What's it like as a petrol car

[jaapv]

Well, in the first 18 hours of my ownership ( got the car in the last day of 2013) it gained me 15.000 Euro net in MIA (Environmental tax relief) and KIA ( small business tax relief.) In the BIK/Writeoff part it will gain me somewhat similar sums over the next five years.... After five years my net investment will have been something like 7000-9000 Euros...
Still I like the thing for what it is as a car, the monetary gain is a bonus to me.

 

[spellinn]

Apart from BIK (we call it "bijtelling") we have a few more advantages:
- No road taxes in 2013, 2014 and 2015, reduced road taxes thereafter
- Faster write off (not a huge plus, more a liquidity and interest advantage)
- Extra write off (bigger plus, tax saving is about 14% of list price)
- Euro 0,- car sales tax applied (on my MY2010 Outlander diesel, car sales tax was about EURO 14.000 out of a total of EURO 45.000)

We have the first two of those in the UK. Low CO2 emissions mean there is no road tax, and companies can write-off 100% of the purchase cost of the vehicle in the first year, rather than depreciate over several years as per normal cars. This has obvious tax benefits (faster write off=reduced profit=reduced corporation tax)

Cheers

Neil

 

[anko]

This has obvious tax benefits (faster write off=reduced profit=reduced corporation tax)

But also more corporation taxes in the years to come, as you have no more write off then. Faster write off does not lead to reduction in tax, but a shift in the moment you pay it. As a result, there is a small interest benefit and you can use the money, that you would normally have paid to the tax office, for other purposes.

The sales pitch for the PHEV (as well as the pitch for the Volt, Ampera, V60, etc.) brought the faster write off as a big advantage, not pointing out that it would be a disadvantage for the following years :?

 

[jaapv]

Not quite, if you are a small business/professional you can play your tax brackets with a variable writeoff. And, given the probably depressed used price after a few years due to the large number of leased vehicles hitting the market, you can move it to private quite cheaply.

 

[gwatpe]

I think all the chat about tax avoidance is getting OFF topic....

 

[anko]

I think all the chat about tax avoidance is getting OFF topic....

Sorry, you are right

 

[jaapv]

I think all the chat about tax avoidance is getting OFF topic....

Using the PHEV as a petrol car only is all about tax avoidance. Nobody would consider buying it for that purpose if were not for taxes.

 

[maby]

I think all the chat about tax avoidance is getting OFF topic....

Using the PHEV as a petrol car only is all about tax avoidance. Nobody would consider buying it for that purpose if were not for taxes.

I'm not sure it is quite so black and white, you know. If you want a large and moderately capable 4WD estate with genuine automatic transmission and want to protect yourself against the growing penalties being imposed on diesel vehicles, then the Outlander PHEV can be a valid option. Its fuel consumption driven as a pure petrol car is comparable with that of other similarly sized and similarly capable petrol alternatives.

 

[gwatpe]

We have to realize that the world is actually bigger than just the EU and in other places there are no tax avoidance schemes. In AUS we [personal buyers] have to buy cars on specifications and suitability of our personal driving needs. The PHEV petrol car aspects work well and even better now that my PHEV can start automatically in SAVE mode.

 

[jaapv]

of course it is not so black and white, and it can even serve as an introduction to a more environmentally conscious way of driving.
However, I do happen to think that the tax-driven approach invalidates the intentions of the governement somewhat, spoiling the success of the stimulating measures for those (and that includes the vast majority of forum members) that do make a serious effort to use the PHEV as intended.

 

[maby]

It would be interesting to know how many forum members actually have a PHEV. We seem to have around 870 members - of whom more than 50% have posted twice or less.