Octopus EV lease conditions

Cheery_Daff

Hi,

Just wondering if anyone has leased an EV from Octopus and can help me understand the pricing structure. I'll book a call with them this week but it would be helpful to understand in advance if possible.

There's an option to pay, for example, 12 months upfront, which reduces the monthly cost. But I can't work out if that means you don't pay anything at all for the first (or last) 12 months, or whether it's just that the monthly cost is reduced.

So, for example, a 2 year lease with 1 month upfront is £329 upfront, then £329 a month. Or 12 months upfront is £3108 plus £259 a month.

So is it:

(A) £3108 + (£259 × 12) = £6216

(B) £3108 + (£259 x 24) = £9324

I would have assumed the first, because why would you pay such a massive upfront fee if it was going to make the overall cost over 2 years MORE expensive?

But their T&Cs just refer to it not being a deposit, but a payment to reduce the monthly cost, and also I just clicked for an automatic quote for one with a ONE year lease with 12 month upfront payment, which still included a £3k ish '12 months upfront' payment AND a £271 monthly cost (which surely shouldn't exist if it's a 12 month lease and I've paid 12 months upfront).

Is this a case of poor communication, or a really crappy deal if you pay upfront??

Any help appreciated - I've never leased a car before, always just driven crappy old bangers til they died so this is a new one for me!

Thanks 😊

WellKnownSid

12 months up front means you pay the equivalent of 12 months worth of monthly payments as a deposit, then you pay the agreed monthly payment each month. 12 months does not give you a 12 month payment holiday.

Depending on how the deal is stacked - paying more up front may reduce or increase the overall amount - or make no difference. Small changes to the mileage / term will make a significant difference too - often headline figures can be based on two years at 5,000 miles p.a. or similar.

Make sure you buy gap insurance if not included as part of the deal (lots of cheap options exist online). Replacement value as deemed by the lease company's accounting system will far exceed an insurance payment.

noitsnotme

From my experience, for a 2 year lease it would normally be deposit plus 23 monthly payments.

Which car are looking at on Octopus and what annual mileage are you selecting?

Cheery_Daff

Thank you both, that's helpful.

Having gone back and tried again with this knowledge I can see why my figures seemed so ridiculous - I was calculating while in the car (as a passenger!) and clearly at some point I've ticked the 4 year box rather than 2 year 😂 So I'd calculated overall cost based on 2 years of monthly payments, not four.

And I'd only done that particular calculation with one example of car, so not corrected myself 🙈

Anyway, I don't have a particular model in mind at the minute - I've been comparing a 2 year lease, 15,000 miles a year. So, for example, a Citreon eC3 paying 1 month upfront (and 23 monthly payments) is a total of £9336 over the two years, whereas paying 12 months upfront gives a total of £8925 - which is more like what I'd assumed the difference would be.

So, apologies for being a plonker - I now need to go away and work out whether we can justify breaking our old banger habit for an EV (will still need a second car, so need to decide which of our current wrecks to keep, which mileage etc we can switch).

Thank you for your help!

WellKnownSid

A Tesla model 3 would be cheaper for one month down…

Arunmor

Personally I would want to pay a maximum of 3 months up front, the less you have invested upfront the better.

Penelopa.Pitstop

It depends on circumstances and person, whether it's better to oay less or more upfront. Someone may prefer to pay more upfront and keep monthky payments lower or the other way around. But in case of big upfront payment, GAP insurance and initial payment insurance should be considered. In case of write-off, you will lose big upfront payment.

Ectophile

There are plenty of used EVs on the market now. You could pick one up for the price of a 2 year lease, and keep it as long as you like.

born_again

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82012117#Comment_82012117

Even more so given a lot of Octopus leases are 2nd hand cars.

Penelopa.Pitstop

I would avoid leasing second hand car unless it has warranty for the period of lease.

WellKnownSid

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82012117#Comment_82012117

It's probably not a slam dunk.

If you can get a new M3 for 2 years / 30,000 miles for around £9k - then most of the comparisons will be against a five year old car with a loo-paper warranty, MoT and servicing to think about.

There are a lot of Stellantis cars around for that money - with the ongoing OBC issues. The Nissan Leaf can have overheated cell issues that Nissan point blank refuse to fix under warranty. I love our Zoe but wouldn't choose one out of warranty. In my mind MG ZS is probably the best option, they can go on for moon miles (and have done as taxis) and you might get 2 more years out of the 7 year warranty.

Anyone without £9k sat in the bank also has to consider the cost of financing said vehicle.

You could go a lot worse than leasing an M3 - zero range anxiety, zero servicing costs, a careful driver might even eek it out on the original tyres.