repair costs
What are the most requested EV repairs, and are workshops ready?
The marketing for EV ownership promises dramatically lower maintenance costs. There is valid mechanical engineering logic supporting this. Traditional petrol or diesel vehicles have 20 times more powerand drivetrain-moving parts, which need maintenance and replacement.
But what is the truth about EV maintenance, and how does that influence planning for aftermarket automotive service centres and independent workshops? Actuaries and data scientists at Warrantywise have analysed a rich dataset of EV repairs over the last five years, representative of EVs maturing through the mileage cycle.
Cost rankings
The findings reveal which EV repair requests are most frequent and which repairs are the most costly. Unsurprisingly, electric system sensors are the most in-demand EV repair, with an average cost of R17,000.
With legacy automakers still trying to master software-defined vehicle design and moving from traditional 12-volt electrical architectures to 48-volt, this is not surprising. The second most common EV repair request was central locking mechanism failure, which is also electrical architecture-related, at an average repair cost of R20,000.
The EV service data revealed that the third-most-requested repair job was the on-board charging system. Average costs here were highest, at R48,000.
WORDS IN ACTION 18 JULY | AUGUST 2026