Again, due to the Twizy’s official classification as a quadricyle, it’s exempt from the WLTP testing regime that conventional cars’ efficiency is measured by, meaning we have no official miles per pound data. However, given its lightness, low speeds and small battery, this is the cheapest car to run currently on sale.

Clearly, there are no conventional fuel costs but a full three-and-a-half-hour charge on a typical domestic arrangement should cost you less than £1. Public charging points suitable for the Twizy are becoming fewer and far between given it can only work with a conventional three-pin plug.

Other running costs, such as servicing, will also be modest. Renault suggests that a routine service takes about an hour with minimal charges for parts. Tyres won’t be too pricey given the wheels are only 13 inches in diameter, while the disc brakes are also small – and electric cars use them more efficiently anyway. 

It also falls in the cheapest VED bracket for road tax, so as a zero-emission vehicle there’s no cost to pay, while zones such as the London Congestion Charge are also cost-free.

Ultra-reliable city car

• Only one recall despite sales starting in 2012
• Should prove to be a trouble-free buy
• Very little equipment to go wrong, anyway

The addage goes that because electric cars have fewer mechanical parts than a conventional petrol and diesel one, there’s less to go wrong, and so it’s proving in the Twizy’s case. It’s been on sale in the UK since 2012, yet there’s only been one official DVSA recall to deal with a potential brake fluid leak, an action that only affected 225 of the very first examples to arrive.

With that in mind, the Renault’s a car we can recommend as a sound purchase from a reliability perspective, but the caveat would be that some aspects of the Twizy’s construction do feel a bit flimsy, so treat it with care.

As there’s very little equipment to speak of, there’s not much to go wrong at all – the Twizy feels reassuringly old-fashioned in that regard.