Review
I cannot escape the feeling that the V50 is a car designed with me in mind.
It is safety and environment conscious, provides a premium feel without being showy and offers plenty of space (but not too much).
It is also undemanding to drive on long journeys.
Trips such as these over the summer have also helped the fuel economy to a new test record average of 58mpg, although to achieve it you do need to sit in a queue behind a Lada-driving pensioner doing 25mph on country lanes for what seems like an eternity.
Drive it hard and 50mpg is more likely, although that defeats the object of getting a DRIVe in the first place.
Maximising economy is vital for justifying the additional expense of the diesel model against the cheaper petrol version.
Using the Fleet News running costs tables, I compared the 1.6 S petrol against the 1.6 DRIVe S and over four years/80,000 miles the petrol model costs 31.51ppm and the diesel is just 31.2ppm.
However, moving up to the SE DRIVe increased wholelife costs to 33.35ppm, a hefty premium despite the diesel cost advantage of 3.53ppml.
This is only part of the story, but it shows the importance of wholelife costs when it comes to creating a business car policy.
Talking of costs, the Volvo is the car if your drivers are complaining about mileage allowances not covering fuel costs.
The current Advisory Fuel Rate for sub-2.0-litre diesels is 10ppm, but the Volvo is currently costing me 8.5ppm. Every little helps.
