Of course, we can wax lyrical about Ford being a dab hand with damper rates, but the Puma Gen-E will live or die by its purchase costs – especially its monthly PCP and lease rates.
List prices starting from under £30,000 for the Puma Gen-E Select are a strong start of it; although the keyless entry, Matrix LED lights and B&O sound system will no doubt swing the decision in favour of the Premium trim for a lot of buyers. You’ll be wanting to add the £350 pack to get heated seats regardless of which trim you fancy, though; a weird omission from standard kit for what’s otherwise a very generously equipped car.
What’s a bit more underwhelming is that the Gen-E currently starts from around £350 per month with a £5,000 deposit, over a 48 month contract. That’s competitive, but it’s far from the best in the class, so it’s good that Ford’s just introduced its ‘Power Promise’ that throws in a free home charger, 10,000 miles of free charging, and five years of free servicing. Sure, you’ll get a longer warranty with Kia, Hyundai or MG, but that’s still a persuasive package from Ford.
Especially as that efficiency does seem to play out in the real world. Even on fast, hard-driven mountain roads above Barcelona, and with a fair stretch of motorway speeds included, we saw 4.4mpkWh, for a real-world range of 190 miles. Not bad at all for such a modest usable battery capacity – and obviously that means you’ll save money on electricity to keep the battery fed.
