What charging apps and card subscriptions?

[Fury1]

Ok, so I have an M3 on order, delivery stated as March. I am in the process of looking for a local fitted to install a charger (hypervolt), but also checking the local area for other options.
There is a local car park with 2 chargers, that up until recently were free to use, but looking now they are run by Geniepoint at 42p kWh.
The local Tesco has 2 7kWh chargers which are still free to use, so will be shopping more at Tesco for now on.

What do others use? I will obviously be using supercharger where I can but don't really want to sign up with dozens of apps and cards if not needed.

Richard

 

[spdpsba]

Ok, so I have an M3 on order, delivery stated as March. I am in the process of looking for a local fitted to install a charger (hypervolt), but also checking the local area for other options.
There is a local car park with 2 chargers, that up until recently were free to use, but looking now they are run by Geniepoint at 42p kWh.
The local Tesco has 2 7kWh chargers which are still free to use, so will be shopping more at Tesco for now on.

What do others use? I will obviously be using supercharger where I can but don't really want to sign up with dozens of apps and cards if not needed.

Richard

My simple answer to your question is you are doing the right thing. Technically you don’t need dozens of apps or cards unless you want a back up option where the supercharger spread is bit thin.

Myself and lots of other members here do not subscribe to any other apps or third party chargers. You don’t need it if you have a home charger and a Tesla SC nearby or any other 7kw charger as back up.

It is only on a rare occasion when I was on holiday in the lakes there was no home charger in the accommodation and the nearest supercharger was around 20 miles away and I had to do couple of trips to hospital 50 miles. I was bit anxious about running out of charge. But I was lucky to have a Podpoint charger points at the lakes in most of the car parks. They are free but you just need their app to charge. I am lucky as I have a home Podpoint charger so I already had the app.

So my short answer is you don’t need any third party one under normal circumstances.

 

[Fury1]

Cheers for the reply spdpsba,
A few weeks ago we were looking to change our energy supplier to Octopus. our deal with British Gas has come to an end and wanted to cheap rate to charge through the night. When we looked into it we were advised to stay were we are for now as the energy prices are all going up and we couldn't get on with Octopus.
Fingers crossed it settles down so we can find a decent rate soon.

 

[Js1977]

Plugshare, Zap-map, a better route planner and other apps such as instavolt etc (free versions) for apps and If with octopus energy you might as well get the juice card as its costs you nothing. All these as backup tools are useful things to have for the 1% of tasks that you dont normally do.

Subscription stuff is good for some people and that should be down to the individual to work out as to wether they are beneficial.

By all means do ask questions and there is plenty of great content on youtube, general ev forums like speakEV for guidance. Just bare in mind that everyone tends to be a bit biased and what is good for them might not necessarily apply to you and its fair to say maybe as much as this comment goes.

 

[Mr H]

If you intend to use the free chargers at Tesco then you will need the Podpoint app. You have to 'claim' the charge after you plug in or it will stop after 15 mins.

 

[Overworked]

If you are traveling to Scotland you definitely want the ChargePlace Scotland app. There is free charging in many places still and the app is needed to start and stop the charge.

 

[Js1977]

If you intend to use the free chargers at Tesco then you will need the Podpoint app. You have to 'claim' the charge after you plug in or it will stop after 15 mins.

Also a good app to have and very much relevant to the initial question and something that i overlooked. Now, just do bare in mind that if you charge on a cheap rate such as your planned octopus which is 5p per kw, if you were in the shop for an hour, you will save a whopping 35p which might not be worth the bother on a sunny day, never mind a rainy one. Each to their own but certainly the app will have other uses since these PodPoint are in allot of places.

 

[Jeeves]

Depends where you go. Use ABRP to plan your route and work out what you might need. ev.energy to optimise home charging costs.

 

[GeorgeSymonds]

More and more rapids now offer credit card payments although I believe if you sign up to the network you can sometimes get a discount. But in general I wouldn’t worry too much and just use apps like Zap-Map and PlugShare to look at the networks where you travel frequently which are out of round trip range and join them. I would avoid any network that wants a subscription if you can.

While free charging at Tesco sounds a great deal you’ll add relatively little while you’re in the store (one hour at 7kw is equivalent to about £1 of charging at home) and if you hang around the store for longer or buy a coffee you’ll wipe out the savings.

 

[Adopado]

While free charging at Tesco sounds a great deal you’ll add relatively little while you’re in the store (one hour at 7kw is equivalent to about £1 of charging at home) and if you hang around the store for longer or buy a coffee you’ll wipe out the savings.

… or 35p of home charging at 7kW if on Octopus Go.

 

[Billbrown1982]

You've said your already looking at Octopus, which is great. But yeah right now is not a great time to change unfortunately.

But, when you do, they have the Electric Juice network, which has a variety of different charge providers linked up, so you can use your Juice card to charge and have it come straight off your electric bill.

You don't HAVE to be an octopus customer though, they can just bill you for charging as normal, but if your with them then I believe there's a discount.

I've got one, honestly not used it yet as I pretty much ALWAYS charge at home, but I think its a nice, many options but only one card kinda deal.

Octopus Electroverse

One-tap access to 651,325 EV chargers across the UK & Europe

electricjuice.octopus.energy

 

[spdpsba]

Ok, so I have an M3 on order, delivery stated as March. I am in the process of looking for a local fitted to install a charger (hypervolt), but also checking the local area for other options.
There is a local car park with 2 chargers, that up until recently were free to use, but looking now they are run by Geniepoint at 42p kWh.
The local Tesco has 2 7kWh chargers which are still free to use, so will be shopping more at Tesco for now on.

What do others use? I will obviously be using supercharger where I can but don't really want to sign up with dozens of apps and cards if not needed.

Richard

I hope it is not confusing after hearing from the forum members. I am sure you can work it out after few months of owning the car. It is not as complex as having a BMW, Audi or Jag or a Merc - just to name a few premium brands. So I think that’s the best bit of it. If you have one of those premium brands you have to have those multiple apps or subscription etc., With Tesla it is not really necessary both for local commute or the long ones. Your home charger and SC covers most situations. But having one or two back up is recommended if you are more adventurous and would like to explore all of UK and Europe.

You can go through @Medved_77 trip to Europe using SCs to know more about how all this is been possible in less than 10 years with Elon’s vision when Toyota is been struggling for the past 21 years to make hydrogen fuel cell a viable option! Model 3 is a great car think of it as how Model T changed the car industry.

 

[Mr H]

 

[spdpsba]

Thanks Mr H