Our Fleet: Skoda Superb estate 2.0 TDI SE - May

It was good to get back into the Skoda Superb – for my bank balance, if nothing else. Having driven the excellent BMW 520d on long-term test for a number of months, before switching to the Audi A4 2.0TDi 170bhp Avant for five weeks, I’ve been used to achieving fuel consumption of around 46-48mpg.

One weekend in the 2.0-litre 140bhp TDi Superb estate, however, and I was already comfortably into the low 50s - without even trying. Shame it has now gone back to Skoda, but I calculated that comparing like-for-like, I saved close to £20 driving the Superb for those three weeks estimating weekly mileage of 400. Over the course of a year, that’s a frankly eye watering £312 for just one car.

Now, if I was running a fleet of 100 cars, simply choosing the slightly less powerful Superb rather than A4 would reduce my annual fuel bill by £31,200 (as long as I wasn’t paying fixed AFRs).
In the Skoda hatchback/saloon we had on test a little while back, my record for a single journey was 61.9mpg. I didn’t quite match that, but on one journey I was nudging 60mpg.

The Superb is a huge car. It has bags of space for five adults – I can even squeeze one between my two child car seats without fear of injury. And the boot is gargantuan – 633 litres seats up, 1,865 seats down. Compare that to the Mondeo (537/1,728), Passat (603/1,731) and Insignia (540/1,530).

It’s little wonder that the car took our best upper medium car title at the Fleet News Awards for the second year running, although it was narrowly beaten for best estate car by the BMW 5 Series and the highly commended Astra Sport Tourer.

Certainly no shame in that, this car is an excellent all-rounder.