The question that won't go away Every business owner I speak to who runs vehicles has the same question circling: should we switch to electric? The government just announced plans to make it easier to install pavement charging points, which tells you the direction of travel. But direction of travel and what makes sense for your business this year are different things. I've helped a few people work through this decision properly. Not with vibes or environmental guilt or because a salesperson showed them a shiny brochure. With numbers and operational reality. Here's how I'd approach it. Start with how your vehicles actually get used Forget the EV question for a moment. Map out what your vehicles do. How many miles per day, on average? What's the longest regular journey? Where do they park overnight? Do drivers take them home or return them to a central location? These questions matter more than any specification sheet. I worked with a landscaping business last year. Five vans, all doing roughly 60 miles a day, all returning to the same yard each night. Perfect EV candidate. They could charge overnight on a standard setup and never think about range. Contrast that with a client running a courier operation. Vehicles out 12 hours, unpredictable routes, drivers taking vans home to different postcodes across London. Much harder. Not impossible, but the infrastructure investment and operational changes would be significant. The vehicle isn't the variable. How you use it is. Run the actual numbers People get excited about fuel savings without doing the maths. So do the maths. A diesel van doing 30 miles per gallon, covering 15,000 miles a year, burns through roughly £2,800 in fuel at current prices. An equivalent electric van covering the same distance, charging at off-peak rates, costs around £600 to run. That's a saving of about £2,200 per vehicle per year. Sounds good. But the electric van costs £15,000 to £20,000 more upfront, even after the plug-in vehicle grant. So you're looking at a payback period of seven to nine years on fuel savings alone. Now factor in reduced maintenance. Electric vehicles have fewer moving parts. No oil changes, no exhaust systems, brake pads last longer because of regenerative braking. That knocks a few hundred quid off each year. But also factor in depreciation uncertainty. The used EV market is still finding its feet. Battery degradation concerns mean resale values are harder to predict than with diesel equivalents. When I run these numbers with clients, we often land somewhere unexpected. The pure financial case is rarely overwhelming. It's more like: slightly better over a long hold period, with more upfront risk. The infrastructure question is the real question Here's where most people underestimate the complexity. If your vehicles return to a depot you own, you can install charging points. A 7kW charger costs around £800 to £1,200 installed. That handles overnight charging for most use cases. If you need faster turnaround, you're looking at 22kW units or rapid chargers, which means electrical upgrades, potentially £5,000 to £15,000 depending on your site's capacity. If your drivers take vehicles home, you're asking them to install home chargers or rely on public infrastructure. Home installation grants exist, but you're now depending on each driver's housing situation. Rented flat with no dedicated parking? Problem. The new rules around pavement charging gullies might help here eventually. But eventually is not a business plan. I've seen this stall more EV transitions than anything else. The vehicles are ready. The charging network isn't, at least not in a way that maps onto how the business actually operates. Consider the non-financial factors honestly Some things don't show up in a spreadsheet but still matter. Client perception. Some industries care about this more than others. If you're pitching to corporate clients with sustainability mandates, an electric fleet signals something. Whether that's worth £20,000 per vehicle is a judgement call only you can make. Driver experience. Electric vehicles are quieter, smoother, often more pleasant to drive. That matters if you're trying to retain good people. Regulatory direction. Clean Air Zones are expanding. London's ULEZ already covers the whole city. Other cities are following. Diesel vehicles face increasing restrictions and charges. This isn't speculation. It's published policy. The question isn't whether EVs make sense eventually. They probably do. The question is whether switching now, with current prices and infrastructure, makes sense for your specific situation. A framework for the decision When I sit down with someone wrestling with this, I use a simple structure. First: can your operations physically accommodate EVs today? If vehicles can't reliably charge, stop there. Revisit in 12 months when infrastructure improves. Second: what's the total cost of ownership over your typical vehicle hold period? Not just purchase price. Fuel, maintenance, depreciation, any grants or tax benefits. Compare like for like. Third: what non-financial factors apply? Regulatory exposure, client expectations, driver retention, your own values about environmental impact. Weigh those three honestly. The answer usually becomes clear. I've built a Decision Matrix tool at alira.london that helps structure exactly this kind of multi-factor choice. It won't make the decision for you, but it forces you to put numbers against gut feelings. What to do this week Pull your mileage data for the last six months. Work out the daily range each vehicle actually needs, not the maximum theoretical journey, the typical one. Get a quote for charging infrastructure at your main location. Even if you're not ready to switch, knowing the real number changes the calculation. Pick one vehicle in your fleet and run the full cost comparison: diesel versus electric, over five years, including everything. Use that as your baseline for deciding whether to investigate further or wait.