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Which home EV charger to install?

Dekkerb

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Coventry
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Hi Newbie here. I'd posted a question about charging costs on the newbie thread, thanks for all the useful replies. I'm waiting delivery of my SR until my charger is installed. My local MG dealer, Unity, recommended Rolec (Tru-pen) and quoted @£350. A number of calls & emails later with the proposed installer and we are looking at £766! Should we look at a different charger like Zappi given the largely poor reviews of Rolec and how easy/hard is it to find a professional, reliable, reasonably priced and installer (West Midlands)? Any advice really appreciated. Thanks
 
A lot of prices initially quoted are best case scenario with relatively easy access and a finite cable length. As soon as you deviate from this, price changes. As it does for the smarter and more premium units.

Can’t advise on which to choose as it quite a personal choice based on usage, budget and needs. And on aesthetics to a degree. Zappi looks good if you get into their ecosystem with renewables, etc but there were rumours a few months back of a slight decline in quality - may be resolved now though.

Best advice is get multiple quotes. Ideally from installers who have visited. Saying that, I chose the one installer who turned up, it wasn’t particularly cheap but very happy with quality. And I had the car for a month before it was installed, used local 7kWh units for a few hours and occasional rapid.

Hopefully someone local to you can recommend an installer
 
The Zappi is a great unit especially if you are going the solar route but once you add the Hub for smart app control you will be near £1000
 
Cost me £550 for Sync EV but that was un-tethered (personal preference).

I went with them based on reviews, the ability to connect a LAN (network) cable for stability/reliability, built in PEN fault detection (no earth rod needed), it has a CT clamp for monitoring the house load to protect your main fuse, it supports Octopus tarrifs out of the box and solar for future use.

Recent posts from people have confirmed they are being quite responsive to issues raised and the app is updated regularly.

If it wasn't for the extortionate price quoted and a slightly disappointing customer service experience, I'd have gone for Hypervolt again based on research. They wanted over £1000 for the same install and the installer wouldn't communicate with me. Hypervolt then kept emailing me saying 'We haven't heard from you' and when I told them about the installer they went quiet too and didn't return my last email to them. Shame...

Only other one I considered was the Ohme Home Pro, they had an offer on of £499 installed, but only if you're in the South East. Their installer quoted me £950, quite a difference!
 
A lot of prices initially quoted are best case scenario with relatively easy access and a finite cable length. As soon as you deviate from this, price changes. As it does for the smarter and more premium units.

Can’t advise on which to choose as it quite a personal choice based on usage, budget and needs. And on aesthetics to a degree. Zappi looks good if you get into their ecosystem with renewables, etc but there were rumours a few months back of a slight decline in quality - may be resolved now though.

Best advice is get multiple quotes. Ideally from installers who have visited. Saying that, I chose the one installer who turned up, it wasn’t particularly cheap but very happy with quality. And I had the car for a month before it was installed, used local 7kWh units for a few hours and occasional rapid.

Hopefully someone local to you can recommend an installer
Thanks Biffo, very helpful
 
Cost me £550 for Sync EV but that was un-tethered (personal preference).

I went with them based on reviews, the ability to connect a LAN (network) cable for stability/reliability, built in PEN fault detection (no earth rod needed), it has a CT clamp for monitoring the house load to protect your main fuse, it supports Octopus tarrifs out of the box and solar for future use.

Recent posts from people have confirmed they are being quite responsive to issues raised and the app is updated regularly.

If it wasn't for the extortionate price quoted and a slightly disappointing customer service experience, I'd have gone for Hypervolt again based on research. They wanted over £1000 for the same install and the installer wouldn't communicate with me. Hypervolt then kept emailing me saying 'We haven't heard from you' and when I told them about the installer they went quiet too and didn't return my last email to them. Shame...

Only other one I considered was the Ohme Home Pro, they had an offer on of £499 installed, but only if you're in the South East. Their installer quoted me £950, quite a difference!
Useful info Ozzie thanks
 
Take a look at the Hypervolt unit, customer service is very good by all accounts.
I had a couple of glitches with my Hypervolt charger. You are right, customer service was first rate - quick, friendly and effective. Made a welcome change from the fob-you-off, wheedle-out-of-it, call-centre-canned-muzak hell that's the norm these days.

Since then, no problems and it's worked very well. Recommended.
 
i've signed up for Electric vehicle home charging made simple at £499, but its not installed yet (im waiting an installation date), it was just a lot cheaper (on paper) than anything else. I had originally selected the hypervolt as the best features, but it was working out at twice the price (£950 fitted i was quoted) so didnt work out worth it for me.

what i dont know is if the Ohme installation will actually be £499 all in, or when they get to site if they try to upsell!
 
I had a couple of glitches with my Hypervolt charger. You are right, customer service was first rate - quick, friendly and effective. Made a welcome change from the fob-you-off, wheedle-out-of-it, call-centre-canned-muzak hell that's the norm these days.

Since then, no problems and it's worked very well. Recommended.
I've heard great things and I'm sure Hypervolt themselves were not the issue in my case but the installer. That being said, if Hypervolt really cared for my business they'd have put me in touch with another installer or arranged a meeting with the original one for me.

Sync EV and their installer have responded to my emails within hours and the installer spent 30 min on the phone understanding my requirements and setup before quoting a price which was the only one out of 5 quotes in total.
 
i've signed up for Electric vehicle home charging made simple at £499, but its not installed yet (im waiting an installation date), it was just a lot cheaper (on paper) than anything else. I had originally selected the hypervolt as the best features, but it was working out at twice the price (£950 fitted i was quoted) so didnt work out worth it for me.

what i dont know is if the Ohme installation will actually be £499 all in, or when they get to site if they try to upsell!
Thanks Rich. A house round the corner had an ohme and we are getting the installer round tomorrow to quote. Indian captions are the quote will be along the lines you are saying. Will let you know
 
I had a Hypervolt installed in October where it sat a month waiting for a car to use it!

In that time it lost connection to the network and I had calls over 3 days whilst they suggested various things.

They were very polite and helpful but I got pissed off on day 3 and just did the one thing they didn't tell me to do. I flipped the fuse switch and turn it back on.

Worked fine since.

It's a nice charger but unless you have it hidden, the lights are a bit "look at me" and even on lowest brightness some of the colours are too obvious. I'd like an option for it to only be lit for 30secs after starting a charge or when you open the app for example.

Rather than all the time or off entirely which also isn't the best option
 
I had a Hypervolt installed in October where it sat a month waiting for a car to use it!

In that time it lost connection to the network and I had calls over 3 days whilst they suggested various things.

They were very polite and helpful but I got pissed off on day 3 and just did the one thing they didn't tell me to do. I flipped the fuse switch and turn it back on.

Worked fine since.

It's a nice charger but unless you have it hidden, the lights are a bit "look at me" and even on lowest brightness some of the colours are too obvious. I'd like an option for it to only be lit for 30secs after starting a charge or when you open the app for example.

Rather than all the time or off entirely which also isn't the best option
I thought you could completely turn off the panel lights, if you so desired ?.
 
I thought you could completely turn off the panel lights, if you so desired ?.
Yep - you can

I had a Hypervolt installed in October where it sat a month waiting for a car to use it!

In that time it lost connection to the network and I had calls over 3 days whilst they suggested various things.

They were very polite and helpful but I got pissed off on day 3 and just did the one thing they didn't tell me to do. I flipped the fuse switch and turn it back on.

Worked fine since.

It's a nice charger but unless you have it hidden, the lights are a bit "look at me" and even on lowest brightness some of the colours are too obvious. I'd like an option for it to only be lit for 30secs after starting a charge or when you open the app for example.

Rather than all the time or off entirely which also isn't the best option
Drop them a suggestion, I know they have a Facebook group - some of the features have come from user feedback
 
Hi Newbie here. I'd posted a question about charging costs on the newbie thread, thanks for all the useful replies. I'm waiting delivery of my SR until my charger is installed. My local MG dealer, Unity, recommended Rolec (Tru-pen) and quoted @£350. A number of calls & emails later with the proposed installer and we are looking at £766! Should we look at a different charger like Zappi given the largely poor reviews of Rolec and how easy/hard is it to find a professional, reliable, reasonably priced and installer (West Midlands)? Any advice really appreciated. Thanks
Not had any problems with my rolec. easy to use with ev energy app. For smart timer charging on octopus go 5p pkh. You can buy charger for £399. And get a competent electrician to install.
 
I believe Octopus aren't accepting new customers at the moment.

And if you buy the charger through your installer you should get the govt grant towards it, though they still aren't cheap.
 
I believe Octopus aren't accepting new customers at the moment.

And if you buy the charger through your installer you should get the govt grant towards it, though they still aren't cheap.
I want to install a charger using a competent professional electrician that I've used for years. We have the 32a wiring all there. The problem so far is that I can't buy the charger without the install being included. The electrician is not olev registered to obtain the £350 grant but can do the install for less than these "from" inclusive prices. He believes they are simply hiking up their prices before the grant is applied. I trust the electrician sooner than a complete stranger.
 
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