Lowering your windows only helps with stop & go traffic. If your cruising down the highway using A/C with windows closed saves gas due to aerodynamics. I do shut off the A/C when climbing a hill, and two or three minutes later I turn it back on while going down the hill.
By me Costco beats the locals by 15 to 25 cents a gallon. Plus you get 2 or 3% back on your credit card.
Organize your driving. Plan your trips to maximize gas and time savings. Donât drive past the grocery store to the hardware store on Monday, then make a separate trip to the grocery store on Tuesday.
⌠especially if they just bought a new car and are bragging about what great gas mileage they are going to get.
If youâre in the market for a new car anyway, consider buying one with auto-stop technology. We bought a new car last month with that feature. Iâm a low-mileage driver, but I still notice going longer between fill-ups.
Park soon after entering a lot if spaces are available instead of searching for a space close to the front of the mall/store/etc. You also largely avoid having to wait for other vehicles and pedestrians to pass when you leave. Iâve seen cars waiting and waiting for someone to finish loading their babies and bags and leave instead of parking immediately just 20 feet farther away.
https://www.groupon.com/deals/shell-rewards-program
What Youâll Get
After you become a Fuel RewardsŽ member, save 25¢/gallon (up to 20 gallons) off your next fill-up at a participating Shell station.
About the Fuel Rewards Program
As soon as you join in the Fuel Rewards program, youâll get instant Gold Status and immediately save 5¢/gallon on every fill-up at any participating Shell station as long as you maintain active Gold Status. Simply swipe your Fuel Rewards card or enter your Alt ID number before filling up.
Stack your rewards to save more at the pump. Link your credit card and youâll earn cents-per-gallon discounts on fuel (known as Fuel Rewards savings) by shopping, dining, or making other day-to-day purchases at any merchant or restaurant participating in the Fuel Rewards program.
The Fine Print
Promotional value expires Jan 25, 2018. Amount paid never expires. Offer valid 10/23/17â1/23/18 or once 500,000 reward codes have been issued. Limit 1 per person, may buy 3 additional as gifts. To earn a Fuel Rewards savings of $.25/gal, you must register as a new Fuel Rewards member. No purchase required to earn the Fuel Rewards savings. Fuel Rewards savings limited to 20 gallons of fuel per purchase. Once you begin to dispense fuel using your Fuel Rewards savings, you must dispense to the 20-gallon limit or you forfeit any remaining savings for the other gallons. Other restrictions may apply. See www.fuelrewards.com for complete Fuel Rewards program Terms & Conditions. Merchant is solely responsible to purchasers for the care and quality of the advertised goods and services.
BTW you can use a fake phone number so you dont get spammed
I asked a similar question before the demise of FWF, but geared toward saving on a road trip.
We have a local chain of stations that gives you $0.03 off per gallon for having their rewards card. They also do double coupon Tuesdays, and honor coupons from any other local stations.
Another local chain of stations has teamed up with a large local car dealer, where we bought our last car. It offers $0.10 off per gallon for two years, and includes $5.00 car washes. Additionally, the station uses perks from a large local grocery store for additional savings. Generally, we use this with a 1.5% cash back credit card.
For our road trip, I opened a Exxon/Mobil SpeedPass+ account on my phone, and applied for their credit card through the app. That gave me $0.50 off per gallon. This goes down to $0.06 off per gallon after two months. We used this on our 3,000 mile trip and will continue to use it locally unilt the deal expires. So far, it has saved us about $100 over the last 4 weeks, mostly due to the road trip. We used Gas Buddy to route our trip and make sure we stopped at the Exxon Mobile stations with the lowest prices within a few blocks of the Interstates we used, to ensure maximum savings. It is also linked to Plenti, so I have about a $8 credit there too.
Itâs not fun to be on the receiving end though. Fake phone numbers can turn out to be someoneâs real phone number
A few months ago I started getting daily voicemails and texts from a title loan place. Someone had taken out a loan and wasnât paying it back. They had my phone number on that personâs account. The place was only 5 mins. from my house, so I drove there and told them to get my phone number off that guyâs account and not contact me again. They havenât contacted me since. I havenât gotten any collections calls, but if I do, theyâre getting ignored.
I have a real account and have never received a text or call from them. It only works on new accounts.
If youâre going to idle for more than 10 seconds, turn off the engine. Please donât do this at red lights (even though I hear itâs common to do in Europe), but itâs fine for the drive-through.
I remember looking through the ownerâs manual of a BMW I once owned and it recommend turning off the engine if you are going to idle for more than 4 seconds. Nowadays, many of the newer BMWs and Mercedes automatically shut off the engine when you come to a stop for more than a couple of seconds.
Thatâs the auto-stop technology I referred to earlier. Itâs on my Chevy Equinox. Lately, Ford has been advertising the technology in their commercials. This technology has been common in Europe for awhile, according to my husbandâs co-workers from Europe.
And you donât pay for their gas? Iâve heard of frugal, and cheap. Guess what they call you?!?! 
Iâd love to see data on this. Starting a vehicle causes wear and tear, costing money. Also, starting an engine draws more fuel in as it starts. MAYBE more than you saved by turing off your vehicle for 11 seconds.
I quoted the BMW from memory that turning the engine off saves fuel, but it didnât mention anything about wear and tear. However, hybrids turn the ICE on and off regularly and yet there are many Priuses (Prii?) out there with very high miles. Also, as gwraigty mentioned, there are many cars with âauto-stopâ or âstart-stopâ technology. From what I understand, itâs only when you start a car cold that there is any wear on the engine. Once it has warmed up and the oil has been distributed throughout the engine, there is no more wear.
I didnât find any actual data, but there is this study by Edmunds that showed cars saved about 10% in fuel costs. https://www.edmunds.com/car-reviews/features/do-stop-start-systems-really-save-fuel.html
To be fair, I just read the Edmunds article in detail and I see that they only really tested cars with âstart-stopâ technology and not regular cars without the extra technology needed to make the start-stop effective.
Wow, I was always under the impression from something I heard years ago that it was 2 minutes for break even. Apparently, quite wrong:
http://greenactioncentre.ca/healthy-travel/myth-2-its-better-to-idle-your-car-than-shut-it-off/
The fast-start tech has gotten much better in recent years after the electric hybrids starting using/developing this to selectively cut their gas engine on and off as needed. I understand many newer cars use this now also, so the breakeven is pretty short for turning off the car rather than idling.
Well, OP was asking for cheap and easy.
The first time I rented a car that had the fast-start tech, there was a slight learning curve. I was used to going when stepping on the gas. After sitting at a traffic signal, there was a slight delay between hitting the gas and actually going. On this car, using the flappy paddles prevented the car from turning the engine off, but that didnât make me like them any more.
[quote=âgwraigty, post:30, topic:1882â]
Fake phone numbers can turn out to be someoneâs real phone number
[/quote]
I use a Google Voice number for things like this.
With our car, thereâs barely a delay. On the test drive, the salesman had to point out to me that it was happening. I hadnât noticed it until then. Seriously, I couldnât move my foot from the brake to the gas faster than the engine restarts. I love the feature.