EV repair rates continue to increase in the US as more appear on the roads but their write-off levels remain similar with ICE vehicles.
This was one of the findings of the latest Plugged-In: EV Collision Insights report from Mitchell, an Enlyte Company in the US, that has insights into what a future Australian repair landscape might look like as EV numbers increase.
Claims frequency for repairable, collision-damaged battery electric vehicles rose to 2.5 per cent of all collision repairs, a yearly increase of 45 per cent in the US where they make up 9.3 per cent of new sales, slightly more than Australia
While EV sales have slowed slightly in both the US and Canada the report found, hybrids have grown, and their claims rate has also grown accordingly with a frequency of 3.8 per cent in the US.
EVs remain on average more costly to repair, according to the Mitchell report with Q2 average claims severity for repairable EVs costing US$5,753 compared to and US$4,806 for ICE automobiles, a difference of US$947 or just under 20 per cent.
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Hybrids have a two per cent higher severity based on estimates data from the first half of 2024 while plug-in hybrids exhibit “a greater severity delta compared to the ICE population, 2.5 per cent in the US due to their close similarity to BEVs.
However, the number of EVs written off was 9.16 per cent in the second quarter report (down 8 per cent from Q1 2024). This compared to newer ICE vehicles of similar complexity and cost to repair which were written off at a frequency of 9.45 per cent, about three per cent lower.
The report also found there were a higher number of average mechanical hours per EV, but they had lower rates of labour for framework, 5.21 per cent for EVs versus 8.18 per cent as compared to ice vehicles.
“Frame labour is typically flagged when technicians must use a hydraulic frame machine to straighten both full ladder frame components as well as unibody structures. This lower frequency suggests the design of EVs could be more effective at preventing crash energy from damaging the vehicle’s structural components. Although further study is needed to determine the true cause of this delta, this could be one aspect of EV engineering that bodes well for future repairability.”