The Volkswagen up! concept car was first shown at the Frankfurt Motor Show in 2007. Since then they have produced various different examples of the up!; each with different dimensions. It’s still not clear when the up! will be on sale; we have for some time been receiving enquiries from contract hire clients who are interested in leasing a Volkswagen up!.

Skoda however say that their version of this car will be on sale early 2012, although it is still not clear what form the car will take. The concept VW up! will they say have emissions of 65 g/km and it is being suggested that Skoda 's version could have fuel consumption approaching 100 mpg.

One version of the concept car has four doors with no central door pillar, rather like the Ford B Max. We expect the B Max to be a very popular Ford contract hire model and this vehicle is likely to follow suit.

  ; Skoda 's version will certainly increase demand for Skoda leasing although Skoda contract hire is nothing like as popular as it should be, considering how much it has to offer; the company is a Volkswagen subsidiary, so there should be no concerns about quality, reliability or safety, and yet sales are slugish.

When we recommend Skoda contract hire as we often do, we find clients still seem to be reluctant to lease a Skoda. We can only assume that in spite of everything their cars have to offer, there are still memories of the Skoda of years ago, when their quality left much to be desired.

In the eighties there were many jokes doing the rounds such as “what do you call a Skoda with two handles?” The answer was a wheelbarrow. Or “What do you call a convertible Skoda ?” The answer was a skip.

These jokes clearly did a lot of damage to the Skoda image at the time but Skoda was subsequently taken over by Volkswagen and the Skoda models are excellent quality and very safe.

Skoda leasing is very good value for money; you can contract hire a Skoda Fabia for just £185 plus Vat per month. It seems strange that there is still this stigma attached to Skoda after all this time; we actually find that Kia Contract hire is more popular than Skoda leasing, even though Kia is relatively new to the market. Perhaps Vokswagen should have changed the company's name when they took over Skoda.