There’s a division in thought about climate change. Some are convinced that mankind is causing change to weather systems through the use of carbon emitting machinery, technologies and processes. Others, such as President-elect Donald Trump, consider global warming “mythical”, “non-existent”, or “an expensive hoax”.
Regardless of politics, governments are looking at the bigger picture and are trying to push drivers – and by extension, manufacturers – away from internal-combustion-engine (ICE) powered vehicles and toward alternative technologies and fuels.
It’s no surprise that with UK governments of both political hues flip-flopping over a ban on sales of new ICE vehicles – from 2030, to 2035 and now, depending on the outcome of a Department of Transport consultation that closes in February, back to 2030 – that the sector is both struggling to sell new EVs and to move their services on to cope with the new world order. To be fair, there are other influences affecting take-up such as the higher purchase price of EVs, misinformation, and falling values of used vehicles.
It’s worth noting that trade body the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT) is backing a new initiative with Auto Trader and ChargeUK, endorsed by the Department of Transport, to promote data-based facts on owning and driving an EV.
Given this background, it’s fair to ask if garages can care for non-ICE vehicles already sold, let alone those that need to be sold.
The Institute of the Motor Industry (IMI) told CAT that it “has seen encouraging growth in the number of technicians gaining EV certification in 2024, but the skills gap remains and is particularly marked for those technicians with Level 3 and 4 qualifications”.
The IMI is concerned that only 9% of the current workforce is qualified to Level 4; this means that less than one in ten can work on high-voltage vehicle electrical components and associated systems when carrying out maintenance and repair of electric/hybrid vehicles.
An IMI spokesperson said: “Automotive businesses urgently need to prioritise training more technicians – and at all levels – so that the expected rising number of EV owners can find a local technician qualified to work on their vehicle.”
They added: “When the previous government moved the deadline back to 2035 there was a serious risk that businesses and individuals would take their foot off the pedal in investing in EV skills.”
Indeed, this may be the reason why IMI TechSafe found just a two-point increase in the proportion of technicians able to work on electric vehicles in the last year.
An independent’s view
However, some are making a headstrong move to be able to work on EVs.
Take Kidlington-based Summertown Garage. Its director, Lindsay Brown, said that her garage made the move into EV servicing back in 2016. It identified a gap in the market for a garage that specialises in EV’s in the area – “it was just something that we jumped on way before we should have.”
She noted that the garage didn’t find it profitable at the time but does now.
Brown outlined that the process began with getting its technicians IMI accredited and subsequently investing in new equipment.
Brown said: “We were worried at first as we had no one coming through the door. And then we had EV chargers fitted. Over time we started to see the odd EV coming in for an MOT and servicing.”
She said that it was a few years of marketing via the garage’s website before EV work took off; Summertown Garage generally sees a 60:40 split of ICE to EV.
“We see 50% on a good day but it depends on the week… you have a week where you’ll have one in for an MOT and then the next week you can have some in for MOTs and servicing and repairs, and then we’re doing DC to DC converters,” said Brown.
Where the story gets interesting is when Brown talks about local competition for EV work: there isn’t any.
Consequently, Brown noted that “we’re getting many more customers look us up and come our way – we push EVs a lot on our website”. She said that there’s little alternative to her garage “unless you go main dealer, and a lot of them cannot do a lot of the work”.
A majority of the Summertown Garage’s customers are in Oxfordshire, but some come from Gloucestershire and Northamptonshire.
But is Brown seeing other garages begin to make the move into EV work?
“It depends on the business and where they want to take it… people [drivers], I think, are definitely on the fence in jumping to EVs,” said Brown. “A lot of them are sticking with hybrid. I think infrastructure is a problem.”
Overall, Brown thinks it a very cloudy decision for many garages and that the decision to move to providing EV servicing “comes down to whether they can financially invest, whether they feel like they need to profit more, and whether they want the growth”.
A national perspective
Of course, EVs are as much an issue for national chains as independents and Halfords is one that keen to offer services in this area.
Andy Turbefield, Halfords’ head of quality, says that the company has equipped 70% of its locations with EV tooling and can now provide both hybrid and fully-electric vehicle servicing.
But he said that despite the investment, “the ratio of EV to ICE work is still relatively low”; “in part driven by the average age of the EV parc (the European term for all registered vehicles within a defined geographic region) and is very much led by business-to-business and fleet customers rather than retail driven by a lack of uptake in general buying public”.
He made a critical observation – that “businesses across the aftermarket need to see a return on investment in tooling and skills development in order to make these possible”. He says that “Halfords would welcome support to help the industry transition required from the new Labour government; there is a huge opportunity but access to skilled labour remains a key risk”.
Turbefield thinks that greater impetus for change could be given if the cost of public charging was reduced by bringing VAT in line with at home charging. On top of that he’d welcome “setting targets for the number of public charge points to drive down charging anxiety, government support to help remove the misinformation regarding EVs, and support to help curb the falling residuals in the second-hand market of used EVs”.
He said: “Garages, particularly independents, need to realise a return on investment in new equipment and skills. With 2% of the car parc being battery electric vehicles, garages still need to rely upon ICE to survive”.
And it doesn’t help that, as Turbefield identified, it takes a long time to bring a car to market: “OEMs need consistent decision making to build cars to new specifications. Model cycles are a minimum of 5 years so changing phase out dates is hugely challenging”.
He worries that with new heavily subsidised entrants from China, European firms are facing their toughest battle to date with many laying off workers and closing plants.
Fundamentally, he’s suggesting that for EV to grow in market share, and for garages to benefit, manufacturers “need confidence in the UK government’s industrial strategy to continue to invest in the UK.”
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