With the cost of fuel rising quite dramatically over the past few days, it's becoming a real squeeze on people's finances. Nobody quite knows when (or if) these prices are going to come down, and whilst we're all looking at our fuel receipts in horror, we've got some pretty handy tips to help you keep your fuel bill a little bit lower.

For the worst offenders here, I reckon you could save anywhere from 10% to 30% on your fuel bills. That may not sound like loads if you're putting in £20 a week, but it's an extra £2-6 in your pocket a week, or £8-24 a month, or £96-312 a year. So it adds up!

Before Driving

Before we even get behind the wheel and turn the engine on, there are a few things we can check, some are more obvious than others but they'll all help you squeeze out a few extra miles in your tank.

What's on your roof?

Sporting a roof rack? Let's take that off. When you're driving (especially on the motorway), that roof rack is going to create a lot of drag, making your engine work harder than it needs to. If you don't need it or aren't using it then just take it off. It's a faff, but so is forking out for fuel these days.

Heavy boot?

Let's have a peek in the boot. If you're like me, you probably store all kinds of useless stuff in your boot 'just in case'. It's convenient but let's take them out and put them inside. It's just more weight that your engine has to carry. On average, every additional 45kg of weight in your car makes it 1% less fuel efficient. If you're thinking about extreme savings, we could also rip out the spare seats and every other non-major component, but let's be a bit more sensible here. Just removing anything you're not using out of the boot can help to make a difference, even if it's small.

Tyre check!

When was the last time you checked your tyre pressure? My knees are cracking just thinking about it, but if your tyres aren't at the correct pressure, it can make your drive much less efficient and add up to 4% onto your total fuel bill. Your car will tell you what the correct tyre pressure is, either in the manual or on one of the door pillars. Failing that, have a Google and make sure they're correct. Beyond fuel efficiency, under or over inflated tyres can cause other problems as well, so it's a good thing to keep on top of.

Whilst Driving

Now we're behind the wheel, here's where the serious savings come in, these changes are going to make the biggest difference to your fuel efficiency.

Air-con

Air-con is great for keeping your car cool, but we can be a little wiser in how we use it, as it does use extra fuel. When you're going at lower speeds, it's almost always more fuel efficient to open your windows instead of having the fans blasting. At higher speeds? Air-con is actually better than having the windows open. Open windows cause additional drag at higher speeds which, you guessed it, uses more fuel. There's no exact science to the speed at which you should switch, but it's usually around 45mph (or whenever your hair starts blowing around uncontrollably).

Driving habits

The way you drive has the absolute biggest impact on your mpg. Aggressive use of the pedals is going to burn through your fuel quicker, and a great analogy for this is to think of your pedals as money pumps. Pressing the accelerator pushes fuel into the engine, and braking turns that movement energy into heat. The further down you press the pedals, the more money it uses. Now, obviously you need to use your pedals to operate the car, but being a little more conscious of how you use them goes a long way. Accelerating slower and giving yourself more braking distance is really going to save you some money. The main aim is to press them less, and not as hard.

Drive Less

Trust me, I know how patronising this one sounds but there is actually logic behind it. Most cars are extremely inefficient for the first 3 miles of driving. The engine isn't up to temperature, and it needs to work a little harder to operate how you'd expect. My own car gets anything from 15-20mpg for my 3 mile trips (my overall average is 40mpg), so it's one of the most expensive ways to drive. Consider walking for some of your shorter trips, it'll save you money, save some wear and tear on your car, and walking is great exercise (not that you need it, you look great already)!

A couple more tips

There's a few more little things you can do to help stretch your fuel even further:

• Fill your tank: If money is tight, this isn't always possible, but it's a good habit to fill up your tank completely. It means fewer trips to the petrol station, and less fuel wasted getting there. don't worry about the weight of the additional fuel either, this is going to have a negligible effect.
• Use Cruise Control: This is another debated topic. For some reason, some people think cruise control uses more fuel, but it's actually a very efficient system and it will use less fuel than your own driving.
• Don't speed: Now, I know you don't do this anyway. But the faster you're going, the more drag you have, which is going to use a lot more fuel. Even driving at 70mph uses nearly 10% more fuel than 60mph.
• Avoid excessive idling: This includes enabling that God awful 'Stop-Start' feature all cars seem to have these days. As much as it pains me to say, they do actually help to save on fuel. If your car is going to be still for longer than 7 seconds, it's more efficient to use stop-start.

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‍About the Author: David Scriven works in the marketing team at AMT Auto. When they aren't writing about ways to save money on the road, they’re usually trying to remember the last time they actually checked their tyre pressure.