New Delhi: Park+, which hosts about 1.5-crore cars on its app, Friday announced key findings from its India (Delhi NCR, Mumbai, Bengaluru) centric survey among e-car owners. The survey, answered by 500 e-car owners, wasto understand their mindset.
Park+ hosts over 25,000 verified e-car owners on its platform, from across India. Nearly 91,000 electric passenger vehicles were sold in India during the financial year 2023-24, according to the data released by the Federation of Automobile Dealers Associations (FADA), India.
Key findings from the survey include:
Charging anxiety (88%) replaces range anxiety: Finding an accessible, safe and working charging station was a top anxiety trigger for e-car owners. Even with more than 20,000+ EV charging stations in India, EV owners felt that the visibility for these stations was extremely opaque. Meanwhile, range anxiety took a backseat as most of thedrivers preferred to take short intercity drives, limited to less than 50 KM.
Maintenance cost: EV maintenance costs were a major grey area for 73% of e-car owners. About 73% of respondents highlighted the fact that their e-cars were like a black box which they could not decipher. Their local mechanics were also unable to solve minor issues at hand. The respondents also highlighted the fact that they were unable to get a clear picture on the cost of repairs as they could not get second opinions from multiple repair shops.
Fall in resale value: Dramatic fall in resale value for e-cars was mentioned as a major worry by the respondents. About 33% of them mentioned that when they casually checked the resale value of their e-car, the quote they got was far below its perceived value. However, the resale value of e-cars in India is expected to improve in parallel with the maturing of the current EV ecosystem. While ICE cars can be quickly valued via their age and mileage, there are no tests in widespread use that determine the quality of a battery, which constitutes 30% of an EV’s value.
Unhappier than ICE car owners: E-car owners on average were unhappier than ICE car owners, due to perceived everyday hassles involved in owning an EV. About 51% of 4W EV owners felt that they wouldn’t buy a second EV and would rather go back to owning an ICE vehicle. Part of the problem is that the industry is handling second hand EVs for the first time.
People’s choice: TATA Nexon EV (61%) emerged as the people’s choice, amongst the current EV lineup, followed by the TATA Punch EV (19%). TATA EV as a brand also topped the list in terms of design, durability and safety. BYD as a brand got maximum attention from the survey respondents. However the pricing and a lack of test driving options was noted as a major hindrance.
Amit Lakhotia, founder and CEO, Park+, said, “At Park+ our main business objective is to bring delight back to car ownership. This survey is a step in the same direction to understand the mindset of the e-car owners in India. The Indian 4W EV story is still being written and the need of the hour is to build a robust and smart EV charging infrastructure embedded in our current vehicular ecosystem. Charging anxiety has overtaken range anxiety by a huge margin. As the largest EV charger installer in the country we will continue to invest our energies in enhancing the EV car ownership experience for them, throughout the life cycle of their car and look forward to partnering with other external stakeholders to support us in this endeavour.”
