The Gas Man Shouldn't Cometh

Insult to injury. The injury has been the inexorable rise in price of energy, both gas and electricity. At least with electricity you don't have to do anything, other than inspect your bills for the latest little stunt that Endesa is trying to pull. Gas, on the other hand, and by which in a Mallorcan context mainly means butane, is a different matter.

The insult to the injury of a bottle of butane now setting you back just shy of 15 euros is the antediluvian nature of the service. It is one which places the onus largely on the consumer. There are doubtless those who consider the fact that you, as a consumer, have to do the fetching and carrying as quaintly reassuring of a Mallorcan bygone era that is otherwise being lost amidst the other inexorable rise - that of development - but I am not one of them. You have to go and get the damn gas.

The further insult is the organisation, or lack of it, that currently obtains at the gas-collection "station" in Puerto Alcúdia.

The gas truck is located in a residential street near to the commercial port. It always has been located there. The organisation has tended to work reasonably enough, insofar as one accepts that one should have to even bend to the demand of this organisation of supply. But not since vehicles came to be parked all along what is a fairly narrow street.

For those unfamiliar with the routine, let me explain. You drive into the road, go past the gas truck, turn round and then come back and queue behind other cars. This is how it normally works. But the parking which has suddenly occurred makes the turning around a virtual impossibility. It can be done, but it ain't easy, and is made less easy by the fact that one pavement is raised that high that you risk smashing your car front or back as you perform a twenty-three point turn.

But because of the cars that are parked, there is barely enough room to get past firstly the gas truck and secondly the line of cars that has managed to turn round. The result of all this, as I discovered yesterday, is chaos. It needs a copper, or some Repsol official, to be on traffic duty.

This gas "station" serves a pretty wide area. Years ago I made a foolish assumption that every town would have one, but this isn't so. The demand on the Alcúdia station, and the truck has been known to run out, merely adds to what chaos can ensue.

There are of course other ways of getting the butane. Some petrol stations sell it, and then there is the home delivery. But this is also adding insult. You can no longer be sure when the truck's going to turn up. You know the day, but as to the time?

In that quaint bygone era, you could leave your empty bottle out, put the money with it and the chap would perform the swap without your having to be there. Not now. You can try it, but chances are that while the money might have been accepted by the "butanero" and the bottle indeed swapped, someone will have come along and nicked the new, full bottle. So, to avoid the risk you have to make sure you're in. And therefore wait until whatever time the chap appears. And it has also not been unknown for him to run out.

The point about all this is that the increases in price of butane take no account of the inconvenience to the consumer who also, never let it be forgotten, risks hernia or back injury when lifting the damn bottles. The service, such as it is, is a two-fingers-up, take-it-or-leave-it throwback to an era when you didn't complain, when the consumer was expected to be meekly compliant.

The diffusion of natural gas cannot come quickly enough. The butane system is archaic and anachronistic. It is not a service for a modern economy and a modern society. Yes, there will be parts of Mallorca which will retain a reliance on butane, just as there are parts of the UK which demand butane or propane supply, but the persistence of the current system reinforces the fact that Mallorca's infrastructure, woefully inadequate for years, has improved in leaps and bounds to the extent that modern systems of supply are now expected and should no longer be tolerated.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.