Hey! It’s roundup time…
We blinked and it was the 15th of October and we realised we hadn’t shared the September news roundup with anyone! In the digital world in which we live looking back with nostalgia at the month just gone is something that we don’t always have time to do, and if that’s not a way of romanticising the lateness of this roundup I don’t know what is…
So how was your September? Bit of a distant memory now? We can’t give you an update of where you were personally last month 1.) we don’t know and b.) Data protection… GDPR… privacy laws! However we can tell you what was going on in the world of electric vehicles and at DriveElectric.
We celebrated world EV day! Fully Charged shared some details about their EV only drive-in cinema nights. The Skoda Enyaq iV and the Volkswagen ID.4 were both launched, both are SUV style electric vehicles, read on for a bit more info on those. We also broke part of our website for a few hours yesterday – so there’s an apology for that at the end of the roundup… and when I say ‘we’ broke the website, I mean I broke the website. I should still be on the naughty step for that one really – not freely roaming and publishing the news roundup!
Sounds like your cup of tea? Excellent! Let’s dive in… (Thanks for reading! Gem)
EV charging payment service launched by Zap Map
7 Sep 2020 | Green Car Guide
Zap-Map have launched a new service that enables EV drivers to use a single app to pay for charging across different networks has been unveiled today: Zap-Pay from Engenie, the UK-wide rapid charging network, will be the first network available on Zap-Pay.
Drivers currently need to use multiple apps and cards to pay to charge on different networks which is confusing and a bit of a pain! This lack of uniformity and ease of access has made public charging into an awkward amenity and a blocker to more widespread EV adoption. Zap-Pay will allow all electric car and van drivers to seamlessly pay to charge on any participating network.
Currently the Zap-Pay app doesn’t include many networks – but an app like this is a step forward in attempting to create some unity in charging access, and we think that’s a positive thing!
World EV Day
9 Sep 2020 | DriveElectric Blog
We joined in celebrating world EV day on the 9th September, we got so carried away reminiscing about how far EVs have come ahead of this special day we updated our EV adoption infographic (see right, or below if you’re scrolling on a mobile 🙂 ). The popularity of electric cars and vans has gone wild over the last few years and it’s been incredible to see this happen (and a bit of a relief to know we weren’t barking up the wrong tree all these years!).
Fully Charged electric Drive-in cinema
7 Sep 2020 | Fully Charged Show
The Fully Charged Show have launched the UK’s first indoor Electric Drive-In Cinema and tickets are now available! Tickets are availabel now and will grant you access to a weather-proof, COVID-safe, drive-in with a brand new movie and some special surprises.
The Electric Drive-In will run for a limited time only this October at Farnborough International and features TENET*, the highly anticipated new blockbuster from director Christopher Nolan.
Polestar are sponsoring the Electric Drive-In and attendees will be able see the new Polestar 2 up close at the screenings. Please note these screenings are limited to Electric Vehicles only and numbers are limited so please book early to avoid disappointment.
ALL-NEW ENYAQ IV
14 Sept 2020 | Skoda
Enyaq – you can configure one of these over on the Skoda website. Meanwhile at DriveElectric HQ We’re still con-figuring out how to pronounce it!
But it looks like all the sensible EV necessary extras are going to be available. Heated seats and steering wheels are a must for winter driving! There are loads of extra niceties too you can add on to your Enyaq – you’ll have the option to go for heated rear seats too – so you can also keep your rear passenger seats toasty (if your friends / family members have been especially well behaved this year maybe this is an upgrade you’ll want to consider), and there are extra USB ports in the rear to keep everyone’s phones topped up (and ensure some peace and quiet) on longer trips. The Enyaq iV has a WLTP rating of 242 or 316 miles per charge depending which battery size option you go for. There will be 62kWh or 82kWh options available in the UK.
We’ll keep you updated when this new electric car will be available to lease through our social channels and blog. You can also sign up to our mailing list for updates straight to your inbox.
Tesla Battery Day
22 Sept 2020 | Tesla
Tesla’s annual ‘Battery Day’ featured more announcements than you can shake a stick out, we’ve included the highlights here on our blog. The event (like many this year) was postponed from it’s original date earlier in the 2020 due to COVID-19, and fell on the 22nd September instead. Battery Day is an exciting day for Tesla fans and drivers, eager to see whether a million mile battery would be announced and what we had to look forward to in the near future.
The VW ID.4 Debut had us at “Hello…”
22 Sept 2020 | Volkswagen
Details on the ID.4 have been shared by VW. It’s an SUV style all electric car, amazing turning circle, recessed door handles for improved aerodynamics, fancy features here, more great stuff there, jazzy new VW logo… oh and if you say this to it: “Hello ID., show me the stars” the sun blind opens.
Well that’s pretty special… SOLD!
Have you met our new ‘quoting tool’ widgets?
August 2020 (belatedly sharing) | DriveElectric website
Have you met? Can you think of catchier name? (If we ask our MD they’ll all get called Eric and we’ve already got an electric van on the FlexiHire Fleet called Eric, a while slew of vehicle pages with the same names is not going to be manageable!). We introduced these little widgets into the site in August but neglected to introduce them to anyone else, we were waiting to see if they were going to settle in happily before we made a big deal. There’s one of them on each vehicle page and they enable you to adjust your own pricing so you can instantly get a quote for 10,000 rather than 5,000 miles per annum, or compare the cost of a 24 month EV lease deal vs a 36 month offer.
Marvellous and pretty handy! Turns out the widgets love the website and if we (me) hadn’t blundered around in the site yesterday and upset everything for a few hours they would have carried on quoting away. Apologies if you were stopped in your tracks yesterday afternoon getting a quote, we are back to full working order and we have also apologised to the widgets for the upset. Quote away!
