Experience report hiring an EV in France

[tsedge]

I recently hired a Fiat 500e in France via Sixt and thought my experience might assuage some fears of those thinking of doing the same for the first time. It was a good experience.

The pickup was very easy, everything done beforehand online, including scanning my licence etc.

The car was charged to 100%, the promise was 80% or more and the request was to return the car with 80% or more,

The car had about 150 miles range, plenty for my trip. Included with the car was a granny charger and a Type 2 lead, plus a Shell Recharge card - which proved useless but more on that later.

For most of the trip I charged at my destination on the granny. However, I had to reduce the charge power to 2/5 (Fiat just has a 5 option scale) as otherwise it would trip the circuit breaker. French properties typically only have a 6kW supply unless the owner chooses to upgrade in units of 3kW for an higher standing charge.

This meant roughly a 1.5kW charge rate, although I could have put it up a bit overnight. This wasn't an issue for my use but might catch out some people. The car charged to 100% always, this seems to be the policy, not sure what kind of battery it has.

On the way back I tried to top up at a Shell Recharge charger but both chargers were completely dead and not working. When I took the car back, it had 54% and they said they'd charge me only the difference between 54% and 80%. It wasn't expensive. You can prepay so that the top up charge isn't on return but unless you know how much charge you will return the car with, this will often be more expensive, at least with Sixt.

I would have needed better apps for finding chargers in France if I'd been travelling a long distance, would strongly recommend that.

Overall, it was easy and simple and I would do it again.

 

[evmg1]

I recently hired a Fiat 500e in France via Sixt and thought my experience might assuage some fears of those thinking of doing the same for the first time. It was a good experience.

The pickup was very easy, everything done beforehand online, including scanning my licence etc.

The car was charged to 100%, the promise was 80% or more and the request was to return the car with 80% or more,

The car had about 150 miles range, plenty for my trip. Included with the car was a granny charger and a Type 2 lead, plus a Shell Recharge card - which proved useless but more on that later.

For most of the trip I charged at my destination on the granny. However, I had to reduce the charge power to 2/5 (Fiat just has a 5 option scale) as otherwise it would trip the circuit breaker. French properties typically only have a 6kW supply unless the owner chooses to upgrade in units of 3kW for an higher standing charge.

This meant roughly a 1.5kW charge rate, although I could have put it up a bit overnight. This wasn't an issue for my use but might catch out some people. The car charged to 100% always, this seems to be the policy, not sure what kind of battery it has.

On the way back I tried to top up at a Shell Recharge charger but both chargers were completely dead and not working. When I took the car back, it had 54% and they said they'd charge me only the difference between 54% and 80%. It wasn't expensive. You can prepay so that the top up charge isn't on return but unless you know how much charge you will return the car with, this will often be more expensive, at least with Sixt.

I would have needed better apps for finding chargers in France if I'd been travelling a long distance, would strongly recommend that.

Overall, it was easy and simple and I would do it again.

We've had a tesla y in France.....beauty with that is you get free supercharger use for a set number of miles. So convenient.