some property advice. The question was whether his daughter should buy a flat or rent one.

A few months ago I was musing over whether the concept of loyalty could be applied to the forecourt industry. At the time my comments were mainly focused on our customers and whether loyalty cards per se were a worthwhile proposition. Of course, the other side of the coin is the relationship we have with our suppliers, when we are the customers.

I suppose I shouldn't really have been that surprised. I mean, there had been some indications over the past few years - a little phrase here, a little inaction there, but even so when it finally came I found it sadly staggering. What I'm talking about is the official, public announcement that as far as this government is concerned small retailers are of no significance. We don't matter. In the grand scheme of things we are expendable. If we chose to be small independent retailers then that's our choice and we have to accept the consequences. Don't come whingeing, don't expect any help. In fact about the only thing a small retailer can expect from No 10 these days is more red tape and more taxes.

A long time ago I devised my own Petrol Retailers master calendar. In truth this wasn't exactly a world-beating breakthrough in the science of retailing, but with the little modifications I made each year, it grew into a very useful document. Basically the calendar started by listing any event that could possibly bring in extra sales. It then worked backwards so that it prompted you to start sourcing products and devising strategies far enough in advance to ensure you could maximise your potential when the 'event' arrived.

Unusual name, Jerome. The only time I had come across it before was when it took two Jeromes to get three men up a river in a boat. Presumably thanks to the marvels of modern technology, it now takes just one Jerome to get one bank £3bn up the creek without a paddle! Of course, he would say that if the bank had held its nerve its loss would only have been £1.3bn instead of £3bn.

Loyalty points, loyalty schemes, loyalty rewards. That word 'loyalty' really is an interesting one. We use it all the time but what does it mean for a retailer? In its true sense 'loyalty' is a devotion and/or commitment to someone or something come what may. Despite everything that may happen and whatever inducements may be offered to the contrary, you continue to keep faith with the object of your loyalty. Doesn't exactly ring true for a retailer, does it?

Last month, while trying to fathom out Shell's kamikaze fuel pricing policy, I posed the question 'Do you have to keep your fuel price highly competitive in order to sustain your c-store turnover?'. Now they say that, when cross examining, a good barrister never asks a witness a question that he doesn't already know the answer to and I'm beginning to wish I had remembered that advice. As Shell continues to increase its blitzkrieg on the independent dealers' margin, and as I continue to struggle to understand what the hell it is up to, I can't stop this bloody question rattling around in my head.

The advantage of having been around the block a few times is that your experience ought to help prevent you from doing anything too disastrous. Unless you've been exceptionally lucky you've found out the hard way that embarking on a course of action without weighing up all the possible consequences can be an expensive and time-consuming exercise

Who would have thought it? TV screens showing queues of people desperate to withdraw their savings from a bank they had thought safe. Not in Argentina, not in a banana republic, but in dear old Blighty. So how did this amazing state of affairs come to pass, and what's it got to do with us?

So farewell, then, mister cheque - you served us well. Well, actually, if the truth be told you were really a right pain in the arse, but we used to handle a hell of lot of you once upon a time. Check for the Shakespeare hologram, does the sort code match, which building society is it that you can't be certain of, check the signature... the list was endless. Quite how we didn't end up with many more bounced pieces of paper I'll never know. The news that even Sainsbury's has stopped accepting cheques in its stores from August must surely hasten their complete demise from all forms of retail. For once petrol retailers were ahead of the game - most of us had banned them a long time ago, but that didn't stop us from getting stick from the odd customer (and, boy, do we get some odd customers) who reckoned we couldn't refuse his perforation. At least it won't only be 'you petrol retailers' who are accused of being rogues and vagabonds.

Global warming, don't you just love it! Or not. Back in April we were all sweltering and being warned not to waste water as this summer was going to be a scorcher. Cancel those holidays abroad, we won't need to fly anywhere to get a great tan. Just sit in your back garden and soak it up.

So, after 10 years it's farewell to Uncle Tony. Ten years is a remarkable achievement by anyone's standards and, who knows, if it wasn't for Iraq maybe the 10 could have become 15 (mind you, if it wasn't for the poll tax maybe Maggie would still be prime minister). Well, we know how it's been for you but how has it been for us?

The other week I'd plonked myself down in front of the telly and was indulging in a spot of channel-hopping, when I chanced upon the BBC's Whistleblower programme featuring Tesco and Sainsbury. For those of you who didn't see it, two reporters went undercover - one at a Tesco's and the other at a Sainsbury's, to work on the fresh fish and meat counters. Neither of them had any previous experience but both blagged their way into the jobs.

So, another May, another round of local elections. As Tony prepares to ride off into the sunset (and no doubt start earning enough from the after-dinner speaker roadshow to make him the major breadwinner in the Blair household for the first time), and Prudence readies himself to get his own hands on power, it is no surprise to see the government launching all sorts of 'new' initiatives in a forlorn hope of swaying the voters. Now although the number of voters that need swaying at local elections is probably less than a season's attendance figures at the Theatre of Dreams, certain policies have a sense of déjà vu.

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. In the ever-muddied waters of forecourt retailing the difficulty, sometimes, is to work out who is doing the imitating and who is being flattered. There is absolutely no doubt that the major winners in our trade (in fact every bugger's trade) over the past 10 years have been the hypers.

Loyalty cards have been very much in the news recently. I don't know whether you saw the recent documentary about Tesco's clubcard, but if you did I'm sure you would have been impressed by its scale and potential economic and marketing power. So the question is, are loyalty cards worthwhile in the forecourt market in 2007?

Recently that motley crew of the world's most powerful people all met up at Davos in Switzerland for the World Economic Forum. Despite its name, this Forum doesn't confine itself to economic matters but tries to hold discussions on a wide-ranging set of issues. Of course, Uncle Tony, Prudence Brown and the boy Dave were all in attendance, strutting their stuff and hoping to further their own ambitions.

I PARTICULARLY LOOK FORWARD to the period between Christmas and New Year. It's one of the few times in the year that I give myself a few days off. Of course I go in on Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day - not full days you understand, just a few hours to show my face. I think this is important if you expect your staff to work these unsociable hours. Luckily my delivered trade supplier always carries out stocktaking during this time, so there's no big order to oversee. I've usually so over-ordered on fuel that tankers aren't a problem so, emergencies excepted, it's the ideal time to slope off for a couple of days.

So here we are in December, another year nearly gone. It would be nice to claim that I've been too busy to properly prepare an end of year report but, sadly, that hasn't been the case. In truth, October and November just haven't seen the usual increase in activity from our punters. I know it's not due to the competition as that hasn't changed. And I'm pretty sure it's not that my operation has worsened.

"is there one or two? Well, if you lot can't agree how do you expect me to decide?" So might the imaginary conversation go at the Competition Commission during its investigation into the grocery market. Predictably, the arguments put forward by the hypers et al are very much along the lines of self-interest. Tesco says there's only one. Morrisons agrees (although I'm not quite sure why) while, predictably, Asda and Sainsbury claim there are two. And as for good old M&S's suggestion that you have to consider the type of retailer, well that could lead to a definition of four or five markets!

"AN ANNUAL APPEAL to the unwise by the unscrupulous which annually succeeds." Yes, folks, it's the Party Political Conference season. In my youth I used to follow these events avidly - now, like the vast majority of the British public, I can't even be bothered with the 30-second sound bites you get on the news. I wonder if, one day, I will turn on the TV and hear a party leader say something like following.

ONCE UPON A TIME a time there was a concept called common sense. This was back in the days when men held doors open for women (who wore skirts), schoolboys wore short trousers and doffed their caps to their teachers and shops were shut on Sundays. In those days people sometimes suffered physical misfortune and some of those misfortunes were given the quaint, ancient name of 'accident'. This was generally applied to situations where something went wrong when performing a routine task that normally had no adverse consequences. A boy shinned up a tree but a branch broke and he fell down skinning his knee. Someone walking along a pavement, talking to a friend, didn't notice one of the paving slabs was raised, so tripped twisting an ankle.

I DON'T KNOW ABOUT YOU, but I'm a bit of a footie fan. Now I'm not talking here as a 'World Cup convert.' I'm talking instead as a dyed-in-the wool terrace fan, the sort that actually didn't mind standing on an open terrace at 3 o'clock on a Saturday afternoon with the rain pouring down his neck, provided his team was stuffing their local rivals.

NOW, AS SOME OF YOU WILL REALISE, I've been around the petrol scene for quite some time. No, I wasn't about when the guy with the red flag had to walk in front of your motor, but it is true that I remember wind-up petrol pumps and shots of Redex. One of the advantages of longevity in this trade is that you quite often get to see things second time around.

SO NOW WE WILL ALL have to work until we are 68 before we get a state pension. Well, actually, you will have to work until you're 68 - I won't because I'm an old fart who's been around so long I will still be able to put my feet up at 65. Not that I ever envisage that will be the case - as I mentioned last month, the prospect of spending 24/7 with her indoors doesn't bear thinking about.

TO SELL OR NOT TO SELL, that is the question. Whether 'tis better to suffer the slings and arrows of dealing with Joe Public and make a living for now or take the dosh while it's on offer and put your feet up.

SO WHAT DID YOU THINK of the show, then? Now okay, as far as the equipment side goes this was the 'intermediate' year in the two-year cycle so I wasn't expecting a massive turnout from the suppliers. So I wasn't disappointed! Having said that, those suppliers who did attend put on a pretty decent effort and there were a few new ideas to seek out.

ANOTHER MARCH and another forecourt show. Well, almost. The days of a standalone forecourt show packed with exhibitors of forecourt equipment have, of course, long since gone, consigned to the memory of when there were 20,000 forecourts. So now we have the combination of forecourts and convenience stores, and entirely appropriate that is too.

SO HOW DID YOUR December end up then? While the High Street as a whole had a late revival, discussions with my friends seem to point to forecourts having a pretty thin time of it all. Volumes and margins were OK, and once upon a time that would have been enough to make us happy bunnies. But that was in the days when your shop sales were the froth at the top of the glass. Now it’s the other way round and from all accounts most people’s shop sales were significantly down. The cause is not hard to find. It’s those bloody hypers again. Remember when we used to sell loads of confectionery selection packs, boxed chocolates, after dinner mints etc? Then there were all those extra soft drinks and crisps. More recently, those of us who had invested in alcohol had the added bonus of those last-minute cans and bottles of wine. When the likes of Asda, Tesco et al sell at prices at or below our cost levels, it becomes impossible to compete. Who’s going to buy a box of Milk Tray for nearly £6 when you can get a 1.2kg tin of Celebrations for £5? And with larger scale purchases, like two cases of beer for £16, the scope for last-minute top-ups diminishes – our customers are awash with the stuff.

FIRST OF ALL LET ME give credit where credit is due. A few months back I was pretty scathing about the way the oilers had mishandled the effects of the fuel non-protest protest. On the basis that it was a foreseeable event, I had asked where were the contingency plans and whatever had happened to the pro-active style of management? Well, along comes Buncefield and at last we see management earning its stripes. Now I’m not near the terminal, so maybe I’ve got a distorted view of the situation in the aftermath of the explosion, but considering how tight the whole supply chain has become in our industry, the effect on my deliveries has been far less than I would have anticipated.

SO THAT'S ANOTHER £2,000 a year to find. An increase of 20p an hour in the National Minimum Wage may not sound a lot (and at just over 4% it’s thankfully one of the smallest increases for a while) but if you’re open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, allow for 20 ‘extra’ hours for cleaning, stocking and paperwork and pay four weeks holidays, £2,000 is what the bill comes to. If you want to get really depressed, chuck in the fall of mobile top-up revenues and the erosion of utility income as every little shop gets its own Paypoint/Payzone terminal and you now need to find nearly £4,000. Oh, it’s being this cheerful that keeps me going. Luckily it’s not all doom and gloom. Thank goodness for booming bottled water sales and the ever-increasing demand on car valeting is what I say.

To SAY SEPTEMBER has been an interesting month is a little bit of an understatement. As I write this article Hurricane Rita is coming onshore. Quite often, when a disaster is anticipated the actual event is thankfully less severe. It’s the ones that aren’t anticipated that seem to be more devastating. Let’s hope that Rita comes into this category and, from a selfish point of view, let’s hope that the refining capacity around Houston remains relatively unscathed. We’ve enough problems with fuel prices without another ratcheting-up of demand on the European scene.

FOR THOSE OF US in the southeast, it’s been a long, hot, dry summer. For those in the north it’s been more a question of what summer? For all of us, however, the price of product has been red hot! I’ve lost count of the number of times Platts has soared above its previous record and I’ve thought that we must surely have reached a peak only to see it rise another couple of pence in the next few weeks.

SO, SUMMER HOLIDAY time again. I don’t know about you, but once upon a time I couldn’t wait to get on that sun-lounger. Get the old suntan cream on, order up a couple of drinks and just lie there and frazzle. Guess it must be a sign of me getting older (or perhaps that I’m not working hard enough!) but now, after a couple of days of unwinding, I find I’m bored and restless.

“SO THAT'S THE END of our business, then,” said the voice of doom, aka the wife. “What’s that my dear?” I replied. “This levying a £1.34 a mile congestion charge, of course. People just won’t be able to afford it – they’ll just stop using their cars as much,” she explained. “Calm down, my dear,” I responded in my best Michael Winner tone. “It’s not as simple as all that.”

OH DEAR, I had always dreaded this moment and how I would feel. Now it’s happened and I can’t believe it. Last week it suddenly dawned on me that I had become a member of the, whisper it quietly, old fogies club. And the reason why I knew I had eventually succumbed? I managed to have THREE Victor Meldrew moments in half an hour.

THE AMERICAN COMEDIAN Jacky Mason used to devote part of his act to the role of the successful businessman. He goes out to his office in the morning where he’s king. His secretary rushes to carry out his every instruction, his sales force bow & scrape in an effort not to have their targets raised too high, and his suppliers phone all day long, offering him compliments and inducements, to persuade him to place more orders. And when he goes home his wife greets him with “You putz, you forgot to put the garbage out!”

I DONT KNOW whether you noticed the recent series of adverts from the Health & Safety Commission that extolled the commercial sense of good safety practices. “This Port Authority saw its absenteeism drop by 70%, its days lost through sickness fell by 50% etc etc.” All very laudable stuff, I’m sure, but I, for one, am beginning to despair of the never-ending stream of new measures and restrictions that are being foisted on us in the name of Health & Safety or saving the planet.

OH LIFE WAS SO MUCH SIMPLER back then. A row of petrol pumps, a couple of old codgers to take the money and all stock control consisted of was counting the oil cans on the trolley and wondering each month why the UCL receipts never matched the amount that had been dispensed. (Silly boy, they may have been old codgers but that didn’t mean they were daft old codgers – some things never change!) Annual budgeting sort of took care of itself. Your wages went up a bit but then the annual increase in duty at the budget took care of part of that and the increased margin on the higher price took care of the rest. For the benefit of my younger readers let me repeat that phrase ‘increased margin’. These were the days of 10% gross profit margin on retail price that everyone in the area adhered to.

IF THERE'S ONE MONTH that’s absolutely guaranteed to make me feel utterly depressed it’s January. The month starts off badly, screwed by yet another fatuous Bank Holiday, and hardly improves till the capital F of February appears on the horizon. To begin with there’s the petrol tanks filled to the brim because you didn’t want to run out over Christmas. Every year I look at the previous year’s sales when placing my tanker orders and every year I think “I know that’s what we did then but I daren’t risk running out and with no deliveries for four days I’d better play safe”. And every year I’m filled to overflowing. Then there’s absolutely crap fuel sales – we know that the first couple of weeks after Christmas everybody is skint, but why does it have to take till February before normal activity is resumed. Then there’s the New Year Resolutions. Now I’m sorry, this Resolution thing may offer some short-term soul-cleansing but don’t the public realise that we NEED our cigarette and confectionery sales to keep our bottom line in black ink! Last, but not least, is the almost guaranteed tumble in fuel prices. If the hypers looked at their previous year’s sales they would know that cutting 10p off a litre won’t get the buggers to buy more, so what’s the point of giving margin away?

ON THE FACE OF IT we only have ourselves to blame. It’s not as if we hadn’t been warned – this was no last-minute surprise. All credit to BP for being the only oiler (as far as I am aware – aggrieved parties please send your emails to Merril!) to have approval ready for the off. The company rolled out its Dione terminals last Christmas, and although initially they caused some grief, at least BP retailers will only have the problem of plonker customers to deal with. So the fact that hardly any of us are ready for chip and pin on January 1 must obviously be our fault, mustn’t it? That’s certainly the line the banks will probably take, but it is a little disingenuous to say the least.

SO IS YOUR CIRCLE VIRTUOUS OR VICIOUS? The virtuous circle is where you cut your prices and get more customers. On the back of the extra business you’re doing you screw your suppliers to reduce their prices, you reduce your prices and get even more customers and then go back to your suppliers again etc etc. The vicious circle is when your costs go up so you raise your prices. Because you’ve raised your prices you get fewer customers so you have to raise your prices again in order to cover your costs, so you get even fewer customers… Now, according to all the experts, if you’re a retailer and your circle isn’t virtuous you’re a dead duck, but are they right?

I DONT KNOW WHETHER OR NOT it’s a sign that the festive season is approaching, but these past few weeks I seem to have been spending most of my social hours at dinner parties. Now, to be honest with you I don’t particularly care for dinner parties. I’m not exactly renowned for my ability to make small talk at the best of times – ask me out at the end of a tiring work day and my natural instinct is to be positively taciturn! You can probably guess that most of these invites come because of her Ladyship, who positively revels in the ‘pass the After Eights’ scene. And because I’m a truly subservient, henpecked husband, I don’t really have much choice in the matter!

SO FAREWELL, THEN, Kuwait – or not as the case may be! After months of speculation over whether it would be BP or Total, now we know – it’s neither. The curious outcome to the Kuwait (Dutch?) auction is perhaps a fitting end to the curious saga of one of the world’s richest oil producing states attempting to retail in the UK, where it had no resources of its own. Now I can only assume that the Sheikhs had some lucrative swap deal in place in another part of the globe, otherwise there appears little logic in their original decision to be a player in a very mature market.

SO THE BIG QUESTION IS, will you or won’t you? Support the appeal from the PRA for a legal fees fighting fund to take on the issue of hot product, that is. Now unless you are a very lucky bunny, and I’m happy to say there are a few out there who still receive deliveries of cooled-down fuel, you know your delivery shrinkages are costing you a fortune. And even if you receive some sort of allowance from your supplier you know that it’s a pittance and totally at their whim. And it hasn’t increased as the price of fuel has rocketed. And your losses are getting higher with each new introduction of higher specification, more eco-friendly, grade. So the answer is pretty obviously ‘yes’ isn’t it?

ITS REALLY QUITE IRONIC that a country whose citizens were once renowned for their reserve, and their ability to spend a three-hour train journey without ever saying anything to their fellow passengers, should these days be awash with people who can’t shut up. It seems that everybody and their dog is now an expert on how I should conduct my life.

IT'S MY OWN FAULT REALLY. I mean, it’s not like this is the first time I’ve suffered such a disappointment. After all, I’ve been round the block a few times and really should have known better. Every time good old En-ger-land are in a major football competition it’s the same. I get all excited. Will this be the time when it finally all goes right? The line-up looks good, the planning has all been done, the pundits really believe success is possible. And then what happens? Almost nothing. Barely an achievement worthy of note.

SO OK, THE BANKS FINALLY got fed up of losing a fortune on their credit cards through fraud. Fair enough. Surprisingly (perhaps?), I’m not one of those who delights in their misfortunes – experience has taught me that eventually it’s Mr & Mrs Average who end up paying the bill. And while it would be a cheap shot to suggest ‘Serves them right for dishing the plastic out like confetti’ there is no doubt that they have contributed to their own predicament. The irony, of course, is that it was the pursuit of increased efficiency (or, in everyday English, saving money and boosting profits) that really opened up Pandora’s box for the fraudsters. If the banks hadn’t pushed out the old manual vouchers in favour of EFT, the skimming industry would never have started. By the same token, we’d probably by now have exhausted 62 rain forests and stood the risk of being sued by our managers due to prolonged skin contact with carbon paper or coating, so I’m not suggesting being a luddite either.

LOVE THEM OR LOATHE THEM, there is something about an annual net profit of £1.6bn that kind of earns respect. As Tesco goes marching on it’s worth remembering that it wasn’t always so. Back in the early supermarket days Tesco did alright with their ‘pile-them-high-sell-them-cheap’ philosophy but they never really stood out from the rest. Then, as supermarkets got bigger, Tesco became totally eclipsed by Sainsbury’s and it took them a while before realising they needed to change their trading philosophy.

MANY (MANY!) YEARS AGO when I first started out in business, I can remember discussing politics with my friend’s father, a local businessman who had done very well for himself and was now preparing for retirement. ‘Interesting thing, politics,’ he said. ‘In my experience it’s the unions that do well out of the Tories but it’s big business that does well out of a Labour government.’

I MUST ADMIT THAT I’ve never been a member of a co-operative, mainly due to my tendency to being a bit of a rebel. So I have been following the goings-on at Londis as an interested observer rather than as a shareholder. Incidentally, the way some of the media have been reporting this story you could be forgiven for thinking that holding a share was less to do with being a member of a club and more like being the lucky winner of the Golden Ticket for Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.

THERE IS NO DOUBT THAT 2003 saw the start of the biggest change in ownership of Britain’s forecourts to have been seen in decades. After years of seeing the oilers increase their share of non-hyper sites, the combination of wholesale site closures and disposals should herald the re-birth of the independent dealer.

SO I WAKE UP ON CHRISTMAS MORNING and the room feels decidedly chilly. After a quick check to make sure the radiators are switched on I venture downstairs to discover that the boiler isn’t working. Now considering we were having a houseful round for Christmas lunch this is not good timing!! Being the cautious sort I do have a maintenance contract, but more in hope than belief I phone British Gas (or whatever they’re called now) and explain my problem. ‘Don’t worry, sir, we’ll have someone round to you as soon as possible’. And by lunchtime the engineer had called, fitted a new thermocouple and Aunt Gladys and the rest of the family were able to enjoy their Christmas dinner in the tropical heat my wife insists is ‘pleasantly warm’. Not bad service for £180 a year.

SO THERE I WAS, getting out of the car to go to a PRA roadshow, when I suddenly realised that it was November and I was in my shirtsleeves! Perhaps there is something to this global warming business after all. I just wish the experts could make their minds up what weather conditions to blame on global warming, what weather conditions to blame on El Nino and what they will accept as being normal.

‘ROLL UP, ROLL UP....closing at a location near you. Be one of the last people to buy a gallon before it shuts.’ All over Britain the shutters are going up and the fascias are coming down as the oiler’s finally concede that not only will the hypers not disappear but also that they’re not going to change a winning formula.

ACCORDING TO SOME OF MY FRIENDS I ought to have been a farmer. ‘You’re only happy when you’re moaning’ they complain, ‘doesn’t anything ever go right for you?’. Well, actually… very rarely. Let them try being a petrol retailer and see how bright and sunny they feel.

LAST MONTH'S JUDGEMENT in the Esso case arrived too late for my column, which, while unfortunate, does mean I’ve had a little longer to consider the outcome. Obviously the overall result was very disappointing – Esso won on two out of three of the issues and is already three goals up on the unresolved matter of whether its margin cuts etc were reasonable. The result was especially disappointing because during the case Justice Moore-Bick had given every indication that he was not going to fall for the ‘we’re a well respected multi-national company and they are unimportant individuals so who are you going to believe?’ routine.

SO THE CHARCOAL ON THE BARBIE was almost out, the last beef burger disappeared long ago and, yes, we’d sunk quite a few bottles of wine between the six of us. We’d talked about the usual things – local gossip, sex, politics, football and weather – so we drifted into some of those twilight zones of conversation that you only visit when the sun is low and the blood alcohol level is high. You know what I mean – can you describe a spiral staircase without using your hands? If you were the last man on Earth after a nuclear explosion, who would you choose to be the last woman? What would you do if you won the lottery? Anyway, out of the blue one of my friends mentioned he’d been reading in the papers about the Co-op and them buying up convenience stores. What exactly, he asked, is a convenience store?

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO the government’s ‘tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’ stance? Someone seems to have forgotten to tell the boys in blue about it. The most common forecourt crime now is the drive-off or the persistent no-means-of-payment customer. And do the police care? Not in most areas. The response is likely to be: ‘Sorry, haven’t got the resources – suggest you get better CCTV – or why not make everybody pay first. That’ll solve your problem and reduce our crime figures.’ There seems to be only a handful of areas where the realisation has dawned that the drive-off merchants are usually up to lots of other crime too. Instead of viewing forecourts as a nuisance, the police ought to look at them in the same way as a game hunter would consider a watering hole. Why go running all over the place looking for your criminal when you can wait for him to come to you?