8:15 am, June 5, 2011
EVERY Peugeot dealer will be able to service the electric iOn but they won’t have fast charging points.
At the moment, only specialist dealers are able to service the £33k fully-electric car, but one of Peugeot’s product managers exclusively told Car Dealer Magazine that this will change.
‘Because there’s so many technological parallels between the iOn and our hybrid vehicles, by the end of this year, or possibly by the beginning of next year, every dealer will be able to service the iOn as well as diesel hybrids,’ said Alan Nicolson, Peugeot product planning manger.
However, while this spells good news for Peugeot’s dealer network, no dealerships will be getting fast charging points – like rival firm Nissan has installed for its Leaf owners.
Unlike Nissan, the French firm does not think the installation of convenient fast-charging points for customers is important.
(more below advert)
‘We don’t think fast charging is hugely relevant,’ said Nicolson. ‘Actually, we would go so far as to say that if customers need to use a fast-charging point, electric cars aren’t right for them. EVs are inherently not suited to doing daily mileages of 150 miles a day – that’s just not what a modern day electric vehicle is capable of doing.
‘Installing fast charging points is not part of our current strategy. That might change because we might have to react to the market, but our dealers will have a charging bay with a dedicated charging post, although it won’t be the £30k fast chargers that Nissan dealers are installing for the Leaf.’
