FILL IT UP PLEASE MATE

Refuelling your car doesn't have to be a DIY chore. Instead, you can get an attendant to do it for you- if, like John Evans, you know where to go

- John Evans

Time Out lists 13 things to do in Marlow, Buckinghamshire: everything from doffing your hat to the statue of Olympic rowing legend Sir Steve Redgrave to driving over the town's Grade II-listed suspension bridge. Well, we've a 14th: having your car filled up at Platts Garage.

Note, having it filled up' and not 'filling it up'. There's a difference. Regarding the former, you stay in your car and tell Tony, 75 and sharp as a tack, which fuel you want and how much. The latter is just plain old self-service, which you can experience anywhere - and still pay through the nose.

Not that Platts is cheap, at 191.9 pence per litre for unleaded, or around a penny dearer than the average price reported by the government when this was written.

Still, as outraged social-media users are fond of proving, you can pay much more for self-service elsewhere in the country, and that's before we start talking about motorway service stations.

But why, with self-service Shell and BP stations close by boasting multiple pumps, weatherproof canopies and well-stocked shops (you will struggle to get more than a boiled sweet out of Tony), would you go to Platts? Company chairman Jim Platt, 88, admits that, economically speaking, attended service makes little sense.

"We can't charge more than anyone else in the area, and with government taking so much of the price of fuel in duty and VAT, plus the operator's costs and our contracted margin, we make just 4.3 pence per litre," he says.

However, in terms of relationship-building, the service is, he says, hard to beat. "If they have time and while Tony is filling their tank, customers may come into the showroom for a chat and to see the new cars. We've gained many customers as a result."