Company Employee Loan For Ev Purchase?

[WannabeOwner]

I'm wondering if we should do this (for employees)

No idea what is involved ... interest free? cheap interest?

.... and my first thought is that any spare cash ought to be growing the business ...

... but we are off to a BBQ at some Range Rover hugging friends ... I'll berate them all I can ... but I wonder if I should be facilitating at work

I wonder if government would match me pound-for-pound or somesuch? They did when we put 10 chargers in the car park.

Any BIK benefit or other intangible for Employees? (or the reverse - which would be annoying ...)

 

[Milky]

Octopus EV do a salary sacrifice scheme which is free to setup with them and employees can then lease via Octopus cheaper as it is taken before tax NI etc etc.

 

[WannabeOwner]

salary sacrifice scheme

That's a good idea, maybe there are incentives available via that route (to buy the vehicle too)

 

[davidmc]

Octopus EV do a salary sacrifice scheme which is free to setup with them and employees can then lease via Octopus cheaper as it is taken before tax NI etc etc.

Is that free to the company that joins?

 

[Milky]

Is that free to the company that joins?

Yes it is, I am currently going through the initial stages of having it setup, Octopus do all the leg work and no charge to join the scheme.

 

[WannabeOwner]

Maybe I'll have some "Reserved for EV vehicles" signs made ... taking 10 parking bays out of commission would fix the adoption rate PDQ

 

[Tony Hoyle]

That's when 10 employees turn up with 'self charging' Toyotas and take the spaces

 

[WannabeOwner]

ROTFL!

"Reserved for non-self-charging EV vehicles"

There ... fixed it

 

[davidmc]

Yes it is, I am currently going through the initial stages of having it setup, Octopus do all the leg work and no charge to join the scheme.

Thanks for the reply

 

[davidmc]

That's when 10 employees turn up with 'self charging' Toyotas and take the spaces

Haha, my employer is installing 2 charging points because the new company car list has the RAV4. I'm getting the M3 with a car allowance and not telling them they don't plug in! 2 spaces just for me!!!!

 

[WannabeOwner]

employer is installing 2 charging points

Hopefully car park is only 4 spaces then ... otherwise why only 2? and give them a hard time please.

We've electrified more than 50% of our car park ... don't want to have to pay to dig it up again ...

 

[davidmc]

Hopefully car park is only 4 spaces then ... otherwise why only 2? and give them a hard time please.

We've electrified more than 50% of our car park ... don't want to have to pay to dig it up again ...

Don't worry I have 2 signs ready "plugin ev's only"!

The uptake to EV or plugin hybrid is just starting at our company. I'm the first full EV and travel the furthest! Hopefully I can convert them all in time. And of course use my referral code!!

 

[WannabeOwner]

The uptake to EV or plugin hybrid is just starting at our company

Us too ... but I take the view that Charging should come before Ownership ... otherwise Ownership won't happen. Another cage I need to rattle - all business owners with car parks I know ... along with all rich barstewards still doing the school run in a Range Rover ...

Hard work pushing a rock up hill ...

 

[davidmc]

Us too ... but I take the view that Charging should come before Ownership ... otherwise Ownership won't happen. Another cage I need to rattle - all business owners with car parks I know ... along with all rich barstewards still doing the school run in a Range Rover ...

Hard work pushing a rock up hill ...

Refreshing to hear your company taking steps to make sure you are ready. Our company owner doesn't see it that way and will put more in when more People have them. I'm just doing it for me and to teach my young kids this is the future and to make sure they look after the planet for their kids.

He will also be the one with his range rover in the ev spot!

Keep that rock rolling, soon it will go on its own accord

 

[WannabeOwner]

will put more in when more People have them

That I can understand .. .except that bit-by-bit, multiple-times, costs way more than several-at-once. But I ain't seen your car park ... might be you have just two spaces up against the wall where the power is ... they would be easy to wire-up.

Will you charge at work for free? I'm curious to know what employers are doing on that score.

One thing I am sure of is that if we do "free" it will be abused ... so I'm thinking either "cheap" or "limited" - e.g. 4 hours a day so folk don't think it is OK to go away for the weekend and rock up at work and "fill the tank".

If the free-charging covers "normal commute mileage and a bit more for good measure" I think that would be a reasonable starting point ...

... I do 30K miles p.a. and I struggle to charge more than about 50% of that at work so probably £250 all in cost to the company. We aren't a minimum-wage-employer so giving all staff £200 "Free Juice" would be a nice perk & no skin off our nose. I suppose £200 is 12K miles p.a., close to average-mileage. Maybe that's a reasonable starting point.

12K miles p.a. is, say, 18kWh per working day. I suspect that is doable on our destination chargers too - assuming that we will get to the point where we have to swap cars over at lunch time, so 18kWh in 4 hours = 4.5kW. Not sure what the load sharing would be if all 10 bays were full ... anyone, not going to have that problem for a while I'll have a Tesla Roof on the Office building by then, so will be charging staff cars for free ... and all the Pigs will be Fed and Ready to Fly

 

[davidmc]

Will you charge at work for free? I'm curious to know what employers are doing on that score.

One thing I am sure of is that if we do "free" it will be abused ... so I'm thinking either "cheap" or "limited" - e.g. 4 hours a day so folk don't think it is OK to go away for the weekend and rock up at work and "fill the tank".

If the free-charging covers "normal commute mileage and a bit more for good measure" I think that would be a reasonable starting point ...

... I do 30K miles p.a. and I struggle to charge more than about 50% of that at work so probably £250 all in cost to the company. We aren't a minimum-wage-employer so giving all staff £200 "Free Juice" would be a nice perk & no skin off our nose. I suppose £200 is 12K miles p.a., close to average-mileage. Maybe that's a reasonable starting point.

12K miles p.a. is, say, 18kWh per working day. I suspect that is doable on our destination chargers too - assuming that we will get to the point where we have to swap cars over at lunch time, so 18kWh in 4 hours = 4.5kW. Not sure what the load sharing would be if all 10 bays were full ... anyone, not going to have that problem for a while I'll have a Tesla Roof on the Office building by then, so will be charging staff cars for free ... and all the Pigs will be Fed and Ready to Fly

Totally agree I what your saying regards free = gets abused

from a selfish point of view free would give people a reason to swap to EV knowing that they could fill a tank (battery pack) for free!

I think the best way would be to charge for the use but a nominal/small fee say 5 to 10p per kw. This way it's cheaper than home or on the road. And also introducing a time limit to allow other users to charge (similar to Teslas approach in fines if to long)

If my employer charges for use I still would be fine with it.

I would be able to claim the milage back for any business use anyway at 24p a mile

Charging may need some type of meter to see what's been used.

 

[WannabeOwner]

Charging may need some type of meter to see what's been used.

Our chargers have a QR code on them. Employee has to use Phone APP and "photograph" the QR code to get a charge. I think they have the ability to say "Now" or "By 5PM" (so that load-balance scheduler can prioritise anyone who is in a hurry)

haven't looked into it closely, but suspect we can limit "X Hours per day/week/month/somesuch" and also log "how much" (if we wanted to charge ... but I think much more likely we will go for free but limit it).

Conversation we had at management level was

"Do we care if everyone replenishes their whole battery on Monday morning after long weekend trip"
"You mean like "Taking the pi$$"?"
"Yeah, exactly that"

So that lead to:

Daily limit

unless we don't care about occasional weekend abuse and only care about annual overall consumption in which case:

Weekly / monthly limit

or

@ Annual Appraisal:

"How come you put 50-quid Juice in your car every Monday morning, and 10p Tue-Fri?"

We do have Performance Charts too ... so could do "Biggest EV Charging abusers" ... in the guise of "Most CO2 Saved"

 

[davidmc]

Do a salary sacrifice for KW's used lol

That will stop all Monday morning battery replenishment users!!

But I do think charging people to use it at work as long as it's not 30p a kw would be fine by most employees at work.

Nottingham council charges you £400 a year for you to park your car at work!

 

[arg]

Any BIK benefit or other intangible for Employees? (or the reverse - which would be annoying ...)

I think the most beneficial thing you can do is offer them company cars on a salary-sacrifice basis. EVs are exempt from the recent clampdown on "Optional Remuneration" (where the actual cost of providing a BiK is greater than the taxable value), so you get the win where you provide a car that costs you £x to provide, pay the employee £x less salary, but the tax they pay is based on a percentage of the value of the car which (next year at least) will be way less than the tax normally paid on £x.

 

[WannabeOwner]

I think the most beneficial thing you can do is offer them company cars on a salary-sacrifice basis.

Thanks @arg ... I'll have a chat with Accountant and report back.