Analysis of Electric Vehicle Purchaser Satisfaction and Rejection Reasons

Abstract

This study used a matched data set drawn from more than 1 million new vehicle postpurchase consumer satisfaction surveys to test for differences in satisfaction and reasons for vehicle choice and rejection between conventional internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles and plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs). The Wilcoxon signed rank test and the McNemar and chi-square tests were used to evaluate consumer satisfaction and reasons for rejecting considered vehicles, respectively. Results show that PEV purchasers and considerers—people who considered purchasing a specific type of car (Editor’s note: This term is the authors’.)—were less satisfied with their overall purchase experience, but those who considered and rejected a PEV were less likely than those who considered and rejected an ICE to cite the dealer’s attitude as the reason for rejection. Price and value were the most cited reasons and were similarly important for both groups. Reasons related to model availability and vehicle attributes were more often a concern for PEV considerers than for ICE considerers. These results suggest that even with existing incentives, the limitations of the current technology (e.g., price and range) and the variety of available vehicles are the most important challenges to market expansion.