Northgate Vehicle Hire is taking delivery of 350 of the latest Mercedes Benz e-Vito electric vans during 2022 to help drive the electrification of its customers’ fleets.

Thanks to its partnership with Mercedes Benz, Northgate claims to be the first UK rental company to offer the new electric Vito to its customers, with the first vehicles due to hit the UK’s roads within the next few weeks.

“After the huge success onboarding electric panel vans with our customers in 2021, we are continuing to grow our eLCV fleet with the provision of 350 new Mercedes e-Vito vans,” said Neil McCrossan, Northgate’s sales and marketing director.

“We are proud to be the first mobility solutions provider to offer these state-of-the-art electric vans in the UK.”

The new e-Vito promises a range of up to 162 miles and comes with DC rapid charging ability of 0-80% in just 35 minutes.

With a gross vehicle weight of 3,200kg and a payload of up to 807kg, Northgate says that the e-Vito is an ideal zero emission van for both fleets and SMEs.

Taking delivery of the new e-Vito forms part of Northgate’s wider drive towards fleet electrification, entitled Drive to Zero.

The proposition was developed to ease the transition to electric LCVs and includes A fleet suitability analysis, the provision of turnkey charging solutions including infrastructure management - via its charging sister company ChargedEV - as well as servicing, maintenance, and driver training support.

McCrossan said: “The ongoing analysis of the mileage data produced across our customers’ fleets proves that the range provided by the e-Vito is more than practical for their daily usage.

“With a good payload and six cubic metres of available load space the e-Vito is already proving a popular choice with companies looking to onboard their first EVs to their fleets.”

Northgate was named rental company of the year at the 2022 Fleet News Awards.