What I learned calling 55 charging networks
Plus, what I know about the ZEV mandate consultation
Hello, I’m Tom Riley, and welcome back to The Fast Charge, a British EV newsletter.
My top story today… With new regulations coming into force last Sunday requiring each charge point operator to run a 24/7 helpline, I decided to spend the day testing the support of 55 UK networks. Findings below.
Elsewhere… I’ve done a quick recap of all the recent ZEV mandate developments and detailed all I know about the incoming consultation announcement. I’m also publishing a new document that I obtained from DfT yesterday that seems to raise questions about the Business Secretary’s claim that he and Louise Haigh only knew of the challenges Stellantis had 10 days post-election.
As ever, if you have any thoughts, please do get in touch via my contact details below or simply reply to this email. I’m also now on BlueSky.
24/7 helpline people: I test out 55 charging networks
Background: In November 2023 numerous regulations to improve the experience of using public charging networks came into force. Some of the requirements, such as on clear pricing, were instant. However, for other standards, networks got a year to prepare. One requirement for networks is to provide drivers with a 24/7 real-time helpline available every day of the year.
Summary: With more than a million EVs on the road, and over 70,000 charge points live across the UK, the need for strong customer service is important. Particularly as many new EV owners are not the evangelists of a few years ago, who might have been more forgiving when things go wrong. It’s also a great way for networks in an ever-competitive space to speak directly with their customers. And in a country like ours word-of-mouth can make or break companies.
And so, with that in mind, on the Sunday that the requirement became legally enforceable, I began calling up the helplines of 55 networks. Here’s what I found…Only two out of all those I tried did not have a helpline working.
The two networks were Alfa Power and ElectRoad. When I phoned, my call was redirected to a voicemail service. After I contacted them both for comment on Monday, I did not hear back from ElectRoad, which is based in East Anglia. However, Alfa Power did respond to me apologising and saying they were investigating. They also explained that they were currently changing providers and that this had taken longer than anticipated.
Bar that… The fact a whopping 53 networks had a helpline available is super! I had no idea what to expect when I started making calls, though I was pleasantly surprised by this.
However… While that is very clear-cut, much more all over the place was the experience I had calling each network. With most networks, I would ring up and be straight through to someone. Whereas others would leave you hanging for over 20 minutes, promise a callback that never arrives, and in one case an advisor explained they were manning a centre solo - and that was a big energy supplier! Below, I have summarised my experiences.
Best experience… Without question, it was RAW Charging. When I phoned them up I was connected to an advisor in literally seconds. It caught me so off-guard that I nearly spilled coffee down my shirt. Nice one.
Solid experiences… Most of the time, the helplines I rang were what I would describe as ‘solid’. Sometimes you’d call and have to wait a minute or go through a bit of automated messaging, but they were ultimately fast and reliable.
In this category, alphabetically… Allego, APCOA, Applegreen electric, Be.EV, Believ, Blink, bp pulse, Char.gy, ChargeMyStreet, ChargePlace Scotland, ChargePoint, Clenergy EV, Connected Kerb, Easygo, ESB Energy, EV Dot, EV Point, EV Smart, EVC, Evolt Network, EZ-Charge, Fastned, FOR EV, Fuuse, GeniePoint, GRIDSERVE, Instavolt, Ionity, Lidl, Mer, MFG EV Power, Osprey Charging, Plug-N-Go, Pod Point, PoGo Charge, Qwello, Revive, Smart Charge, Source London, SSE, SureCharge, Urban Fox, Weev, Wenea, and Zest.
Funniest… As you can imagine, calling helplines up on a Sunday isn’t thrilling. So I was pleased to get some comic relief when phoning GRIDSERVE. While waiting to connect for about 20 seconds, I recognised the background song was 'Fast Car' by Jonas Blue. I loved that little Easter Egg. Albeit, I’m not sure how it might go down to someone standing in the cold.
It was not all sunshine and rainbows. I’ve singled out below several networks I felt delivered a poor experience (if any at all).
Dragon Charging… Operating in Wales, the network has a helpline for drivers which I phoned. After encountering an automated service, I was led into a call queue. After no time at all, a recorded message played explaining the team was busy, but not to worry as they had my number to call me back. The recorded message then spent time going through advice and tips for drivers to self-serve. I made my first call at midday on Sunday, and I’m still waiting for a call back at 9pm on Tuesday. So, I called them back again. Guess what? The same recorded message promising a callback plays. I reached out to Dragon for a comment though, on point, I did not hear back.
Important observation… when I called PoGo, who have sites in Wales, I was asked if I wanted to speak to Welsh-speaking advisors. Meanwhile, despite Dragon being a solely Welsh network, no language option is seemingly offered.
E.ON Drive… According to their website, E.ON operates 300 sites in the UK, though on apps like Zapmap it seems to be a smaller footprint. The only thing I know is they have a helpline, so I call up. After the minutes pass by, the endless... "We're really busy at the moment but hold on and we'll be with you soon" start to grind. I decided at 10 minutes I’d call it quits. Just as that moment passes, my call finally connects to an advisor. The person on the other end was polite and apologetic for the wait, as they explained while typically Sunday is quiet, they ended up very busy. However, the real gobsmacking moment for me was learning that the advisor was running the helpline solo. Mad! I contacted E.ON for an explanation though have not heard back.
Evyve… They are a rapidly expanding rapid charging network. And only this year they won Zapmap’s 'Up and Coming Network' for 2024. After waiting for some 10 minutes, I started stalking them. Their most recent LinkedIn post said… "We’re dedicated to making EV charging simple, fast, and accessible." I’m not finding that experience. After 16 minutes of waiting, my patience snapped and I ended the call. I contacted Evyve for a comment though did not hear back.
ScottishPower Recharge… As was the case above, I had a similar experience with ‘SP’. They have a small-ish footprint in the UK (mostly in South West). I waited 10 minutes waiting before going crazy after a day of endless lift music. I asked ScottishPower for a comment. In response, one of their team said they were investigating, though that’s all I’ve heard.
Shell Recharge (pt1): Shell Recharge operates the UK’s largest public network in the UK, and my experience with them was not superb - not least as they seem to have three Recharge-associated helplines. I called them all. On the first one, the music is quite good, which is helpful because I end up listening to it for 15 minutes before the track presumably runs out - leaving me listening to five minutes of ‘bleeps’. And then at 20 minutes, I finally connected to an advisor. They explain they are one of four support staff in their centre. They also acknowledge it’s not in the UK, but that other call centres help too, albeit they’re unsure how many.
Shell Recharge (pt2): The second number I called provided an automated message only for it to cut out after a minute. The last number is one I had for ubitricity. It’s much more positive, in that it only took me a few minutes of waiting to reach an advisor. They end up revealing that Shell has had helpline issues for a few weeks and doesn’t know when a fix is coming. In response, a spokesperson for Shell apologised for the poor experience. They acknowledged their previous partner had entered administration recently (presumably EVA Global), and that a new team has only just been put in place. Shell said the issue had been escalated and the helplines were being looked at.
And what about Tesla? On Sunday when I called Tesla’s helpline, I had a very poor experience. Mainly because the two numbers I called either told me the Supercharger support was shut or sent me on a merry-go-round of automated messages with irrelevant roadside assistance. When I contacted Tesla about this, I was sent a longer list of numbers. I tried one for Heathrow - that is also available I believe to non-Tesla owners - and did eventually, after lots of automated messages, manage to get through to an advisor in another country. While very polite, the advisor didn’t always inspire confidence. For example, when I said I was a non-Tesla owner interested if they could help with my Supercharging, they replied, “If it's billing related, not directly, but ask me the question, I'll see if the car is not charging, maybe."
Tesla solves it… After sharing my experience with Tesla’s team, I was admittedly very impressed that they responded swiftly by bringing forward new changes to their support that started today. Now, the numbers on their chargers will go straight to Supercharging support. They are also making it so non-Tesla owners can simply press ‘1’ to make themselves known, and if you own a Tesla you’ll just need to type in your associated phone number to get straight through. So from today, everyone will have fewer buttons and save vital minutes of automated messages. Huzzah!
Conclusion… I started my career as an apprentice doing staff engagement in HMRC call centres. As part of that, I sat on helplines numerous times. It was a learning curve. Nobody ever calls you happy. It’s always in frustration. And when you’re the taxman, people assume you’re out to get them. But what I’m reminded of during this testing is it doesn’t always matter if you can solve someone’s issue, but what people want is for you to be there to listen and try. In HMRC, people would often wait a long time to reach us making people go crazy. But when it was faster, people weren’t as mad. Based on the above, my belief is networks that don’t take speed as seriously as availability in the coming years may lose out to those that do.
If anyone named above believes I have misrepresented their position or has updates to share, please get in touch.
ZEV mandate: New document raises questions about ministers’ knowledge of Stellantis troubles
Background: Last night at the SMMT annual dinner, Business Secretary Jonathan Reynolds confirmed speculation that soon the government will launch a speedy consultation on the ZEV mandate. It’s not expected to change the percentages of the mandate. The consultation will include and ask for ideas building on a meeting between ministers, carmakers, networks, plus other stakeholders last week. At this meeting, the policy idea - which I understand all participants seemed ok with - was the potential for reforming the value of the ZEV credits. The change proposed will incentivise British EV manufacturing over imported vehicles. Carmakers did ask in this meeting for a two-year break from fines (described as a monitoring period until 2026). However, my understanding is this will be unlikely. The fact this has featured so heavily in the media today also makes me believe it’s getting briefed hard by carmakers because the government has resisted.
At the SMMT dinner… Reynolds said: “I’m going to be frank with you – I don’t believe the policies that we have inherited, and I mean specifically in relation to zero-emission vehicles, are operating today in a way anyone intended them to.” I believe the language we’re seeing from Reynolds is very interesting. I do believe he is now the most important political stakeholder concerning EV policy. As I’ve said before and have only heard again this week, the Transport Secretary Louise Haigh isn’t very interested in the topic. Since her DP World comments too, she’s not got loads of Cabinet punch. Reynolds on the other hand is close in the Cabinet circle and a nifty operator. He also is said to have drunk in everything carmakers have put in front of him about the mandate.
This morning… SMMT published a hard-hitting press release on the news that Stellantis will shut its Vauxhall Luton plant. It follows a similar announcement by Ford last week. It’s very sad for those people working in the industry, especially before Christmas. The thing is, none of these challenges are out of the blue, albeit the current news is making it feel this way.
*Scoop*… Based on a statement the Business Secretary delivered earlier to the House of Commons, he suggested the first time he and the Transport Secretary “found out about the challenges” Stellantis were facing was 10 days after the election. However, based on a new document I obtained from the Department for Transport via an FOI request yesterday, it seems as if Louise Haigh could have been aware of their difficulties long before she was in power. According to the disclosure from DfT, a meeting had previously been scheduled for 19 June between Haigh’s Parliamentary office and Stellantis to discuss automotive industry challenges and opportunities. However, due to the election this was cancelled at the end of May.
After the election (4 July), Stellantis quickly sent a letter to the new Transport Secretary on 9 July asking for the ‘rescheduled’ meeting to discuss challenges and opportunities with the ZEV mandate. The email also said, “we look forward to our continued work with you.” Suggesting previous engagement.
While Reynold’s statement suggests it was not until after 14 July that they became aware of the issues Stellantis had, to me this document shows not only that it was in the Transport Secretary’s inbox by 11 July (see below) and that actually they may have been aware of challenges when they were in opposition.
Tin foil hat off… Maybe I’m reading too much into the above, in any case clearly Stellantis has had long-running problems.
What’s making all this debate frustrating are businesses like Ford. As The Guardian reported over the weekend, only two years ago Ford suggested the targets might not be strong enough. And now they’ve gone fully into reverse saying recently they are “unworkable”. Ford’s Lisa Brankin told Radio 4’s Today programme this morning: "The one thing that we really need is government-backed incentives to urgently boost the uptake of electric vehicles, because without demand the mandate just doesn't work.” To be honest, I think a lot of people across the sector can get behind some flexibility, but Labour must maintain its commitment - otherwise billions will be at risk. We’ll have to wait and see what arrives next week.
Excellent piece of research on the call centres! 👏 …and mostly pretty encouraging!
I’ve never shied away from calling up for any issues, sometimes on behalf of other people who are dazed and confused that something’s not right at a chargepoint.
I have, almost inevitably become frustrated - and not sorry to politely point out the issues - with a few CPOs … especially those where you discover through a couple of questions that their kit has been down for weeks at a time with no one interested in doing something about it!
Conversely there are a whole tier of helplines you find you can have sensible conversations with (Osprey - bearing in mind they are probably a CPO I have used most or second most-often over three years…often it’s their 3rd party payment kit that plays up - are excellent, InstaBolt and RAW have been surprisingly good too)
And I do have some empathy that they must get so many “education calls” from members of the public who really should have been better guided by dealer or lease company when their car was delivered!
Yet more proper journalism with the FOI request. Luton has been on life support for years, but it is amazing that the government hasn't been in regular communication with one of our largest manufacturers since it became obvious they would soon be in power. Even in opposition this should have been happening.
What is scary is thinking how many other manufacturers are being ignored, and how little the government must know about the economy as a result.