Mitsubishi Motors UK will enable all sites in its 118-strong dealer network to service its electric vehicles.

The decision came as the brand announced 13 points which would sell the i-Miev and Mitsubishi’s future EV products.

Mitsubishi is not insisting its service centres install charging points, but the option is there if they want to.

Lance Bradley, Mitsubishi Motors UK managing director, said: “There’s actually very little specialist equipment needed. It’s mostly specialist insulated tools which the dealer can buy for less than £500.

"We’re also offering the ability for dealers in the network that aren’t the specialist EV sales centres to rent the service equipment if they needed to. We wouldn’t ask the entire network to pay for the kit.

“The i-Miev’s compatible with the normal Mitsubishi diagnostic equipment. What we’re trying to get across in the training is that electric cars aren’t that different from combustion engine cars.”

Bradley admitted the cars would be spending less time in the garage due to having fewer moving parts, but he insisted electric batteries would never replace the combustion engine completely.

He said: “I think we’ll always have standard combustion engines to work on and that maintenance will still provide the majority of maintenance work even 10 years in the future, whether that’s hybrids or just standard petrol and diesel engines.

“Electric vehicles are extremely interesting, but this is a very new segment and no one can predict what’s going to happen for certain.

“The EV just adds another choice for the consumer. They’ll be able to choose petrol, electric, diesel or hybrid for each of our cars eventually, it just broadens the choice.”

Bradley is expecting 20% of Mitsubishi’s UK sales to come from EV and hybrid models by 2020, with the rest going to standard combustion engine vehicles.

Service training is rolling out across the dealer network. Bradley said the EV module was small enough that it had been added to the end of an existing manufacturer training programme.