Refuelia shows three kinds of information about a station, and each one keeps its own source and its own clock. They are not blended together.
What comes from where
What you seeWhere it comes fromHow currentWhat it cannot tell you
The station itself: where it is, the brand, the fuels it sells, a charger’s connectors and power, posted opening hoursOpenStreetMap, the open map anyone can editAs current as the last edit thereWhether there is fuel today, or whether it closed last week
National average pricesGovernment feeds: France (station feed, read hourly), Spain (ministry feed, every 6 hours), Italy (ministry file, daily), United States (EIA survey, weekly)On each feed’s own schedule, with the date shown next to the priceThe price at the pump near you. An average is a country, not a station
Fuel, queue, price paid, charger workingDrivers who were at that stationCounts for 18 hours, with the minute it was saidAnything no driver has reported
How long a report counts
A report from a driver describes one moment at one forecourt. So it has a clock on it:
- 0 to 6 hours: recent. Shown at full strength, with the time it was made.
- 6 to 18 hours: fading. Still shown and still stamped, so you can decide whether it will hold until you arrive.
- After 18 hours: it stops counting. The pin goes back to No fresh report. A day-old report is a guess, so the map says it does not know.
When drivers disagree
When two drivers say different things, the station shows Limited fuel instead of picking one of them. A disagreement is not averaged into a confident green.
Why a station shows a status, not a quantity
A driver can see whether the pumps work and fuel is flowing. A driver on the forecourt cannot see how many litres are left in the tanks, and stations do not send Refuelia their stock levels. So a station shows one of four statuses (fuel available, limited, no fuel or no fresh report) and no quantity.
What Refuelia cannot know
- Whether a station has fuel right now, unless a driver said so in the last 18 hours.
- Whether a charger works, unless somebody tried it. OpenStreetMap lists the equipment, not its state.
- The price at a particular station in a country without a feed, unless a driver posted it.
- Traffic, or how long the queue will be when you get there.
- A closure that no driver has reported and no one has edited on the map.
Where we do not know, the card says so in words: Price not reported, Hours not listed, No fresh report. It does not leave a blank or guess.
Adding what you see, and fixing what is wrong
Confirming fuel or a charger takes one tap and no account. Posting a price or a comment needs a free sign-in, so a real person stands behind it. If the station itself is wrong (the wrong place, the wrong brand, closed for good), use Suggest a correction on its card, or fix it in OpenStreetMap, where the fix reaches every map that reads it.
See also How it works, our Editorial policy, the Disclaimer and the Community Guidelines.