Charging Etiquette

turtleturtle

turtleturtle

Active Member
I’ve had a couple of run ins with BEV drivers who feel I shouldn’t be using L2 chargers because I “don’t need it” but they really do.

First at a ski resort where I parked in a premium lot where there are four chargers, you have to get there early, and a Porsche BEV drove past while I was eating lunch, still charging, chewing me out because he NEEDED to charge and I was hogging a charger.

Second at the park where apparently I didn’t understand that if I’m charging, I should always park in a way where I can be unplugged and someone who NEEDED to charge could wedge their BEV in to charge. This time a Leaf driver.

Now, if you’re desperate and need a charge, I think it’s not the best to unplug someone, but life happens and we all get that. The part that chafes me is getting chewed out for charging because I had a PHEV and so it wasn’t a NEED.

Look, I can drive it on gas, but it works better for everyone if I run it on electric. What high horse of moral high ground am I somehow not honoring when I charge my PHEV? Is there a rule book I missed? Should I only be charging at midnight when I’m sure nobody else could possibly need it?

Personally I just think these people were jerks, however I’m noticing more and more passive aggressive comments on PlugShare from BEVs that are upset to find a PHEV charging in THEIR spot.
 
I never use public L2 chargers because a Clarity can make it home without it. I wouldn't want to keep a full EV driver from making it home because of me being inconsiderate.
 
If I'm on a long trip and my battery charge level gets low I use HV Charge to bring it back up. That isn't the low cost way but it sure is convenient and I don't have to stop for an hour or two.

I've never charged anywhere except home. It just doesn't make sense to me to burn all that time charging when that is what this PHEV thing is all about.
 
I'll use a public L2 charger if it is open and it is convenient for me. I wouldn't get upset if someone unplugged my car to charge their BEV, but I'd like for them to be nice about it. I don't think that public L2 charging is "for BEVs only". I'd relinquish a charger to a BEV that needed it if they asked nice rather than being a jerk about it. Being a jerk would tend to cause me to tell them to wait their turn.
 
First come first served, I say. I took advantage of some, no cost to me, charging at a regional park. I knew it would only take an hour and change to charge, so I went to the car in the middle of my visit to move it from the charging spot. Occasionally, I report to work at a location that offers “free” charging. If there’s a spot open, I plug in. If not, I’ll head back to the parking area later in the day to see if a spot is open.

I’d put them in the “jerk” classification as well. What if they had to wait hours for a BEV to charge? Would that be ok, because it’s a BEV? A Clarity only needs an hour or two to charge. Maybe those BEV owners shouldn’t venture so far from home if they don’t have a reliable way to complete the second half of their trip.

I believe it would be a valid question to ask if they NEED to charge, or if they just want to charge.
 
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Coming from a Fit BEV before my Clarity, I sorta get it. It used to annoy me that I couldn't get where I wanted to go but I never said anything because (a) that was my car choice and (b) I agree it's first come first serve.

Part of the reason why I went to the Clarity when lease was up, during the winter the reduction in range really limited the car to be solely a commuter car for my 76 mi round trip (can L2 at work) and anything else was an inconvenience.
 
I agree with OP. Unless there is a sign that says BEV charging station only, there is nothing immoral about charging your PHEV. Frankly, a lot of the accommodations (restaurants, hotels, etc.) offer free charging to everyone just so that they can get more patronage. If BEV owners are getting anxiety, blame themselves on the purchase decision. No one pointed a gun to their head and forced a sales contract on them. I can be nice about giving the charging priority to BEV owners, but they are NOT entitled.
 
This subject was discussed briefly on this forum 3 years ago. Now owning both a Clarity PHEV and a small, sporty BEV that offers just 110 miles of EPA range, I've been on both sides of the charging etiquette issue.

I don't consider it acceptable for someone to unplug your car without permission. It's especially unacceptable to take my plug if I'm paying for those electrons.

If you want to be nice you can leave a note on your car giving a desperate BEV driver your phone number so you can come help them out. Alternatively, the PlugShare app lets you check in when using a charging station and then other PlugShare users can tap your "name" on the app to send you a message of desperation.

My favorite story of electron theft is the Florida Tesla driver who needed a charge so he picked a house, pulled onto the front lawn, ran an extension cord to an outlet on the house, and plugged in without asking before walking away.
 
Thanks for the comments everyone. Helps me calibrate.

I check in on PlugShare every time and put how long I’m planning to charge. I’m happy to move the car if someone asks nicely, and that’s the key for me. If you really need to charge, just ask! “Please” is like 90% of the equation. Don’t come at me saying I took YOUR spot at a public charger.

I saw in the other thread that some of this shows a need to install more chargers. I totally agree. Once we get enough infrastructure, I’m hoping this sentiment goes away. Scarcity makes people crazy. I don’t want to keep anyone from getting home; I’m obviously charging because it was available when I got there and if it was full I didn’t plug in either.
 
I have never used a public charging station, and likely never will.
If I go on a long road trip, I will just operate in HV mode (with a substantial SOC as a large buffer).

But, correct me if I'm wrong... With the exception of 'free' ones (which are likely rare, depending on where you live), ANY public charging station will be substantially higher cost than your home electric rate. It is also likely to be substantially higher cost than running on gas (either in HV or HV Charge). So, I think the lower cost than gas argument is just not true. Maybe you have a philosophical 'green' reason for charging at a public station, but beyond that, it seems rather pointless to me (not to mention the risk of contracting some kind of communicable disease by inserting strange objects into your car's receptacle) !
 
I mainly charge at home; however, there are MANY free public 32-amp charging locations all around where I work and live.

Even when I travel, anywhere that I have stayed, they have always allowed me to plug in.

With Plug Share, I find that there are charging locations close to where I need to stop for lunch - so I charge, get a few steps in, and have lunch.

I'm over 30,000 miles, and have purchased less that $600 in gasoline.
 
MrFixit said:
But, correct me if I'm wrong... With the exception of 'free' ones (which are likely rare, depending on where you live), ANY public charging station will be substantially higher cost than your home electric rate.
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I guess I am lucky that I live in a special area, as 100% of my charging is on free public L2 charging, and with very little competition for open spots - especially the past 12 months.

No run-ins with EV/PHEV conflicts as of yet.
 
I use a lot of L2 around. Besides a couple of locations, they are rarely full.

MrFixit said:
But, correct me if I'm wrong... With the exception of 'free' ones (which are likely rare, depending on where you live), ANY public charging station will be substantially higher cost than your home electric rate. It is also likely to be substantially higher cost than running on gas (either in HV or HV Charge). So, I think the lower cost than gas argument is just not true. Maybe you have a philosophical 'green' reason for charging at a public station, but beyond that, it seems rather pointless to me (not to mention the risk of contracting some kind of communicable disease by inserting strange objects into your car's receptacle) !
Click to expand...

There are quite a lot of free options, whether from the Volta network or local establishments or government offerings. Blink has awful rates, similar to Electrify America. I'm not sure who's paying for Blink, but Electrify America seems like it's made for cross-country BEV travel, and not PHEVs. I worked out that gas would have to be $5/gal for Blink to be worthwhile. Otherwise, about half of the charging options around are free or cheaper than gas.
 
MrFixit said:
I have never used a public charging station, and likely never will.
If I go on a long road trip, I will just operate in HV mode (with a substantial SOC as a large buffer).

But, correct me if I'm wrong... With the exception of 'free' ones (which are likely rare, depending on where you live), ANY public charging station will be substantially higher cost than your home electric rate. It is also likely to be substantially higher cost than running on gas (either in HV or HV Charge). So, I think the lower cost than gas argument is just not true. Maybe you have a philosophical 'green' reason for charging at a public station, but beyond that, it seems rather pointless to me (not to mention the risk of contracting some kind of communicable disease by inserting strange objects into your car's receptacle) !
Click to expand...

It varies greatly, some are surprisingly cheap and some surprisingly expensive. I've used parking garage chargers where there was no additional cost beyond the parking fee, free chargers at hotels we were staying at or other similar places, and free Volta chargers a couple times. For paid charging, I occasionally used the ones at work that charge the same $.10/kWh that I pay at home overnight (but haven't been to the office in a year). In Klamath Falls OR, of all places, our hotel's charger wasn't yet working, and I happened to check plugshare just to see if there was any place else nearby since I had a few hours to kill while my daughter took the SAT (long road trip for that). There was a public lot with paid charging, and I was about to assume it was a ripoff -- but it was $.36/hour, so it worked out to $.06/kWh.

But you're right, a lot of paid charging costs closer to $.30/kWh or more, which is more expensive than using gas. Of course, the beauty of a PHEV is not having to obsess over any of this if you don't want to on vacation!
 
yes, you can charge it from home. yes, running on gas is cheaper than charging at one of those pay-for-charge stations. PHEV owners don't have to charge at any public places. but that's not what OP's point is. If a PHEV does plug in, does that mean he/she has to take any crap from a BEV owner who is desperate to charge? I don't think so.
 
I rarely use public chargers, they are rare and usually not convenient. If there is a place that only had one plug, I would probably not use it so that BEVs could. I think a good idea for a PHEV owner is to park so that if a BEV came and needed to use it, they could unplug me and use it. If you regularly use public chargers, I would make a sign and put it in the windshield saying that it is OK for someone to unplug you if they NEED it.

I think the only rude thing you can do with a PHEV is leave your car in a charging spot after it has fully charged. The few times that I have used a public charger where I would be in the establishment for a while, I have set a timer on my phone to move it.
 
I've had 2 encounters like this over the past 2 years..

I just tell them to **** off. It's not my fault they didn't plan well or buy a car with a stupid range.. I told a Leaf driver to get a car that has more than 60 miles in range and that if they had a Tesla, they could actually act privileged since they'll have the private supercharger stations lol..

I can't stand BEV owners who think they have first rights to public chargers.. it's called public for a reason
 
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Mark W said:
I think the only rude thing you can do with a PHEV is leave your car in a charging spot after it has fully charged.
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I’d say that it is equally rude for a BEV owner to do the same.

Last week on Wednesday and Thursday, I reported to a work location that has, no cost to me, chargers. There are about a dozen available to employees, they are not available to the public. On Thursday there was a spot open, but the available cable did not work. Apparently, 2 of the 12 don’t work. One spot over was an e-tron. I looked at the display on the side of the pedestal for the e-tron and saw that the charge had completed. So, I unplugged it and plugged mine in.

A few hours later I went to move the car and swap out with a coworker who had parked his Tesla in the on deck circle. At the end of the day, some 11 hours later, the e-tron was still parked in the same spot.
 
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