Electric vehicle owners to pay road user charges

16 January 2024

The Government has today announced that owners of light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid vehicles will start paying road user charges (RUC) when the current exemption expires at the close of 31 March 2024.

EVs owners have been exempt from paying RUC since 2009. The exemption was put in place until EVs reached around 2 percent of New Zealand’s light vehicle fleet. This point has now been reached, so the government has decided to end the exemption.

The Government decided to create a reduced RUC rate for plug-in hybrid vehicles. A reduced rate reflects that plug-in petrol hybrid owners are also contributing to the system when they buy petrol as they’re paying fuel excise duty at the pump.

From 1 April 2024 owners of light EVs and plug-in hybrid vehicles under 3.5 tonnes will need to buy a RUC licence and display it on their windscreen.

Road users help pay for New Zealand’s land transport system through petrol excise duty (PED) or RUC. PED and RUC go towards the National Land Transport Fund which pays for maintaining and improving our land transport system.

More information is available on the road user charges webpage(external link). 

Read the Minister of Transport’s media release.(external link)