It’s hot and bright beneath the high intensity lights in a cavernous crash and safety testing laboratory, hidden away in a business park outside Newbury. A siren blares, a voice counts down — three, two, one — and a small white car trundles into view, rolling into a barrier at just 6mph. There is no torn metal or flying glass. This is the kind of annoying prank you might get in a car park. But lift the slightly bent bonnet and the story changes: this is an electric vehicle (EV), a Dacia Spring, and the hidden damage is significant.
Senior test engineer Sean Hoad points to the high-voltage charging port mounted at the front of the car, now badly broken, along with the components it’s attached to. “This is all one big unit, meaning we can’t just replace the front charge port,” he explains. “We have to replace the charger itself, the inverter, and some of the cabling.” Repairing that would cost about £4,000, and with other damage to consider, Hoad adds, “It’s more than likely this car would be written off.”
“EVs cost 30% more to repair than petrol cars, a minor crash can total a Dacia Spring at £4,000.”
Thatcham Research, which works on behalf of the insurance industry, is carrying out these tests to understand why EVs attract higher premiums. On average, it says, EVs cost 30% more to repair than petrol or diesel models and take 14% longer to fix. That feeds through to insurance: it can cost 10–25% more to insure an EV, depending on the make and model.
According to the latest data from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT), EV sales have surged to the point that they made up almost one in every three new cars sold in the UK in June. Ian Plummer, chief customer officer of car-selling website Autotrader, says rising EV demand is “driven by intensifying competition and rising consumer interest in plug-in cars”. But he warns that “the wider context remains fragile, with ongoing uncertainty around policy, incentives, and wider external pressures”.
The insurance cost is one of those niggling concerns that could put off would-be buyers. “It’s absolutely crucial electric vehicles become cheaper to insure,” insists Steve Fowler, co-founder of the car review website Carblah. “They are expensive — though not as expensive as some people might think — but by making them easier to repair and cheaper to insure, more people will buy them.”
The question now is whether the industry can act fast enough to prevent insurance costs from stalling the EV revolution just as it gains momentum.