Luckypants

*cough* hydro *cough cough* pumped storage hydro We need more of both.

I've just topped up the heating oil as I'm expecting the price to rise over the coming weeks, not just because of the approaching winter. Lots of German and French commercial users will be forced onto oil when the EU finally bans imports of Russian gas. There is only something like a 2 million barrel reserve of diesel/heating oil this year where normally there is 20 million in reserve in the EU at this time of year. Driving any kind of car will be very expensive this winter.

We did about a thousand miles in Scotland in June. We charged almost exclusively on ChargePlace Scotland (CPS) chargers and they all worked seamlessly. We had registered an account with them last year, but never made it up to Scotland. We got a CPS RFID card (costs £10) and used that without exception to start/stop charges and never had a problem. The free charging units are normally CPS units and we did get free charges at Pitlochry, Fort Augustus and Callander. The other charges were very reasonable at 18-36p / kWh. The only non-CPS charging we did in Scotland was a Podpoint rapid at Tain Tesco which was a very reasonable 28p/kWh. (this could have been free too, but two old boys who obviously knew each other well were hogging the free 22kW chargers )

Can't say I have, but always worth an ask?😁

Salary Sacrifice is nearly always better than PCH if the lease prices are similar. You do get BIK taxation, but that is low currently compared to the tax and NI savings made by paying the lease from salary before income tax and NI is calculated. Furthermore, the SS scheme will be reclaiming the VAT, further reducing the cost to you. So the lease price you pay is ex. VAT. If you can, see if the SS lease company can take over your current offer - you may get the benefit of the lower price and SS. Note most company SS will include RFL and insurance. With PCH you must insure it yourself and (for safety) also take gap insurance.

MfG are putting their prices up from tomorrow. Matching Instavolt. https://twitter.com/MotorFuelGroup/status/1559163101622280192?s=20&t=vNTLNnKVWuvDVZktMmlv8w

Instavolt have announced another price increase

I have often cited my own example as I do monitor the cost of my cars. My previous diesel Karoq averaged 45.4 mpg over 36K miles. (https://www.fuelly.com/car/skoda/karoq/2018/luckypants/793739) - a good comparison to my ID.4 I have now. It was serviced once in that time for £256, insurance was £320 pa and VED was included in the lease - which was £480. Before covid we were doing about 15K a year. At current fuel prices here (£1.85 p/litre) the fuel cost is 18.5p/mile. The ID.4 is on PCP and costs £580 pcm. Insurance is £300 pa and VED is £0. No servicing yet, but I expect to be in the region of £150. Over 17K miles my average charge cost per mile 5.48p/mile (sorry in a spreadsheet so cannot share). This includes free charges at Tesco etc but I get nothing not available to any EV driver and I don't take the **** (e.g could have granny charged at the cottage when on holiday but chose to pay at the rapid 2 miles away). The £100 difference in monthly cost is more or less offset by the cheaper cost per mile, making the cars broadly similar in cost to run / own. If we take an average 1000 mile month, I save £120 but spend £100 more on monthly (This is how I justified the high purchase price of an EV to myself, cos £580 a month is crazy!) These figures meant I was able to get an EV for all the reasons of low emissions without really paying through the nose. I'd like to replace the Citigo with electric, but the figures no where near stack up for a low use vehicle.

This is true BUT the day rate or peak rate paid is very high as are the standing charges. You need to be able to move almost all your use to the low cost period for it to make sense to use one of these tariffs now. Just saying you can charge your car for 7.5p / kWh ignores the bigger picture of overall electricity cost for the household. I work from home, so use quite a lot in the day and for me the SVP would be best if I didn't have a fixed rate at the moment. I get what you say about home charging being cheaper than diesel and for me most definitely is at approx 5ppm versus 18ppm if I still had a diesel. I pasted the rates in my area below and you can see the day rate on Go is double my current (V. Good) rate. Everyone's circumstances are different. My rate YOUR TARIFF Octopus 24M Fixed Octopus 24M Fixed September 2021 v3 Fixed term ends 13/09/2023 21.99p/kWh 23.50p/day Octopus Go rates for my area:- Unit rate (04:30 - 00:30): 42.29p/ kWh Unit rate (00:30 - 04:30): 7.50p/ kWh Standing Charge: 47.31p/ day Prices include VAT. Octopus Go is an electricity only smart tariff. For gas, simply choose any Octopus gas tariff.

I can understand you not getting the granny charger but they must supply you with means to charge your car via type 2 cable, so this should be supplied. Have you checked with the dealer that they have their facts straight?

Watched this yesterday and now on tenterhooks for part 2. 🙂

Blimey, that was a while back. IIRC it was a trip to Bodnant Gardens with the grown up step-kids. It would have been driving normally with auto (or intelligent?) regen set, driving to speed limits and with climate set to 19C. Since then I've done many more miles in the ID.4 and I'm able to get better efficiency as I've learnt to drive to its strengths. I'd be disappointed with less than 3.3 miles/kWh now. FWIW our recent touring holiday of the Highlands, covering 1866 miles averaged 3.4 miles/kWh. Probably around 700 miles of motorway in that, another 700 odd on two lane A roads and the rest on single track. Two adults, two dogs, luggage for all including buggy for the old dog.

Something that just occurred to me as my nearest ultra rapid charger is Flint Mountain Supercharger..... Osprey's 66p / kWh makes Tesla's price for non-Tesla cars seem reasonable at 60p/kWh. Who'd have thought that? 🤷‍♂️

As has been said, most people will look at the monthly cost. My ID.4 costs more per month than our previous Karoq, but less to run. When we went for the ID.4 I thought the running cost savings would offset the increased monthly cost and this has been proved by experience. Broadly speaking going EV has been cost neutral for me.

Only get the discount if charging between 7pm and 11pm. It is not a discount across the board and the discounted price puts it at around the same price as everyone else, 52.8p. Bonnet PAYG rate is 50p at the moment, so the cheapest way to charge at Osprey chargers. (unless you have bought a Bonnet refill, which is cheaper still) And I agree that the price of used EVs is crazy, mainly due to the daft waiting time for a new car. I've been offered more than I paid for mine and its 16 months old and 16k miles. I recently thought I'd be able to change out our Citigo for a second hand electric Mii/Up/Citigo until I saw the prices being asked - even 3 year old ones are asking more than new price (two year wait for a new one)

Chapeau! 🙏

If you rapid charge, I'd agree using a CPO company is getting expensive. I note the CPS chargers are still cheap though, mostly below 40p so that is still economical. We have a few (and I mean few) Transport for Wales chargers here at around 40-45p so not too bad. Home charging is still cheap compared to fossil fuels for most, so in my experience EV is cheaper than ICE equivalent. As an example, my previous Karoq averaged 45mpg in our ownership (37k miles) which means 10 miles / litre. This makes working out cost per mile pretty straight forward. Around here diesel is £1.93, giving 19.3 p/mile if we were still running our previous car. The ID.4 has an average of 5.47 p/mile over 16k miles and so far this month is 4.83 p/mile. Last month we did 2K miles at 4.49/mile mostly on CPS rapids, but that is skewed by some free charges. But I think it demonstrates how cheap EV is compared with comparable ICE. I don't do much rapid charging though, mainly home charging and Tesco / Aldi free top ups.

Well as Osprey have put their prices up from 25th July (66p) I think more people will take advantage of the 'off-peak' discount. So maybe a peak time tariff will come, but I think that will be driven by the price charged to Osprey by their power supplier. However, the cheapest way to use Osprey after the price rise will be via the Bonnet app which is 50p PAYG. (you can PM me for my referral code, which gets me and you £15 towards a 'refill')

Osprey have announced a hefty price increase to 66p/kWh from 25th July for PAYG and 2nd August for account customers. However, at present it will still be 50p/kWh through the Bonnet app.

Isn't the Wallyford hub at the park and ride intended for visitors? Or is that always full of commuters by 8:30? When we visited the Falkirk stadium hub it was practically deserted.

A small piece of good news on the cost of public charging. Electric Juice (Octopus Energy's charging card) and Osprey announced cheaper charging at off peak times, 20% discount when charging between 19:00 and 23:00.

So a number of new charging hubs have opened recently. I'm bound to have missed some while on holiday, but hope this is of interest. E.G. Severn View Services Gridserve Heston Services Gridserve Instavolt Rhug Estate A5 York Monks Cross park and ride York Poppleton Road park and ride Fastned in Hamilton near Glasgow Fastned at Redbridge Park and Ride, Oxford

I want to say how great the ID.4 is as a touring car. We have just spent 10 days in the Highlands of Scotland which totalled 1900 miles in the car. The car munched the motorway miles to get up there and back, sitting on the ACC at 70 effortlessly - it made the journey easy. Once we were at our rented cottage, travelling around was a breeze on the single tracks and smaller two lane roads up there. The large boot on the car was taken up by our two dogs so the spacious rear seat was utilised to carry our stuff. Everything fitted in without much effort even though we don't pack light. The range has been exemplary and we have needed a break long before the car most days. We had a planned long leg on the journey up and journey back that tested the range a little but got to the planned charge stop with over 40 miles remaining each time, so really no drama. The first long leg up was over 3.5 hours of driving and I was well ready to stop, so car beats human need for a break. Charging has not been an issue at all, even though prior to this trip we had done almost no public rapid charging. The coverage of chargers from Chargeplace Scotland in the areas we visited was very comprehensive. Every charger we used worked well. The only hiccup was with the charger at Uig needing a reset before charging started, which I could do by following the easy instructions on the screen. (press and hold the silver button for 20 seconds ) The cost of charging has been very low, 1900 miles has cost me £95.22 which is 4.66p/mile. A remarkably low figure by any standard, albeit helped by some free charging at CPS chargers and a Bonnet free charge on the way home. We had no free charging at our accommodations. Overall efficiency was 3.48 mi/kWh for the trip. Running around the Highlands with two adults and two dogs plus coats + buggy (arthritic dog) etc regularly saw 3.7 / 3.8 daily averages. Fully loaded on the motorway saw 3.2 / 3.3. I'm happy with this.

Used the Falkirk Stadium charge hub the other day, great facility with plenty of free chargers. EDIT: To be clear, the 'free' chargers I refer to above means available - not no cost.