I Rented an EV. Oops.
Sep. 23rd, 2025 07:54 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerPhoenix Getaway travelog #8
Around town · Sun, 21 Sep 2025. 7pm
Getting a rental car usually involves a spin of the proverbial roulette wheel. The past several years I've been reserving at the "full size sedan" or "intermediate SUV" categories to avoid the worst of the econo-penalty box vehicles. Alas the result is usually an uninteresting car. The most common model I've been assigned the past few years is the Toyota Camry (read my Camry review). Number two, Toyota RAV4 (read my RAV4 review). They're good cars but bo-o-oring. (Except that one time a RAV4 implausibly got me through snow and mud on a 4x4 mountain trail.) This trip I got an interesting rental car: a Hyundai Ioniq 5 electric vehicle.
Being assigned an EV this trip wasn't a surprise. I mean, I booked the EV category. 😂 But not because I particularly wanted an EV. Frankly I've avoided booking EVs as rental cars because I don't want to have to figure out how to access charger networks without a subscription for just one fill-up. This time the EV category was way cheaper than everything else, like half the cost of an econo-penalty box and one-third a traditional intermediate SUV. My innate thriftiness won out over my dislike of having to figure out charging.
Well, I haven't had to charge it yet, but I've looked up the network info the rental agency provided and— yeesh, what an f'ing mess.
To put this in terms of filling up a traditional, gas powered car, imagine that:
Around town · Sun, 21 Sep 2025. 7pm
Getting a rental car usually involves a spin of the proverbial roulette wheel. The past several years I've been reserving at the "full size sedan" or "intermediate SUV" categories to avoid the worst of the econo-penalty box vehicles. Alas the result is usually an uninteresting car. The most common model I've been assigned the past few years is the Toyota Camry (read my Camry review). Number two, Toyota RAV4 (read my RAV4 review). They're good cars but bo-o-oring. (Except that one time a RAV4 implausibly got me through snow and mud on a 4x4 mountain trail.) This trip I got an interesting rental car: a Hyundai Ioniq 5 electric vehicle.
Being assigned an EV this trip wasn't a surprise. I mean, I booked the EV category. 😂 But not because I particularly wanted an EV. Frankly I've avoided booking EVs as rental cars because I don't want to have to figure out how to access charger networks without a subscription for just one fill-up. This time the EV category was way cheaper than everything else, like half the cost of an econo-penalty box and one-third a traditional intermediate SUV. My innate thriftiness won out over my dislike of having to figure out charging.
Well, I haven't had to charge it yet, but I've looked up the network info the rental agency provided and— yeesh, what an f'ing mess.
To put this in terms of filling up a traditional, gas powered car, imagine that:
- There are only about a dozen filling stations you can use spread across a major metropolitan area
- You can't just swipe a credit card at the pump, you have to download an app and create an account
- And Exxon, Shell, Valero, etc. each require a different app
- And, for you, gas is $16-20/gallon. 😡
