ABM Q4 - Flipbook - Page 26
REV I E W
VW T-ROC R-LINE
handsome 19in York Aero rims, and in
the process, does something quietly
expensive.
All in, the car as tested came to
£41,945. And the moment a car’s list
price crosses £40,000, it triggers
the expensive-car road tax
supplement, an extra
annual surcharge
that applies for
several years.
Tick a generous
options list without
watching the total,
and you have
voluntarily signed
up to pay hundreds
of pounds a year
in extra tax for the
privilege of a HUD and
some nice alloys.
Spec it with a little
restraint, and you dodge
the lot. It is the kind of detail that
separates a smart fleet order from an
expensive one.
On the road
This drives just as a Golf should, which
is to say, tidily and without drama. The
steering is light and predictable, visibility
is excellent thanks to the raised ride
height, and around a village or a car park
it is genuinely easy to place.
The one caveat is the R-Line’s sports
suspension paired with those 19in
wheels, which fidgets over patched-up
country tarmac and thumps into the
occasional pothole, settling into proper
serenity only once you reach a motorway.
If ride comfort is your priority, the
smaller wheels lower down the range
are the wiser choice, and the twinclutch gearbox – smooth almost all the
time – can occasionally dither over a
down change if you are indecisive with
your right foot. These are quibbles.
Refinement, comfort and everyday
usability are all genuine strengths.
So, who on a fleet should actually have
one? The honest answer is: the driver
who cannot make an electric car work.
If you have no driveway and nowhere
to charge, if you rack up big rural miles
where a two-minute splash of petrol
beats hunting for a rapid charger, or
if you simply need the no-nonsense
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AUTOMOTIVE BUSINESS
Q4 2026
flexibility of a 50-litre tank and a 500mile range, then a mild hybrid petrol
like this makes complete sense. The tax,
while high, is the price of that freedom.
It is also an easy car to recommend to
anyone taking a cash allowance
instead of a company car,
or buying on a personal
lease, because in those
cases BiK doesn’t
apply, and you are
left with a wellmade, strongresidual, pleasant
thing to own, in
insurance group
20, that will tow
a modest 1,500kg
braked if you ask
it to.
There are two things
worth flagging before you
sign. The first is the warranty,
which at three years or 60,000 miles
is starting to look a little mean when
some rivals throw in five or even seven,
and that matters over a fleet life.
The second is timing: a proper fullhybrid T-Roc is due shortly, one that can
genuinely run on electric power in town
and posts lower emissions, which should
drop it into a friendlier tax band.
It still will not be a plug-in, so it will
not rival an electric car for company car
tax, but if the tax figures above made
you wince and you can wait, it is worth
holding on for.
The verdict
After a week, I was quietly charmed
by the T-Roc, wasp costume and all.
It is refined, well-built, practical and
thoroughly sorted – exactly the sensible,
likeable small SUV Volkswagen has been
making a fortune from for years. Just go
in with your eyes open.
The hybrid on the badge is a mild one,
the tax is anything but mild, and the
difference between a shrewd order and
a costly one is a single glance at whether
your options have quietly nudged it past
£40,000.
Get that right, and it is a genuinely
lovely thing. Get it wrong, and you
are paying premium tax for a
highlighter-yellow reminder to
read the small print.
