You can’t beat bricks and mortar
Having actual dealers still makes for a better owning experience. By Ben Oliver
Things are changing for Genesis in the UK, with the previously standalone brand now run by the UK division of its Hyundai Motor parent, and a small network of dealers being appointed instead of online sales, and home delivery and collection for test drives and servicing.
Genesis is currently selling only modest quantities of cars here in the UK but these changes should help improve that: in an increasingly virtual world, seems there are some things for which we still prefer a bricksand-mortar solution.
In the meantime, it feels like I’m doing my bit to spread the Genesis word while piling up the miles in this GV70 Electrified. It reminds me a little of how it felt to drive an early Tesla in the UK. Electric cars are far more common now, of course. But like the Model S, my car looks a bit like lots of other things on the road, and once people spot the badge and realise it’s a brand they’ve either not heard of or not seen on the road before, they get chatty.
We’re not doing it in a proselytising, fanboy way, though, unlike some Tesla owners. I like the Genesis, but not quite that much. We’re just doing a public service, and if Genesis had some dealers maybe the curious could call in there with their questions rather than ambushing me in the Waitrose car park.
In daily use, the GV70 is proving a comfortable and capable if unremarkable companion. In addition to its impressive bad-weather, bad-road chops reported last month, its refinement is probably the quality I mention first.
In fact I’m actually writing this from the back seat as Sophie drives us from Sussex to Yorkshire in it, again, and it’s lovely back here: quiet and smooth, with separate air-con controls, heated seats, a pair of USB sockets, blinds, and switches on the side of the passenger seat to motor it away from you chauffeur-style, which I have done.
I’m less impressed with the controls in the front. I admit that having spent at least an hour learning how to navigate the user interface and set up the shortcuts when I first got the car, I’ve pretty much forgotten it all: the blame lies 50/50 between the system’s unnecessary complexity and my declining mental acuity. I’ve defaulted to Apple CarPlay, which irritatingly only works while the phone is plugged into the USB rather than by Bluetooth, thereby rendering the charging pad redundant.
And now I’ve no choice but to use it anyway, as the onboard SIM has failed, which in turn takes out the native sat-nav, the remote-control functions of the app, over-the-air updates and ‘live’ services such as trac and weather. There’s also a mysterious knocking from the rear cabin, and the central console wobbles noticeably if you lean your left knee against it while driving.
These are all niggles which might easily be sorted by calling in at a dealer while passing, but they’re not a great statement about build quality. We’re choosing to live with them for now, rather than getting someone to drive all the way to our place with a replacement car and take this one away. Maybe Genesis needs to do more than build more dealers if it wants to take on Lexus, let alone Audi.
The story so far
EV proving refined, but quality questionable
★ Quick and luxurious, with a great drivetrain
- Slightly anonymous looks; little brand image; quality
Logbook
Price £64,405 (£78,895 as tested) Performance 77.4kWh battery, twin e-motors, 4.2sec 0-62mph, 146mph E ciency 3.6 miles per kWh (claimed), 2.7 miles (tested), 0g/km CO2 Range 283 miles (claimed), 212 miles (tested) Energy cost 10.6p per mile Miles this month 1198 Total miles 9274