Noted on 3 Sep 2026

Every eVED headline recently said the same thing: EV drivers to pay 3p (or 1.5p for PHEV) a mile from April 2028. All of it written for someone with one car on the drive. Buried in the actual consultation response, though, is a paragraph aimed squarely at anyone running shared vehicles.

HM Treasury published its response on 13 July. Chapter 7 covers fleets, and paragraph 7.2 names the hard case in the sector's own words: "challenges may be particularly acute for multi-driver vehicles and short-term rental, pooled or subscription-based models, where estimating mileage is more complex."

So what's the answer? Well, there isn't one yet. There's a placeholder. Fleets will be able to submit estimated mileage instead of real odometer readings (for rentals, "the estimated mileage might be the fleet average"), reconciled only when a vehicle leaves the fleet. How do you model that estimate for a pooled car driven by dozens of different people a month, Treasury hasn't said. "The government will engage further with businesses in the leasing and rental sectors on how mileage estimation will work in due course."

A pooled vehicle's whole economic case rests on doing far more miles than a private car would, because that density is what makes sharing it worth anyone's while. Build a tax around "fleet average" estimation and you've built it around exactly the number a pooled vehicle isn't supposed to hit.

About eighteen months to launch, and the one paragraph that actually applies to shared vehicles ends with, in effect, "we'll get back to you."

Has anyone in the sector had direct contact with Treasury or DVLA on this yet? Or is everyone still waiting for the "further engagement" promised in July?