High business mileage - is a Tesla the right choice?

[Coolshades]

Hi,

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year. I work in sales and drive 1k-1.5k miles a month. I use my personal car for work and get a generous business mileage allowance which more than covers the expenses.

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year.

is a Tesla appropriate for that kind of business mileage?

I am thinking of a model X or Y at the moment, simply for the experience of driving a more spacious vehicle, but deciding to go EV or not EV is the more important question.

 

[Alan J]

Hi,

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year. I work in sales and drive 1k-1.5k miles a month. I use my personal car for work and get a generous business mileage allowance which more than covers the expenses.

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year.

is a Tesla appropriate for that kind of business mileage?

I am thinking of a model X or Y at the moment, simply for the experience of driving a more spacious vehicle, but deciding to go EV or not EV is the more important question.

So long as you have a Home Charger so you have a full Battery every morning and can plan your journeys around Superchargers or Locations / Hotels with Charging Capability then you should be fine and it will save you an absolute fortune in petrol / diesel.

 

[LukeT]

The running costs you'll incur in the personally owned car are easy enough to estimate and they should be very low. Once you take depreciation into account too they'll be more comparable. Presumably you'll continue to receive the same mileage payments?

Do you expect to do more miles in a day than the car's (realistic) range? If you do then you need to factor in charging time.

Note differences in consumption/range between SUV and more aero cars (3/S).

Note also how consumption, and therefore range, is different for different routines. Short journeys in cold weather are high consumption because of energy used warming things up etc, plus regenerative braking is limited when battery is cold. So if you travel to a meeting, let the car cool over an hour or two, then travel to another, you might find actual range in colder weather to take quite a hit compared with one long journey.

Assuming you're going to buy a car anyway one way or another and EV is OK for your circumstances, consider also that a comparable ICE car has, overall once manufacture and the rest of it are considered, roughly 3-4x the emissions impact of equivalent EV. And in my case (same mileage as you) this thing is near enough the biggest emitter in my life. Faced with that choice I had to discount ICE. Sorry if I'm preaching!

 

[pgkevet]

You also need to look at business insurance costs for an EV

 

[LukeT]

Oh and also consider that your real daily range is not between 100% and 0% of charge, generally speaking. Most folk charge to 100% only relatively rarely to be kind to their battery. And avoid going below 10 or 20% to avoid sh1tting themselves, and also to be kind to battery.

Then again, if your working day is well within all these parameters, you might never have to visit a service station again. Nice!

 

[Rooster6655]

Hi,

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year. I work in sales and drive 1k-1.5k miles a month. I use my personal car for work and get a generous business mileage allowance which more than covers the expenses.

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year.

is a Tesla appropriate for that kind of business mileage?

I am thinking of a model X or Y at the moment, simply for the experience of driving a more spacious vehicle, but deciding to go EV or not EV is the more important question.

If you have home charging then 1.5k miles a month is nothing to be concerned about, with the supercharger network and a long range model you could do 500 miles in a day no problem just charging once

 

[Keeper]

and while you're charging at a Super Charger you can turn the car into a fully connected office and work away to your hearts content (or watch Netflix, YouTube or play a game or two and also get paid) Marvellous

 

[Jonathantuba]

No problem. I have done 40K business miles in my first year charging at home, Superchargers and destination chargers at hotels - that is travelling all over Europe. Remember if you get a new raven model X it will have over 300 mile range and free supercharging. That free charging is an appreciable benefit for us high mileage users.

I actually enjoy the time at Superchargers - chance to stretch legs, use facilities, eat/drink, catch up on emails, and chat to other owners

 

[Obliter8]

Yeah, business use here. Just started with it, but the BIK savings are huge, and if your work reimburses at 45p/mile, you're going to cover costs well.

 

[arg]

is a Tesla appropriate for that kind of business mileage?

It's absolutely fine for that amount of mileage, the one thing to check is whether it's appropriate for how you cover those miles - where you go, what mileage you do in a day, what you normally do for lunch. Also where you are based as that affects charging options.

You say 1000-1500 miles/month, so 50-75 miles a day if evenly spread - like if you are on the road every day covering a local territory. That would be absolutely fine, overnight charging only needed, better in every way than the car you drive now.

Also fine would be if you make long trips to just visit individual clients who may be anywhere in the country - some of them might well be out of range, but if you are making a single long journey then your route almost certainly passes (or can be adjusted to pass) good charging options. if you are driving that far in one go, you'd be happy to stop for at least a coffee en-route so charging doesn't actually cost you any time.

The worst possible pattern is if your miles are condensed in a few days each week where you expect to spend a long day visiting multiple clients with only an hour or so each, and your territory is Wales. This is a killer in various ways. In winter, the pattern of driving for an hour then letting the car cool down for an hour, then warming it up again etc. gets the worst possible range out of the car - on a single long drive it's easy to get fairly close to the indicated range (ie. 200+ miles per charge, depending on model); for the extreme multi-stop pattern you'd still be fine in summer but maybe 30% less in UK winter conditions. If you do need to charge, then with only 50-mile hops between the fixed locations there's probably only one sensible route and if it's cross-country it may not pass (m)any good charging locations; if it's in Wales where there are very few public chargepoints anyhow then you are probably out of luck. Finally, if you are visiting a client every hour then you probably get all the coffee you can drink and so the charging stop is extra time you wouldn't otherwise have spent.

But it's fairly easy to work this out - spend a few minutes with Google maps to look at the mileages of where you went over the past few weeks and check out how those days would have played out in a Tesla. Any days <150 miles, no problem at all; days 150-200 miles, if they happen often maybe an argument that you need a Tesla with the bigger battery; days 200 miles+ check how your routes look against Tesla's supercharger map and the zapmap.com map of public chargepoints.

 

[Jason71]

Slightly off topic but do you use your own car because you have to or because it works out cheaper than a company car. If the latter you could also consider getting a company car. Since the BIK is 0%/1%/2% in the next 3 years it suddenly becomes a much more attractive option.

 

[davidmc]

Hi,

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year. I work in sales and drive 1k-1.5k miles a month. I use my personal car for work and get a generous business mileage allowance which more than covers the expenses.

I have been thinking of buying an EV next year.

is a Tesla appropriate for that kind of business mileage?

I am thinking of a model X or Y at the moment, simply for the experience of driving a more spacious vehicle, but deciding to go EV or not EV is the more important question.

I drive 2k ish miles a month (M3 SR+) and no home charging. On street parking is all I have. I charge at work (free) and on the networks (polar and Ecotricity mainly) and so far have found it not bad. As long as you plan you will be fine. You kind of get into a routine with how you charge and where you charge and the likes of Zapmap helps loads for planning trips. As people have said above the cost of an EV is surprisingly better than a company car with Fuel card. I'm better off by around £180 a month with my previous company car (Ford Mondeo!) This saving I put aside for insurance, tyres, services and the charging on the network. No brainer and is a really fun car to drive

 

[gangzoom]

It's absolutely fine for that amount of mileage, the one thing to check is whether it's appropriate for how you cover those miles - where you go, what mileage you do in a day, what you normally do for lunch. Also where you are based as that affects charging options.

Best advice here.

We've done 29k in 24 months in our 75D X with only 200 miles of Mway range with no issues. However virtually all those are personal miles where there is no time pressure, we can pick where to park/charge etc.

For the occasional (literally twice last 12 months) long distance work trips needing me to cover 200-300 miles in ome day we take the combustion car hybrid.

In rain/cold/wind even a 300mile range LR Raven X will struggle to hit 150 miles range if your travelling at 70-80mph. For personal trips its not an issue, you can slow down, charge, take a detour etc. But if you need to be at destination A for a 9am meeting than you woudlnt have that luxury, unless you want to leave home alot earlier - 10 minutes sitting at a supercharger during rush hour can add 30 minutes easy if you hit school traffic.

Everyones usage varies, for us work trips = taking the combustion car. 500 miles range regardless of speed/weather/traffic, the convenience is something EVs simply cannot match at present.

 

[VanillaAir_UK]

Have a look at typical routes that you do in A Better Routeplanner, select Tesla superchargers and CCS (you may need an adaptor) then be aggressive on worse case temperature and road conditions. Some areas of country are well served with rapid chargers and some are not. Don't make your decision based on 'coming soon' super chargers.

 

[arg]

In rain/cold/wind even a 300mile range LR Raven X will struggle to hit 150 miles range if your travelling at 70-80mph.

I think that's a little bit pessimistic for a straight trip in the larger battery cars. Even my old-school S85 I would be confident of getting 200 miles on a full charge under most conditions - doing normally 70-80; probably in a severe blizzard/downpour it wouldn't, but I probably wouldn't drive 80mph in a blizzard either!

You did say 'X' rather than 'S' which makes it worse, but on the other hand the 100kWh batteries and improved Raven drivetrain make it better, so 200 should be comfortable in the big battery cars; your 150 miles maybe appropriate for the smaller battery.

 

[Mo City]

High daily mileage is the reason I bought my Model 3 last year. Instead of $320/month in gasoline, I now spend $65/month in electricity.

When you also consider zero monthly maintenance cost, I'm in a really good place.

Doesn't matter if it's business mileage or commute mileage, the savings is significant.

 

[Coolshades]

my travel is A to B and back to A. so for example, home location in the Midlands, to Bristol and back to home.

It's absolutely fine for that amount of mileage, the one thing to check is whether it's appropriate for how you cover those miles - where you go, what mileage you do in a day, what you normally do for lunch. Also where you are based as that affects charging options.

You say 1000-1500 miles/month, so 50-75 miles a day if evenly spread - like if you are on the road every day covering a local territory. That would be absolutely fine, overnight charging only needed, better in every way than the car you drive now.

Also fine would be if you make long trips to just visit individual clients who may be anywhere in the country - some of them might well be out of range, but if you are making a single long journey then your route almost certainly passes (or can be adjusted to pass) good charging options. if you are driving that far in one go, you'd be happy to stop for at least a coffee en-route so charging doesn't actually cost you any time.

The worst possible pattern is if your miles are condensed in a few days each week where you expect to spend a long day visiting multiple clients with only an hour or so each, and your territory is Wales. This is a killer in various ways. In winter, the pattern of driving for an hour then letting the car cool down for an hour, then warming it up again etc. gets the worst possible range out of the car - on a single long drive it's easy to get fairly close to the indicated range (ie. 200+ miles per charge, depending on model); for the extreme multi-stop pattern you'd still be fine in summer but maybe 30% less in UK winter conditions. If you do need to charge, then with only 50-mile hops between the fixed locations there's probably only one sensible route and if it's cross-country it may not pass (m)any good charging locations; if it's in Wales where there are very few public chargepoints anyhow then you are probably out of luck. Finally, if you are visiting a client every hour then you probably get all the coffee you can drink and so the charging stop is extra time you wouldn't otherwise have spent.

But it's fairly easy to work this out - spend a few minutes with Google maps to look at the mileages of where you went over the past few weeks and check out how those days would have played out in a Tesla. Any days <150 miles, no problem at all; days 150-200 miles, if they happen often maybe an argument that you need a Tesla with the bigger battery; days 200 miles+ check how your routes look against Tesla's supercharger map and the zapmap.com map of public chargepoints.

 

[arg]

my travel is A to B and back to A. so for example, home location in the Midlands, to Bristol and back to home.

That should be OK. If I take Birmingham<->Bristol as an example, that's 90 miles one-way, so should be OK for a round trip even in winter. If I make it a bit more challenging, say Leicester<->Bristol, that's 130miles one-way, 260 round trip, so might be achievable without charging in the larger-battery S/X models. For one of the cars with a 200 mile practical range, you are 60 miles short of being confident to do it, but both plausible routes from Leicester to Bristol pass superchargers and if you arrange to arrive there fairly empty that's a max of 10 minutes charging needed - on a summer day you might manage without stopping at all. If you are lucky, you might find a slow chargepoint near your destination in Bristol so you can charge while parked - doesn't happen often but handy when it does.

So with that sort of driving pattern, you will have a lot of days where you don't need to charge at all, a fair number of days where you need to stop for 10 minutes or so, and occasional days (when you go somewhere really inconvenient) that you have to stop for half an hour of charging.

Quite likely you will spend no more time charging than you currently spend filling your car with diesel, it will just be spread out differently.

 

[MaDProFF]

My Plan for me to go fully EV was no journeys over 200 miles per round trip per day, thus not having to rely on chargers away from home, which all ready in my view are over crowded, and certainly for teslas chargers going to get far worse before it gets better, so I only needed to rely on over night charging at home, BUT I probably over estimated how much a full charge would last in real world especially if it is far more motorway, and winter wet cold, so I guess 180 Real World driving day to day.

The other issue is over night charging has to be at least on a 7.2 KW charger to guarantee a 90% charge for a full day next day, having a 7.2 KW means after a long day drive it is quick to chuck a quick charge if you need to use in the evening etc., and still be charged for next day. Also having a 7.2KW charger means you can charge far more in off peak hours.

So it is then less inconvenient on a day to day, and defiantly doable, So far it is worked well for me, but my furthest journeys for me in a day are like 180 miles so far, but having to rely on a 3.6 KW home charger means after a long day, out in the evening, you will not get back to 90% if going out next day early so restricted. I intend to upgrade home charger to 7.2KW (I so wished I had 7.2 KW installed first off but only had a 30 mile range hybrid so did not need it, just to save £50-00 now will cost me £500 to upgrade.

 

[Avendit]

Having a play on a better route planner is def the best way. Load it up with worst case situations (cold, wet, windy, heavy load) and test it on your regular routes.

Of the 700 miles on my 3 so far 500 have been business, and I'm currently £300 up. Free destination chargers for the win \o/.