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I read this horror story on Faceache. I've no idea how common this is, but it's a problem that doesn't have a parallel in fossil world which gives me twinges of nerves.
Pre-charged the battery to 100% before setting off. Stopped at Moto Exeter for some eats, so did a top up. Had a pleasant journey upto Gloucester farm shop services M5 to top up to be able to complete my journey, then my troubles started. Tried 4 Tesla chargers, non worked. Tried 3 E volt, again no joy. So cut my losses and carried onto Hopwood park services M42. Tried 4 Applegreen, again no joy. By this time, I was thinking it was a fault with the cars charger, so I contacted MG assistance who just told me it wasn’t classed as a breakdown as the car was mobile and should carry on till it was almost a flat battery. He said to try yet another charger, but then I couldn’t get the charger cable plug out as it was locked in and wouldn’t release whatever I did to try and release it. So he sent out the AA to assist. The AA mechanic didn’t know anything about EVs. He did eventually get the plug disconnected though. He then said to try a BP charger at the NEC Birmingham. Non of them worked either, and others couldn’t get them to work either. So I decided to carry on at 50mph. By doing 50, the range went up and could have possibly have made it home with 10 miles to spare, but decided to try again at Rotherham services. Plugged into Applegreen, hey presto, it worked first time. Got home 3 hours later than planned.
Nope, but it's one of the simple ABCs of owning an EV of pretty much any description. If you're parked somewhere you can charge (especially at home where it's cheap) Always Be Charging.Aren't you plugging in every night?
Clearly not. Did you fill up your car every night before you got an electric car?
Was my first time using a properly rapid charger today. IONITY @ 46p kWh with the cheapest £10.50 per month membership. Plugged in, popped into Greggs for a flat white and yumyum. Made a couple of work calls so 25-30mins. That was enough for a 60% boost to my 60kw battery. I was impressed.
I do have one complaint with this thread and the EV Guy type social media posts where people constantly boast about being able to charge their car overnight for £3.50. Superficially this is true but in nearly every case it is only possible because of an EV tariff which will include a much higher day time rate for everything else your house uses. I know about load shifting, storage, solar etc and to some extent this mitigates. But in most cases that £3.50 charge is only possible because people are paying more to cook their dinner or do their laundry during the day. That is the true cost.
I do wonder how many people on Octopus have done the maths to work out true, total, electricity costs versus Fuse EV, OVO all you can eat, eon etc. I have and, in my use case, octopus was the most expensive EV tariff option
This isn’t an argument against EV’s, I’m well and truly a convert. It’s just a reminder that the £3.50 charge might come with some other costs.
I did a full spreadsheet of day electric use and our mileage in the old car, over 3 months.
The combined cost was still nearly £1k saved over a year fuelling EV Vs petrol. I do 12k miles a year though.
The combined cost was still nearly £1k saved over a year fuelling EV Vs petrol. I do 12k miles a year though
I’m on very similar numbers as you Matt, both in miles and savings
I do have one complaint with this thread and the EV Guy type social media posts where people constantly boast about being able to charge their car overnight for £3.50. Superficially this is true but in nearly every case it is only possible because of an EV tariff which will include a much higher day time rate for everything else your house uses. I know about load shifting, storage, solar etc and to some extent this mitigates. But in most cases that £3.50 charge is only possible because people are paying more to cook their dinner or do their laundry during the day. That is the true cost.
I do wonder how many people on Octopus have done the maths to work out true, total, electricity costs versus Fuse EV, OVO all you can eat, eon etc. I have and, in my use case, octopus was the most expensive EV tariff option
Funnily enough I did this the other day.
Based on my 2025 usage, and my current rate of 25p per kwh, if I moved to the Octopus EV tariff of 30p during the day and 7p at night, my normal electricity usage would cost £100 more a year, and based on what I've charged at home over the past 3 months on a non EV tariff, if I switch to one and charge overnight on the cheap rate, I project I'll save about £400 on EV charging over a year so despite the increase daytime cost, it's a win overall, and that's before I shift any daytime usage to night time.
Funny enough Was just checking out what my average rate is currently this evening on octopus watch Hovering around 11p Average around all my use since the car arrived on octopus go.
While I was at it I also worked out the kWh cost of the solar panels I had fitted 4.5 years ago. Currently costing out at 26.5p a Kwh generated and in decline.
Meanwhile we have had the EV for 1200 miles and so far 28 quid. The same in our diesel would have been 170-200 at prices offer the same period.
I do have one complaint with this thread and the EV Guy type social media posts where people constantly boast about being able to charge their car overnight for £3.50. Superficially this is true but in nearly every case it is only possible because of an EV tariff which will include a much higher day time rate for everything else your house uses. I know about load shifting, storage, solar etc and to some extent this mitigates. But in most cases that £3.50 charge is only possible because people are paying more to cook their dinner or do their laundry during the day. That is the true cost.
I do wonder how many people on Octopus have done the maths to work out true, total, electricity costs versus Fuse EV, OVO all you can eat, eon etc. I have and, in my use case, octopus was the most expensive EV tariff option
This isn’t an argument against EV’s, I’m well and truly a convert. It’s just a reminder that the £3.50 charge might come with some other costs.
I did the maths on this for our house back in Jan when our tariff was up. Cannot remember the exact numbers but we were better off taking the cheap EV/hours vs a standard discount day rate. We have 2 EVs so one always on charge most nights. I think it Costa an extra €40 a month during the day but save over €100 on EV charging at night, so about €60 a month better off. We pay, for our EVs, under €2 a night vs closer to €6 a day if we took the discounted rate and our day use would not justify the extra cost (not including load shifting of either which adds more savings). I get what you are saying though as a low mile EV driver might not be better off. It all pales in comparison to the almost €300 a month we used to spend of fuel!
I did a full spreadsheet of day electric use and our mileage in the old car, over 3 months.
The combined cost was still nearly £1k saved over a year fuelling EV Vs petrol. I do 12k miles a year though.
Have you looked at overall cost including buying and depreciation...or are you a leaser/PCP ?
We're moving house/country shortly, our old car has already gone so we have 2 wheels apiece for a few weeks, then we buy a new to us car. But we are old school, so save up and buy and hopefully keep it a good few years. Some absolute bargains to be had in nearly new EVs (which must mean someone has taken a bath ....personal purchase or the lease/finance company). £55k new, £18k at 18 mths old with 9k miles as an example
try a BP charger at the NEC Birmingham. Non of them worked either
I've never had an issue there. Maybe the shonky chinese MG was the problem?
I do wonder how many people on Octopus have done the maths to work out true, total, electricity costs versus Fuse EV, OVO all you can eat, eon etc. I have and, in my use case, octopus was the most expensive EV tariff option
Bills for the IOG tariff give your average unit price, so it's easy to see if it works out cheaper. I have household battery and pv so it's a total no brainer, averaging less than 10p per unit.
Our bill gives 8.95p as the average import price last bill. When I take into account export it's <3p.
Some absolute bargains to be had in nearly new EVs
100% a new one made no sense without some form of tax efficiency to dispose of the losses
We bought a 9 month old 1 owner 12k miles car for very slightly over half its original sticker. (And 5k less than ANY of the same car in its diesel models -all those were WAV vehicles too )
And for mum a 3 year old 30k miles top spec mint condition leaf tekna + for less than 10k.
I've never had an issue there. Maybe the shonky chinese MG was the problem
Setting aside the silly stereotype (have you ever actually been to China?) I imagine it was indeed the car. But that’s the point. It was a type of failure that couldn’t happen with a fossil burner.
But in most cases that £3.50 charge is only possible because people are paying more to cook their dinner or do their laundry during the day. That is the true cost.
You're ignoring the cost of petrol in that part of the calculation that they would have to buy had they not switched to electric to optimise their energy costs.
Which in most cases would blow the uptick in electric costs for day usage out of the water - by a factor of around 8x versus the spend petrol. (Less in winter)
That said it can be quite tricky trying to figure out all the elements, and you have to charge at home. And it's designed that way. Market is trying to beat you.
I actually despise it but there's not much choice if you want to tackle it all.
I'm still on a very cheap fix of 6p for 7hrs use from last year - for two cars. With timed electric usage domestically at night.
It won't be such a good deal next time. The window is getting narrower.
Our domestic electricity use works out at around 8kwh daily and at the time of switch to OIG the increase in daytime unit cost was 5p a kwh. So worst case, if that was all 8kw was used in the daytime that would add 40p to the daily bill. As we now run the washing machines and dishwashers exclusively during the night, as laundry dehumidifier too that difference is hugely narrowed. We also now use the immersion heater all the hot water and have that run 0430-0530 on cheap rate saving a good chunk on LPG. I then consume 15kwh daily average on EV charging at 7p kwh.
The maths works for me.
I did a full spreadsheet of day electric use and our mileage in the old car, over 3 months.
The combined cost was still nearly £1k saved over a year fuelling EV Vs petrol. I do 12k miles a year though.
Have you looked at overall cost including buying and depreciation...or are you a leaser/PCP ?
We're moving house/country shortly, our old car has already gone so we have 2 wheels apiece for a few weeks, then we buy a new to us car. But we are old school, so save up and buy and hopefully keep it a good few years. Some absolute bargains to be had in nearly new EVs (which must mean someone has taken a bath ....personal purchase or the lease/finance company). £55k new, £18k at 18 mths old with 9k miles as an example
I had 2017 Fabia with 97k miles that was racking up bills (rusting catalytic and turbo iffy for a start...).
I've moved to a 3 year old ex-lease Polestar 2 with 35k on it. Cost was £17k, but only £3/month more loan payment than the older Fabia.
So yeah, overall depreciation will cost more. But month to month I'm driving newer, cheaper to run car and happy with the money it costs.
A new EV would be about £120-200 a month more.
Nope, but it's one of the simple ABCs of owning an EV of pretty much any description. If you're parked somewhere you can charge (especially at home where it's cheap) Always Be Charging.
But the point stands – I didn't (I wasn't expecting to be having to take that car until the last minute) and the knock-on effect was hours wasted trying to charge it.
I do have one complaint with this thread and the EV Guy type social media posts where people constantly boast about being able to charge their car overnight for £3.50.I don't have an EV tariff (and to be frank my home electricity isn't *that* cheap) but that, combined with charging at work, in a PHEV (with sufficient range for 95% of my driving). In total it's cut my fuel costs by about 35% from my previous diesel. I have a spreadsheet. Which i started filling in when prices spiked during the early days of putins invasion of Ukraine.
But the point stands – I didn't (I wasn't expecting to be having to take that car until the last minute) and the knock-on effect was hours wasted trying to charge it.You miss the point, it doesn't matter if you're planning to use it or not. If it's parked near cheap power, get in the habit of keeping it topped up to a reasonable level. Most of my colleagues are running full EV, and have been for a long while. Get home, plug in. Hell, i even plug my PHEV in when i know i'm not going to be using the car for 2 or 3 days.
Which in most cases would blow the uptick in electric costs for day usage out of the water - by a factor of around 8x versus the spend petrol. (Less in winter)
I completely agree. I am not saying that my argument offsets the saving versus petrol, very far from it. But the true cost is more than the £3.50 charge, even if only a few pennies or pounds each month.
payment via the Tesla App only
That's the only exception, I think. Everywhere else lets you use contactless.
in nearly every case it is only possible because of an EV tariff which will include a much higher day time rate for everything else your house uses
Don't think so, I pay 28p for daytime use now and in April looks like that's going down to 25p. 51p standing charge. I think that's the same as standard, but we get 7.5p overnight.
Did you fill up your car every night before you got an electric car?
No, because it didn't matter. I did however head out to get fuel the night before a big trip when the logistics demanded it. We plug in every night because it takes a few seconds; it allows the grid to balance and you never end up without charge like you did. Once it's a habit it's no more of a challenge than brushing your teeth before bed. I'm not prepared to pay a grand a year to save a few seconds each day, it makes no sense.
You miss the point
Not really – for whatever circumstance, the car didn't have enough charge and the shocking state of the charging network in the UK left me faffing around trying to charge it (further compounded by the claimed fast charger I took it to taking an age to charge it).
No, because it didn't matter.
Exactly – see my point above...
But the point stands – I didn't (I wasn't expecting to be having to take that car until the last minute) and the knock-on effect was hours wasted trying to charge it.
It's a change in mindset to be sure.
Back in the day, I had a nokia phone that I had to charge once a week. Back then, the idea of a phone that needed charging every day would have sounded daft. But the truth is my modern iphone probably does need charging every day but I never think about it. In fact, it is such a non-issue that it doesn't even show me the state of charge unless I swipe to check (which I never do). It's just become part of my routine that I stick it on the charging pad when I'm not using it and never even think about the state of charge. Charging is actually less of a hassle than it was with the nokia when I had to find the charger and consciously think about charging.
The transition from ICE to EV is similar. Yes the range is lower and it takes longer to "refuel" but once you get into the mindset of "plug it in when you are not using it" range just becomes a non-issue. I've done nearly 20,000 miles in the EV now including numerous long trips of up to 500 miles each way and never once have I had to stop to charge the car (or wait for it to charge). Just like my phone, I plug it in when I'm not using it and it never runs out of charge so the nominal "range" is meaningless. It's actually less hassle than the ICE car, which requires a special trip to a petrol station and a few minutes standing on a draughty, smelly forecourt waiting for the tank to fill up.
I think EV manufacturers don't help themselves by displaying estimated range so prominently and it just leads to lots of chatter and anxiety about a meaningless number. An old fashioned gauge that said full, plenty, half-full and think about charging would be just fine for me.
Exactly – see my point above...
Yes but it's on you to make the (very small) change. If you want things to get better you can't expect everything to stay the same.
Yes but it's on you to make the (very small) change.
I agree – but, on this occasion, I hadn't charged it and it caused us no end of hassle. Similar has happened when we have had to drive a longer distance on two consecutive days (and our slower home charger can't recharge it fully overnight). For example, after last week's debacle (driving to Manchester and back on Friday night), my wife couldn't use the car for a long trip on the following day as it hadn't recharged enough as I got home at 1.30am.
Not really – for whatever circumstance, the car didn't have enough charge and the shocking state of the charging network in the UK left me faffing around trying to charge it (further compounded by the claimed fast charger I took it to taking an age to charge it).
I think from your description of events it seems pretty clear the issue was with your car, not the chargers.
my wife couldn't use the car for a long trip on the following day as it hadn't recharged enough as I got home at 1.30am.
Why couldn't she break her journey for a rapid charge?
and our slower home charger can't recharge it fully overnight
are you trying to live with a 3 pin plug charger ? This is the main reason we didn't after living with a leaf owner doing just that last year we saw that its unmanageable for us.
Why couldn't she break her journey for a rapid charge?
Because it was time-critical.
my wife couldn't use the car for a long trip on the following day as it hadn't recharged enough as I got home at 1.30am
There is some stuff here that just isn't adding up.
Lets make some assumptions, all erring on cautious / worse case scenarios:
1. You still had 10% left in the car when you got home
2. You have a normal home charger and, with loss, it charges at 6kW
3. Your wife left at 7am
4. You disabled any EV tariff time restrictions on charging, so your car was able to charge 1.30am-7am
If all of these things were true (and I've been very cautious with each), you would have put 35kWH into your car between 1.30am - 7am. You already had 10% so if your car is 60kW battery, would would be well above 60% charge by 7am. Your wife wouldn't have had to stop for a 60%%-100% charge, only enough to get to her destination. So probably 10mins max on a rapid charger if she was going a long way.
As I say, a lot of assumptions there but your argument doesn't really make sense. Unless of course if you are relying on a 3pin granny charger. In which case, you are going to have a very difficult time!
2. You have a normal home charger and, with loss, it charges at 6kW
I believe he only has a granny charger
I believe he only has a granny charger
I went 2 months without a charger at home. It certainly took a bit more forward planning and I was lucky enough to have charging at work.
I believe he only has a granny charger
I do - it charges approx 30% in 12 hours.
EV isn't for everyone.
I have a colleague who keenly leased a Honda eny1 thing. Discovered that the short range, no home charging (terrace) and thier range paranoia just didn't work for them. They are back to a petrol car after 3 years.
On the other hand, another colleague bought a 10 year old Leaf for buttons. It rolls down the hill to his work most days (6 miles each way), occasionally to our office or a site within 50 miles, and they love it.. Saved a fortune, just plug in on the drive to a proper charger and keep running till it's dead.
Each to their own.
That said, we do need to reduce carbon and pollution, and we will need ever stronger 'carrot and stick' to achieve change. Not everyone will need comfortable with this.
I do - it charges approx 30% in 12 hours.
yeah I'm not surprised your facing challenges. Be like trying to fill your diesel tank with a syringe
Because it was time-critical.
So she couldn't set off 20 minutes earlier? Or you get home 20 minutes later? I agree that there are occasions where an EV is less convenient than an ICE car, and need more careful planning as a result.
So she couldn't set off 20 minutes earlier? Or you get home 20 minutes later?
Yes, we could, or go back to ICE and not have to do either. But, my wider point is that the UK network of chargers isn't great – we've been compromised more than once, either having to crawl home, find a charger (that works and takes the payment method we want), hope that it is super fast as claimed and not have to sit around for an hour waiting. More widely, my biggest frustration is that my vehicle (like many others) doesn't get anywhere close to the claimed range, and range plummets at motorway speeds.
For example – my drive last Friday night was 140 miles in total, my car has a claimed range of "up to" 250 miles – I didn't go over 70mph – an average of 37mph (with an 85% "efficiency rating according to the app), drove in Eco mode with max regen. I set off with 98% charge, and I had 8% left when I got home.
Yes, we could, or go back to ICE get a home charger and not have to do either.
FIFY
I think for most people, having a home charger is the key to an easy EV life. It is possible without, it is just a faff.
Its a real shame for people who are not fortunate enough to have that option.
edit* I don't know what is going on with your car John. Your numbers just don't make sense. I agree with you though, I don't think EV's are right for you.
Yes, we could, or go back to ICE and not have to do either.
My point is that things you describe as impossible would be easily possible with a small amount of planning. If that's not for you then I agree you're better off with an ICE car. My annual efficiency is 4 miles/ kWh which gives 256 miles range against the official 283 miles range. I'm quite happy with that.
Think these threads should have an AI summary as the title, this one would read something like "Plan ahead, so your battery isnt dead".
It sounds like the wrong car for your situation though that has been highlighted in the past IIRC. That and lack of proper home charging it's kind of inevitable you've arrived where you are.
We are on our second MG4. This is the LR Trophy version which my wife really wanted (after having the std range one) even tho she rarely needs to charge away from home. Less than 25% and she gets range anxiety. I don't think we ever publicly charged the first one as we always took my ICE car if that was going to be necessary (and I didn't find that one very comfy for longer journeys), now we are pretty sanguine about range especially as we've ended up with £2000 ish of "Free electricity" on our Octo card.
I know everyones experience is different but we've not had one issue public charging. Generally < 30 mins to get to 80%, no issues using the Octo card and a combo of the in built sat-nav (which isn't great) and ABRP (which is) means we've always got options if we do run into an issue.
It's taken a while for my better half to feel comfortable with having to charge away from home, but now we're planning a european road trip this summer.
One thing we would change is we have an ICS home charger. Not a well known make and we're on our second unit. Means we can't use the intelligent Octo tariff. It does talk to Home Assistant tho which means I never have to use the hateful UI!
Random question - has anyone any experience of driving the Irish "Wild Atlantic Way" in an EV? Just looking at ABRP it seems it might be challenging unless you assume that all of the mapped charge points are available and in order.