It shows when VW’s “Cheaper” partner can produce a car that’s substantially higher quality than their offerings. The ID4 and ID5 are, when compared to the Auid Q4 AND Skoda’s Enyaq, poor. Build quality, ride quality, materials, software, they’re all sub par on a car they’re trying to sell for 50 grand. When you look at the £35,000 Enyaq IV 60 and compare it to the ID5 you can see why people aren’t jumping on board.
Then there’s the whole cost of living thing. With prices trying to remain so high and inflation hurting those of us they’re hoping will buy their cars, a lot of people will make do with the car they have for another year or so, just to see out the ‘difficult’ period.
Then there’s the whole nonsense that surrounds the whole EV market, where papers like the Telegraph and certain social media outlets will happily spread complete nonsense, untruths and rumour just to delay the inevitable.
Add in infrastructure issues and silly high prices for rapid charging and we’re getting close to seeing why EV sales aren’t booming here. At 25p per kW rapid charging was still cheaper than fossil fuels, at 65p it’s close, when you get to 75p or even £1 then it’s very hard to justify paying over the odds and they paying the same or more for fuel and the lack of convenience of having to charge goes from something you can easily justify down to an annoyance all the way up to the final straw. It’s very easy right now to ignore all the environmental benefits when the costs just don’t add up as favourably as they were. Yes, if you can charge at home it’s still a bargain but if you’re only charging source is public and there’s no free charging from supermarkets or some car parks due to the prices companies are being charged for their electricity, so the days of owning an EV and running it for a penny a mile are, unfortunately, gone. Even if electricity prices return, I can’t see free charging returning.
It’s going to be a challenging time for a while if you already own an EV, it’s going to lose it’s value as new cars get significantly cheaper but, that needs to happen for the predicted parity between ICE and BEV prices.
I'm Autistic, if I say something you find offensive, please let me know, I can guarantee it was unintentional.
I'll try to give my honest opinion but am always open to learning.
Mark