Interesting read this thread, I think they can be decent / good if they suit your lifestyle and access to reasonably priced charging.
I recently got a Kia Niro EV (new facelift one, looks much better than the original).
The car is on a business lease, makes total sense at the moment with BIK being so low and half of the VAT recoverable and the cost of this car is around £40k compared to £60k plus for German / Teslas makes it a cost effective ish solution for electric motoring.
Getting it was a pain, waited 6 months, wrong car was delivered (cock up by the dealership they ordered a petrol hybrid card instead of the electric) so I was given an older Niro EV for free for two months while the right car was on its way. Finally got the right car about a month ago. But that said I waited 3x longer for the GR!
So I've been living with the electric car for 2-3 months now and I can currently charge for free in Glasgow where I work Monday - Friday (Council ran chargers are all free until April) and I occasionally charge at home if I need to at the weekend. So costs of running it have been almost £0 bar 3-4 partial charges at home. There are 6 22kw chargers by my work and people are pretty good usually at moving their cars once charged, I'm yet to turn up and not be able to charge.
Charging it during the day while working on the 11kw onboard charger is fine for me longest it has taken is 6 hours when it was on 10% battery, but I can see from above the issues you get if you do long journeys often and rely on fast charging at excessive rates.
I've tried a few faster chargers with various success but the lower temperatures up in Scotland mean it usually won't charge any faster than 22kw even if it is on a 50kw or above charger. Not great, but I knew this may be a problem going into buying it and the bulk of my driving doesn't require it.
Yet to do a long trip in it (I do a 500 mile journey to Plymouth a few times a year usually) and I'm planning to do the first one with a lot of contingency built in.
I do think the price per KWH at fast chargers are excessive, and I guess you could liken it to higher petrol prices at service stations, but hopefully in time competition will bring the cost down a little. The way I see it though for me, I would only use these very few times a year so on average my running costs will still be much lower than a petrol car.
I do wish I had opted for the built in heat pump, often wonder if I would get more miles per KWH with it. On my usual commute at the moment with the heating on its around 2.9-3.0 kwh and 3.3 kWh without it. On the 64KWH battery that is about a 26 mile loss over a whole journey.
Using the heated seats and steering wheel doesn't seem to have any effect but isn't quite the same as having the heating on!
Once the free charging goes near me I think I will be able to charge a little slower off the actual building I'm in for free, working that one out with my landlord just now. And at home I'm getting solar panels and a battery so will switch to an eco 7 rate and get a cheaper night rate to charge the car if needed (around 11p per KWH at the moment).
My overall experience is that this isn't something you can just swap out from an ICE car and expect to work. There is an adjustment and a change in mentality around driving it, being able to use slower chargers when you know you are somewhere for a few hours.
Will update this when I do a long journey!
