New energy vehicle charging piles should also be "charged"

A few days ago, the Tianjin Consumers Association released the "Tianjin New Energy Vehicle Charging Pile Usage Demand and Satisfaction Survey" report. The report shows that the configuration of public charging piles cannot meet the needs of car owners, and the installation of private charging piles is more difficult; there is still a certain gap in charging piles.

Tianjin Consumer Association suggested that the relevant competent departments should clarify the criteria for determining the installation conditions of private charging piles and the responsible subjects, clarify the boundaries of the safety responsibility of property companies, break down property management barriers, further increase the number of public charging piles, rationally plan the layout of piles, and improve coverage.

No fixed parking space The property is not difficult to install with private charging piles

Compared with public charging piles, private charging piles are more convenient to use, and the charging price is billed according to the civil electricity price standard of "combined meter users", which is relatively more favorable. Therefore, being able to charge in their own community has become an urgent need of consumers. However, in this survey, the proportion of private charging piles used by new energy vehicle owners surveyed was only 29%, which was lower than the proportion of public charging piles, which reflected to a certain extent that the current private charging pile construction could not meet the needs of users.

The installation of private charging piles has the problems of "cumbersome procedures" and "difficult approvals", accounting for 32% and 27% respectively.

Among the reasons why private charging piles cannot be installed, the proportion of "selfless family parking spaces" and "community property not allowed" is higher, 51.2% and 29% respectively, which are the core pain points of private charging pile installation.

According to the requirements of the State Grid private charging pile installation application, the owner must provide the property right certificate of the fixed parking space or the proof of the right to use the long-term rental space for more than one year. In this survey, the proportion of respondents with fixed parking spaces is less than 40%, for the old community, the number of parking spaces itself is insufficient, and there are no fixed parking spaces, and "no fixed parking spaces" hardly deprives the possibility of installing private charging piles in the community. The first item in the process of installing a private charging pile is to obtain the registration certificate filled in by the property and stamp it, and then apply to the State Grid for telegraph installation, but the installation resistance encountered by the owner of the car mainly comes from the property, accounting for 54.8%. In the installation process of private charging piles, properties often reject the owner's installation application on the grounds that the installation of charging piles causes garage capacitance and cable load, cable messiness, increases safety hazards, and increases management costs.

In this regard, the Tianjin Consumer Association suggested that through the supervision of industry associations and the setting of relevant management systems, the management and guidance of property companies should be strengthened, and the property companies should be guided to cooperate with the owners to handle the relevant procedures for the installation of charging piles and support the construction of charging piles. Strengthen the upgrading and transformation of old residential areas and communities without fixed parking spaces, rationally plan sites, appropriately expand power capacity, and at the same time solve problems such as overloading of community capacitance loads and limited sites through new technology modes such as smart charging and private charging pile sharing, so that the community has the conditions to install charging piles, increase the number of charging piles, and meet the charging service needs of new energy vehicle owners.

Small number of inconvenient public charging piles low satisfaction

Since the number of private charging piles does not match the number of new energy vehicles, more new energy vehicle owners choose to use public charging piles to charge vehicles. The survey shows that 47.5% of car owners use public charging piles, and 23.6% of car owners use public and private charging piles.

Combined with the use of vehicles, the proportion of owners of operating vehicles using public charging piles is relatively high, 58.3%. Nearly 50% of owners of non-operating vehicles use public charging piles.

The charging period of new energy vehicle owners is mainly the trough period of electricity charges at night, and 70.3% of car owners have a charging frequency of less than 6 times a month to basically meet the needs of daily travel transportation.

The comprehensive satisfaction of consumers with the use of charging piles was 71.8%, of which the comprehensive satisfaction of public charging piles was 71.2%, and the comprehensive satisfaction of private charging piles was 73.2%. The ease of use of charging piles and the satisfaction of charging prices were 71.1% and 70.2%, respectively. Among them, consumers' evaluation of the convenience of public charging piles and satisfaction with charging prices is relatively low, 69.7% and 69.8% respectively.

In the survey, the interviewed car owners said that although they can find the charging piles that can be used nearby through the mobile phone App, there are times when they are occupied by fuel vehicles or damaged by charging piles and cannot be charged. In addition, public charging piles are billed at commercial electricity prices, the unit price of electricity is higher, and according to different venues, service fees, parking fees, etc. are also paid, and the charging cost is higher than that of private charging piles, which directly affects the charging experience of public charging piles.

The inconvenience of charging and replenishing energy is a major pain point for new energy vehicle owners. 53.3% of the respondents believe that the public charging pile configuration can not meet the needs of car owners, and it is necessary to rationally plan the layout, increase charging stations, and increase charging tools.

Among the problems encountered by respondents in using public charging piles, the proportion of "small number of charging piles" was the highest, at 59.8%. In terms of charging pile setting and maintenance, the number and location layout of the existing public charging pile settings cannot fully meet the needs of use, especially around the residential community and some places with dense traffic flow, the number of charging pile settings is insufficient, and the waiting time in line is long.

High price, low efficiency, low service standards to be regulated

The survey shows that in the process of using public charging piles, the problems in charging efficiency and cost payment of charging piles are more prominent. Among the problems encountered by respondents in using public charging piles, "long charging time" accounted for 51.8%, "charging parking spaces occupied" accounted for 46.4%, and "high charging prices" accounted for 40.2%. Charging stations lack management of charging piles, and there are often situations where fuel vehicles or full tram occupants cannot be charged, making it more difficult to charge vehicles. In addition, the maintenance of the charging pile is not in place is also one of the problems, most of the owners interviewed have said that they have encountered "the charging pile is old and damaged, the charge cannot be charged" and "the automatic jump gun is not full".

In terms of charging efficiency. DC charging pile power is large, charging is relatively fast, car owners are more favored by DC charging piles, 73.5% of respondents hope to be able to add more DC fast charging piles. Compared with fuel vehicles, new energy vehicle charging time has limitations, even if the use of high-power DC charging piles, car owners still need to wait, sometimes encounter old equipment, poor maintenance of charging piles, charging time may be extended, it is difficult to meet the needs of emergency charging, the convenience is relatively low.

In terms of charging fee payment. The charging electricity fee of the public charging pile is calculated based on the commercial peak and valley electricity price, except for the valley electricity price, the cost is higher than the ordinary civil electricity price, and the owner of the public charging pile also has to pay additional charging service fees and hourly parking fees, and the overall charging price is higher. Moreover, there are different charging stations in different areas or in the same area, and the amount of electricity paid for the final charging is not the same.

In the survey, some car owners roughly calculated an account, according to the 300 km endurance basically run empty, the average cost of each charge using public charging piles is 50-60 yuan, while the vast majority of respondents hope that the single charging cost is concentrated within 30 yuan (95.5%), of which the proportion of less than 20 yuan is 75.8%, and the actual charging cost is still a certain gap with the owner's expectations. In addition, some car owners also reported that there was a problem of charging piles with multiple charges, including "automatic tripping at the beginning of charging, and deducting fees at the end of the order", "repeated deductions", "automatically jumping guns and power off when there is still a balance in the account, showing insufficient balance" and so on.

In terms of charging pile service function. The App operation platform of different charging pile operating companies is not uniform, the platforms are not interoperable, the information is inconsistent, and users need to download multiple Apps to query the operation separately, which is very troublesome for consumers. In addition, some respondents raised the issue of "inconsistent charging pile ports and mismatch with models".

In this regard, the Tianjin Consumer Association suggested that we speed up the construction of the charging pile standard system, simplify the charging procedure, unify the charging pile standard, set up a general App platform, and adapt the charging pile to all models, so as to facilitate the positioning of the charging pile and information query, etc., and improve the user charging experience. Strengthen industry supervision and management, standardize service standards, and urge charging pile operation and management businesses to clearly indicate information such as charging prices and charging operating procedures to consumers. (Reporter Wan Xiaodong)