Simon Hudson drives a Tesla Model 3 Standard Range Plus 54kWh 2020 electric car.

This is Simon’s first electric car, he’s owned the Model 3 1-2 years and drives 10,000-15,000 miles annually. The current mileage of the car is between 10,000-20,000 miles and he achieves 220 miles range from a full charge.

Why did you choose the Tesla Model 3?

We want to minimise our carbon footprint, while enjoying the superior driving experience from an EV. It helps that we have solar PV, so can ‘fuel’ the car from our roof much of the time.

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Positives – List 3 or more reasons why you love this electric car

• It’s very quiet and relaxing to drive
• It generates zero emissions
• It’s extraordinarily cheap to own and run
• It’s extremely quick if we need it to be.

Negatives – List 3 or more things that you really don’t like about this electric car

• Tesla are not very good at customer service, which has an impact on the service experience some of the time
• It’s a big car, we would prefer a smaller vehicle (at least it’s not an unnecessary, unwieldy SUV)
• It’s not the prettiest car around (but that’s true of the majority of modern cars).

Have you experienced any faults with the car? If so, what have they been?

We have had a problem with a camera failing and with a blocked windscreen washer. All rapidly fixed by Tesla. Otherwise the reliability has been excellent.

What are the standout technological features of the car?

• Autopilot – I drive almost everywhere with it on, it makes driving much less tiring.
• We love the single display screen, far fewer distractions in the cockpit once you have learned to process what it displays
• The raw performance, when you need it. It literally pushes you into the back of the seat and holds you there.
• One-pedal driving (regeneration), it’s a revelation and so much more efficient than using brakes.

Surprise us! Tell us something people wouldn’t readily know about the Tesla Model 3

There are entertaining and fun apps built into the car but these are only occasionally useful. However, the Tesla app is something we use every day to:

• check the current state of charge/range
• see where the car is (so I can have dinner ready for when my wife gets home)
• so we can warm/cool the car remotely
• lock it/open it even if we are half a world away
• book at service appointment
• and review our ‘fuel’ use – 297kWh last month, at a cost of less than £40. That gave us about 1,200 miles; about 3p per mile). It’s brilliant!

What electric car(s) are you interested in next and why?

That entirely depends on what is on the market in 3 or 5 years time. It won’t be an SUV (because they are ridiculous), it might be a MINI if they can get the range up and the price down.

Home charging unit – outline both positive & negative elements

We use a myenergi zappi, which can automatically take excess energy from our solar panels and feed that into the car. It’s an elegant looking unit with an app that is the equal of the Tesla app in usefulness. The only flaw I know of is that it can take 10 seconds or so to make changes to the charger settings.

Electricity supplier & tariff – outline both positive & negative elements

We are with Octopus Go, which has given us a fully green energy supply, a good day time rate (currently 13p/kWh, rising to around 25p next month) and an excellent overnight (12:30 – 4:30 am, 5 p/kWh rising to 7.5p) rate which we use to charge the car and our home battery.

Octopus are outstanding – fun, innovative and with great customer service and company culture. The only downside is that our current contract expires in November but even then the new rates will be reasonable.

What public charging networks would you recommend to others and why?

• Tesla is the best – literally plug in and walk away, with market leading reliability
• PodPoint and Gridserve are also given merit points for ease of use and availability
• ChargePlace Scotland should be recognised for ensuring almost every village and town in Scotland has some chargers.

Insurer – outline both positive & negative elements

Churchill – they are a mainstream insurer yet have some of the best EV prices around. No downsides.

Please itemise where you’re saving money owning & running a Tesla Model 3

• The biggest is fuel, we can run the car for a year on the equivalent of about 4 tanks of petrol
• Insurance is low (£250)
• Tax is £0
• There are no service costs, almost no brake wear and tyre wear is the same as we expect from a ‘normal’ car
• We save somewhere around £2,000 a year compared with our efficient Volvo V40, perhaps more with the current price of diesel.

See other owner reviews here