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Company car replacement advice.
My company car is due for replacement later this year and with fuel price increases due to continue I need a vehicle that is frugal. My annual mileage is approximately 30,000, which is split 80% motorway driving, the remainder in town.
I have looked at the Volvo V50 SE Lux DRIVe, Volkswagen Match BlueMotion, SEAT Leon SE Ecomotive and Audi A3 SE 1.6 TDI, all of which claim to have a combined fuel economy in excess of 70mpg. Can you recommend any of theses vehicles or an alternative that would provide good fuel economy and reasonable comfort?
I have looked at the Volvo V50 SE Lux DRIVe, Volkswagen Match BlueMotion, SEAT Leon SE Ecomotive and Audi A3 SE 1.6 TDI, all of which claim to have a combined fuel economy in excess of 70mpg. Can you recommend any of theses vehicles or an alternative that would provide good fuel economy and reasonable comfort?
Asked on 14 March 2010 by GB, via email
Answered by
Honest John
They may do 70mpg in the EC lab tests, but they won't do 70 used as a business car in real life unless you can afford to spend an extra hour or two a day on the road driving for maximum economy. Reckon on 55 - 60 driving reasonably sensibly. I did actually average 55mpg over 8,000 miles in a first generation Focus ECOnetic 1.6 TDCI 110 without stop start, that was just a coupe of mpg shy of the EC 'combined' figure.
You don't have to worry about all the very high replacement parts costs of a diesel in years 3 - 6 because either your employer will have replaced the car by then or your employer or the lease company will have to bear those costs. For true consumption figures obtained by real people rather than lab technicians.
See the Real Life Fuel Economy Register at: www.honestjohn.co.uk/RealMPG
You don't have to worry about all the very high replacement parts costs of a diesel in years 3 - 6 because either your employer will have replaced the car by then or your employer or the lease company will have to bear those costs. For true consumption figures obtained by real people rather than lab technicians.
See the Real Life Fuel Economy Register at: www.honestjohn.co.uk/RealMPG
Tags:
fuel economy
advice
Real MPG enables you to register the fuel economy you are actually getting against your make and model of car, its engine and type of transmission.
Every time you enter an average consumption figure against your car, the overall average automatically adjusts to reflect it.
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