It doesn’t happen often, but we recently took a long trip in my ZOE that was easier than if we had taken a petrol or diesel car. We needed to travel to Peterborough Passport Office to renew my daughter’s passport at short notice.

Plan A was very straightforward – drive to Peterborough and slow charger there for the return journey. The beauty of this was that, with a bit of advance research, I found out that there was an electric car charging point and parking space on the same road as the Passport Office and very close to it.

As ever, I had a Plan B, a contingency in case of problems. That was to charge at Haddon Services on the A1(M) just outside Peterborough. Therefore on the way to Peterborough we called in at Haddon. However, the AC rapid charge point wasn’t working so we just headed straight on to Peterborough.

In fact, we needn’t have worried. We found the parking space and charger by the Passport Office very easily and it was operating fine. It worked first time – we then headed into the Office to do the necessary paperwork. We then headed around Peterborough, visiting the various shops and restaurants to kill the requisite four hours until the passport was ready.

Afterwards we unplugged and headed home. As the EV parking area was very close to the Passport Office and was neither occupied nor blocked (and, if memory serves me right we didn’t have to pay for parking), it turned out to be a long trip that was easier with an EV than if we had had a conventional car.