Electric cars cost twice as much to insure as petrol vehicles - as average cost soars by 50%

Drivers of electric vehicles (EV) are paying more than double for insurance as those who own petrol cars, data has revealed.

The average insurance premium for EVs soared to £1,344 at the end of last year, which is approximately twice the cost of insuring a petrol-fuelled vehicle, according to UK insurance broker Howden Group.

The surge, which is up 50 per cent from last year, is due to the higher cost of repairs for electric models, Howden said.

Hard-to-fix batteries and a shortage of mechanics capable of doing the job are also to blame.

“You’ve got length of repair times going up, you’ve got the cost of the component parts going up, and you probably see more EVs written off because residual values are particularly low at the moment,” Carl Shuker, the broker’s UK and Ireland boss, told Bloomberg.

Insurance for combustion engine cars has also seen eye-watering increases, as the price of insuring a car has soared on average by £338 over the past 12 months to hit £924, according to the Confused.com price index.

But the rise in EV insurance is still bigger both proportionally and in real terms, according to Howden.

To compare, while the cost of insuring a typical internal combustion engine car jumped by 31 per cent, the price still remained some £668 less expensive per year than insuring an electric car.

The company said this is due to the higher frequency of claims from EV drivers and a higher average cost per claim, with the latter being around 35 per cent more for EVs than combustion engine cars.

It comes as analysis by Auto Trader predicts that prices for electric cars are set to fall this year as Chinese electric car manufacturers enter the UK market.

UK companies will be under pressure to compete for their market share with the new zero-emission vehicles (ZEV) mandate starting this month.

The new law mandates that at least 22 per cent of new cars sold by each manufacturer in the UK must be zero-emission in 2024, which means electric vehicles. This percentage will steadily increase each year, reaching 100 per cent by 2035.

The entry of Chinese manufacturers into the UK market adds another layer of competition, compelling established brands to reassess their pricing strategies.