Electric-Car Owners: Watch Out For Those Dealer Service Bills!

One of the benefits of battery-electric cars is that they have far fewer moving parts than gasoline vehicles, so they require less servicing.

Or as the old saying goes, "Nothing but tires and wiper blades"--which is a bit reductive, but pretty close to the truth if you add in occasional brake-fluid checks.

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So imagine the surprise of one Nissan Leaf owner in the U.K. who found he'd paid £8.94 (about $13.60) for a new oil filter and £17.50 ($26.60) for a new air filter during his very first annual service.

As described in lavish detail on Transport Evolved, the dealership eventually acknowledged that he'd been listed with the wrong vehicle--a Nissan Pixo minicar--rather than the Leaf that the service department had actually worked on.

Still, the owner had go back and forth with the dealer for a few months in his attempts to get the charge removed.

The annual maintenance on the electric Nissan Leaf, in fact, consists mostly of checking existing systems. It does not include:

• oil and filter change

• spark plugs

• air filter

• transmission fluid

• muffler

• radiator hoses or flushes

Even the Leaf's brake pads are likely to last much longer than those in conventional cars, because they're used only in heavy braking or to bring the car to a full stop.

The rest of the time, its wheels are slowed by resistance from turning the motor-generator to regenerate electricity that's fed back into its lithium-ion battery pack.

ALSO SEE: Electric Car Maintenance A Third Cheaper Than Combustion Vehicles? (Dec 2012)