Tesco free charging.with VW and useful tip with granny charger

[Utumno]

Nobody should rely on freeloading at Tesco, they’re for customers to use while they’re in the store, they’re not “yours”.

I agree with not relying on them. The 22kw chargers at our local Tesco rarely work lately.
I don't however see it as freeloading if you do charge there. Tesco made a charger commitment commercially and must have weighed up the wider use of non Tesco customers. I shop 100% online these days with 2 deliveries a week from Tesco.
I do however put my bike in the car, put the car on charge at Tesco and have a long ride down the Thames and local country parks all off peak times.
I would have thought Tesco could have somehow used their Clubcard as a validation for charging as an active customer but chose not to.

They're part of their sustainability program, for customers: https://www.tescoplc.com/updates/2021/t ... 0-charges/

Driving to the store JUST to use them doesn't seem to be their intention.

22kW ? The massive Tesco reasonably near us has 4x 7kW points. Hardly worth the hassle of plugging in for the time you're shopping there.

[Daveion]

2 stores near to me have 2 x 22kw chargers each plus 2 x7 kw and 1 50kw that you pay for. The ID3 will only charge at 11kw on AC but its still provides 50 miles/hour and a useful top up from time to time whilst out for a ride.
I thought all Tesco Superstore set ups would be the same!

[Idmania3]

Nobody should rely on freeloading at Tesco, they’re for customers to use while they’re in the store, they’re not “yours”.

Agree well said scott28tt.

[peterg]

Is this for real ? would you like to see my Tesco receipt ?

[Bromsgroveuser]

Tesco are paying for the electricity so it's only reasonable for them to assume that you are shopping there , not doing so would be like someone pulling up on your driveway and using your charger while they take a rest and have their sandwiches

[Jamh2000]

Regardless of the issue of whether you should be shopping in Tesco if you use them, I think the 7kw 30min time limited chargers are a gimmick and no real use. Much better is something like the system at the Westgate centre in Oxford, where there must be c100 parking spaces with 7kw chargers and no time limit. Parking is pricey but it’s a day out in Oxford and an example of what other car parks could look like.

[Warminster id]

Oxford are piloting ‘Park and charge’ scheme.
And as I understand it other councils are looking to introduce it.

[Utumno]

Oxford are piloting ‘Park and charge’ scheme.
And as I understand it other councils are looking to introduce it.

It's an interesting scheme as far as it goes, but there simply aren't enough chargers going in, and the focus seems less on enabling public overnight charging than mid-speed destination charging that subscribing residents can 'book' overnight. It's a start, but I can't help thinking that providing more, but lower amperage, points in the pilot might have helped residential charging needs better.

For example, the sole pilot currently running for this project is the Cattle Market council car park in central Bicester, which is about 15 minutes by car from us. It's a 200+ space car park and the installation is 6 double-headed posts of 22kW each, so 12 spaces. Not much.

All credit to Oxfordshire County Council though, they're active in multiple projects and trials. Far more interesting to me at least is their GULOW project which is putting a small number of a large variety of public charging points out to try to work out likely charging behaviours. There's a mix of lamppost, dedicated posts, subsidised driveway chargers with booking support for public use and the like in various residential areas of Central Oxford.

Credit to Westgate Centre car park though; 50 charging points in their shopping centre carpark means that EV drivers with deep pockets shopping in Oxford are pretty well served with that destination charging. I personally would like to see more public charging though, not destination charging.

[van]

Agreed, public charging is the challenge with so many people not having off street parking or work charging options.
Our local council recently ran a survey of ev owners to see what interest there might be in having charge points in their car parks. The objective was to see if destination charging would encourage visitors. I tried to point out that it was the visitors they needed to survey, not residents, and that a better question might have been " might you consider buying an ev if local public charging existed?".
Their reply showed my two penn'orth had fallen on deaf ears.

[Utumno]

Agreed, public charging is the challenge with so many people not having off street parking or work charging options.
Our local council recently ran a survey of ev owners to see what interest there might be in having charge points in their car parks. The objective was to see if destination charging would encourage visitors. I tried to point out that it was the visitors they needed to survey, not residents, and that a better question might have been " might you consider buying an ev if local public charging existed?".
Their reply showed my two penn'orth had fallen on deaf ears.

You can't expect the local council to serve the needs of the residents in this day and age. They need to encourage visitors to prop up the businesses paying business rates.

[monkeyhanger]

Agreed, public charging is the challenge with so many people not having off street parking or work charging options.
Our local council recently ran a survey of ev owners to see what interest there might be in having charge points in their car parks. The objective was to see if destination charging would encourage visitors. I tried to point out that it was the visitors they needed to survey, not residents, and that a better question might have been " might you consider buying an ev if local public charging existed?".
Their reply showed my two penn'orth had fallen on deaf ears.

How would the council get in contact with visitors or potential visitors? A nationwide survey? It's a tricky one to fulfill. Local residents paying a visit to the town centre isn't a bad place to start. Maybe also signage at said car parks to encourage users to participate in an online survey You'd?

You'd expect in a place like Oxford, which seems to despise cars, the local councils would be doing all they can to encourage EV ownership like putting in an abundance of chargers.

[Warminster id]

‘ You'd expect in a place like Oxford, which seems to despise cars, the local councils would be doing all they can to encourage EV ownership like putting in an abundance of chargers.’
Same as Bath. It’s a terrible place to Park with very few chargers (apart from the uni). And claims to be a green town

[Utumno]

You'd expect in a place like Oxford, which seems to despise cars, the local councils would be doing all they can to encourage EV ownership like putting in an abundance of chargers.

I don't think you understand the depths to which Oxford loathes private cars generally. They won't be encouraging EV uptake in any meaningful form because it's private vehicles they're against.

[van]

Well, to be fair, which I sometimes am, we are a largely rural council area so they may have been trying to assess if "local" ev owners could be persuaded to do more "local" shopping if there were destination chargers available. And there is a dearth of chargers of any kind near me when I look on ZapApp. Apart from two PodPoints at the Tesco store 6 miles away we're pretty much in charger desert, certainly no "popping out" to charge up overnight from a nearby one.

[bitmanEV]

I personally don't see any issue of using the Tesco chargers as long your still around and move on as soon as some one else wants to 'free load" (as called here)

I'm from the time that the Ecotricity chargers were still free so I shouldn't use them too? Nonsense everywhere I park / go I look around to plug in paid or free it's my choice and I don't force any shop to have them for free but if they are I'm using them

In France I used the Rapid chargers at Auchan Supermarket and they were free same goes for using the chargers at the Nissan dealers if possible and most dealers you even get a free cuppa

[tomstring]

I don’t have my ID.3 yet but there’s a Tesco Extra at the end of my road and the free charging points are often all occupied by small DPD vans which I think is a little unfair

[Deleted User 192]

I don’t have my ID.3 yet but there’s a Tesco Extra at the end of my road and the free charging points are often all occupied by small DPD vans which I think is a little unfair

No different from others treating them as if they own them…

[Daveion]

I dont get that view that if you use something that is free, without payment or cost to the user, that you are treating them like you own them.
Own them as in use them any time you want?
Eject others so you can get your charge?
Being mean and avoiding cost of charging?
In my mind when I take a free Tesco charge is:
Tesco chose to make the chargers free.
Wind blows turbine generating electricity.
Car gets charged thanks to infrastructure.
In return I'm a loyal customer of Tesco.
I don't see any negatives in that even if they are used by people who never spend a penny with Tesco. Its all green and good.

[korky]

I'm still waiting on delivery of my id3 but won't have an issue using tesco free charging if it's going to be parked anywhere near one anyway for a period of time, when i test drove 1 last month i did my shopping there one day and the next day i parked up again but just went for something to eat in a pub nearby
i'd guess that part of the reasoning tesco installed these was to entice shoppers with an EV into their stores as oppose those who may shop at others,
i'm not sure of the T&C's using them either, but for a major company like DPD to park up seems a tad cheeky unless, the guy was genuinely on his way home to do his shop, they seem to be located in the prime parking spots too

[Leccy]

Logic suggests that if Tesco (and others) see a business benefit from providing free to use chargers they’ll continue and hopefully expand it, but if they don’t, they won’t, which wouldn’t be good for EV drivers overall. That said, maybe the percentage of free-loading is below a threshold or maybe they’re doing it for to brand credentials and don’t care who uses them. Personally, my instinct would be to go easy on taking advantage where there’s not a win-win, but encourage it by using free chargers where there is.