The excellent 5 year/100,000 miles warranty is particularly attractive if your business means your mileage stays under 20,000 a year
What’s hot
For starters this vehicle is very comfortable and has one of the slickest gear changes we’ve ever come across. It’s also quiet and smooth on the road and corners nicely.
Meanwhile power steering is weighted just right so that there’s plenty of feel for what’s going on between steering wheel and road.
There’s also a height and rake adjustment on the steering column, which means that most size drivers should slot in comfortably.
It’s top marks to Toyota for making ESP a standard fitment. Despite the fact that manufacturers like Mercedes-Benz, Ford, Volkswagen and Iveco fit ESP across the range as part of their standard packages, Citroen, Peugeot and Fiat still largely charge for it.
Safety experts reckon that thousands of lives have been saved across Europe by this wonderful little device, so in our book, it’s a “must-have” item.
The mid-range engine has plenty of poke, but despite this, the van is still slated to return a tad over 44mpg on the combined cycle. It’s a not a bad figure but of course if you fill the van up with cargo and drive with your foot flat on the floor all day, you won’t achieve anywhere near that figure.
In the back, there are eight load-lashing eyes and our test model featured full ply-lining. It’ll cost you around £200 to have fitted but when you come to sell your pride and joy, it’ll be worth a lot more than £200 extra if the rear end is nice and clean compared to a scruffy example.
There’s a warranty advantage in opting for the Toyota variant as opposed to the Citroen, Peugeot or Fiat. Toyota offers five years/100,000-miles, which could be a big bonus for small businesses with mainly local miles. For high mileage users it’s perhaps less of an issue.
Very comfortable, and with a great gear change – all in all the Proace is a good workplace. If there’s a criticism of the cab – well it’s a bit cramped
What’s not
The cab of the Toyota Proace is pretty cramped. Legroom for the middle passenger is severely limited and there are not a lot of cubby holes for all the stuff that van drivers seem to end up carrying.
On the plus side there is an overhead parcel shelf, but we were annoyed to notice that the holes on each side where coffee cup/drink can holders sit in some of the rival models had been blanked off. Do they not realise that coffee (or Coca Cola) is the lifeblood of the average van driver?
Our test Proace didn’t have reversing sensors either. We reckon they should be a legal requirement for vehicles where you can’t see out of the back and once you get used to them (most of our test vans have them now) you don’t half miss them when they aren’t there.
