Fill 'er Up

It is late at night, you are driving down an unfamiliar road and the fuel gauge is dangerously low. Almost anyone who owns a vehicle has had a similar experience and wondered, where is the gas station? As the now-cliché saying goes, there is an app for that.

CRE and PROFECO, the federal attorney’s office for the protection of consumers’ rights, developed Gasoapp to help consumers not only find the closest station but also the most economical. The smartphone application is equipped with an extensive database of every gasoline station in the country and is updated with daily prices reported by those stations.

By using the Gasoapp, the user can get the geographic location and information about any station up to 5km away that reported its prices that day. The app identifies five categories: the reported gas price, expensive gas station, cheap, close and finally, cheap and close. Gasoapp helps users find the best option for filling their tanks, anytime and anyplace. The app also allows users to identify the same information for magna, premium and diesel categories, making the process of finding the best gas station easier. When a user selects the gasoline station of their choice, the app provides directions.

To ensure the quality of the information and promote interactivity, users can evaluate the station they choose. An average grade for the gasoline station is displayed, allowing consumers to make better, more informed decisions.

Gasoapp is not designed to be just an information-gathering tool but also a way to report gasoline stations that are not complying with three specific metrics: adherence to the prices reported through the app, whether user received the product they asked for and whether user received the amount of gas they paid for. Gasoapp is fully supported and free for both Android and iOS