BMW and Mini have launched a subscription service that rolls all the costs of car ownership into monthly instalments.
Payments, which start from £131 per week (equating to around £568 a month), include the costs of insurance and maintenance, as well as breakdown cover, as one bill.
Although BMW is the first major car maker to offer such a service in the UK market, it is not the first brand overall. Polestar, Volvo’s stand-alone performance division, will sell its cars exclusively this way.
BMW and Mini’s service is operated by car subscription company Drover and features several models from both brands. At the entry level is the Mini Cooper 3dr hatch and BMW 116d Sport, while the largest cars on offer include the BMW 5 Series and X3.
Customers can swap, upgrade or downgrade their cars at any time or cancel their contract altogether, with no finance-style long-term commitment or down payments. Chris Brownridge, BMW UK’s sales boss, said this puts the BMW group “at the forefront of such development”.
“Through [Drover’s] new subscription model, we are able to provide an even wider range of ways to access BMW and Mini vehicles for retail buyers to suit their changing requirements,” Brownridge said.
Drover founder and CEO Felix Leuschner said: “Our partnership brings together the latest and best in cars with a new model of ownership to give those demographics access to vehicles who might otherwise not purchase one, driving incremental revenue for BMW group UK."
This new system of ownership illustrates the fast-changing new car market, which in Britain is now dominated by personal contract purchase (PCP) finance. Many industry experts predict that the rise of autonomous vehicles will see this type of finance superseded by subscription services that give users access to car-sharing schemes.
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I don't understand how these are supposed to work...
...won't everyone want a 4x4 in winter, a soft top in summer and a minibus during the school holidays. And are the cars always new or effectively a rental fleet?
No chance.
So lets say some chump already has a 3 series on a PCP at £250 per mth.
Add £60.00 a month fully comp insurance.
He is not really going to be doing much servicing etc for the first few years anyway?
So to drive the same car, it has nearly doubled?
I am puzzled by the rationale.
Car rental
....and nothing more. Hertz will be cheaper, the only advantage I can see is if you treat it as a try before you buy (extended test drive).
New method of car ownership, not at £6,800 for a Mini a year, oh and the Volvo/Polestar one (the XC40 as going to be on) looks like they dropped it in the UK was to have a minimum period of 2 years for £629 a month, I'll be surprized if polestar 1 only do subscription in a years time to!