Beware using Porsche charging card in hotel parking

[Yves]

if you have “preferred charging “ you have made an contract with porsche. @Devmac himself has posted this contract which consist of very few sentences.
it is clearly stated that there is no blocking fee at “preferred partners “ which are listed. further hat blocking fees are:
“Price per minute
after 60 min DC
after 240 min AC”
given this facts, it is impossible that porsche can charge a blocking fee from the first minute.

That’s what the contract said, but is not what I and others have experienced … if you do not believe me, whatever …

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[Etmaniac]

The Porsche charging fee for AC is actually not that bad. Pretty competitive so I do not agree they are "ripping off" their customers at all. For this particular charging station Porsche charges 39 cents/kw and BMW 41 cents/kw. So not really ripping off people. Also their DC charging fee is very competitive. As a general rule, always check the charging stations fee's in the app, if you think you will be staying longer than 240 minutes and basically blocking the charger preventing other people from using it (which is bad practices really unless you are at a airport parking) use a different charging card like Shell (charge 55 cents/KW for this charger) or something.

Common sense folks. And don't block chargers, other people might be in need of charging. Charging ethics do exist..

 

[Yves]

The Porsche charging fee for AC is actually not that bad. Pretty competitive so I do not agree they are "ripping off" their customers at all. For this particular charging station Porsche charges 39 cents/kw and BMW 41 cents/kw. So not really ripping off people. Also their DC charging fee is very competitive. As a general rule, always check the charging stations fee's in the app, if you think you will be staying longer than 240 minutes and basically blocking the charger preventing other people from using it (which is bad practices really unless you are at a airport parking) use a different charging card like Shell (charge 55 cents/KW for this charger) or something.

Common sense folks. And don't block chargers, other people might be in need of charging. Charging ethics do exist..

My home charger was broken, so I needed to use one of the many free AC chargers in the village, so I needed to charge and did not BLOCK the charger I needed the charge and there are plenty of free chargers … guess which card I used … BMW as the Porsche is not capable of charging at 22kw and I need to be quite full if I do a commute Antwerp Amsterdam … so go figure.
I think we all agree blocking an AC charger is not OK, but if you need to charge, you need to charge. PS I think a waiting fee is kind of pointless, the times I encounter that someone just unplug and let the car parked at AC
So blocking fee yes, only if you are connected and not charging, with no fee while charging at AC,
DC is another story, I would even go so far that DC chargers should start charging more ones you are over 80% so that there are no people leaving there car to 100% on a DC chargers should charger …

Anyway the result is I use the BMW car, it has even a 49 cent DC tarif on Allego/Electra stations which is quite nice!

 

[FastCHarge]

This is quite interesting as, unless I'm doing the math wrong, the so called "blocking" fee (whether or nut justifiable, it's not my point) seems to apply from the first minute, which is not what I would have expected from the stated terms & conditions.

I would have expected that,(assuming it's not a preferred location) the price would be 0.39€/kWh + 0.20€/min in excess of 240 minutes. It is at least how I would read it naively. But it seems to be more like "if you're hooked up more than 4 hours, we'll make you pay the fee from the first minute". That's quite a difference in interpretation and worth 48€ to try it out ;-)

I'm just curious whether others have decypthered this and could share their experience of what happens after 240 (respectively 60) minutes.

Bottom line is: we all should be aware of the payment terms that Porsche is applying for it's charging service and be mondful of when and where to use their RFID card compared to another one or even paying directly if adequete.

And yeah, it kind of feels wrong that, if you need to do overnight charging, having to pay 8hours x 0.20€/min = 96€ of "blocking" fee for 34€ worth of electricity is off balance... Also, considering the car fills up at 11kW max on AC, the limit of 4 hours is a bit tight. Worth at least trying to provide feedback to Porsche they should really reconsider this position. Never know what hey'll do with this in the long term...

 

[rcomeau]

Right, so the consensus seems to be that paying a blocking fee after completing charging is fair (to most people) and paying a blocking fee while charging is unfair. If Porsche is indeed charging a blocking fee while charging, it seems to go against the wording of the contract. Certainly paying the charging rate and blocking fee simultaneously (or imposing a 2hr charging time limit) makes no sense. The most obvious use case for a hotel charger is to plug in at check in and charge overnight. It is reasonable to expect one to move the car in the morning once charged, but stupid to expect people to get up at 3am to move the car and L2 chargers are not expensive, so the overnight charge with potentially a couple of hours idle
Is perfectly reasonable and adoptable by the EV public. DC chargers are quite expensive so you want a better duty cycle (time charging vs. time blocked) to protect the investment and DC chargers are a poor choice for a hotel since it does not fit the typical use case. Better to spend the same amount as one DC charger for 10+ AC chargers.

 

[nulled]

Happened to me as well in an underground parking overnight. I saw way too later that they had a charge per minute after 240min ...

 

[Petzi]

That’s what the contract said, but is not what I and others have experienced … if you do not believe me, whatever …

of course i believe you. BUT contract is contract. i would recommend to dispute the charge. let us know how porsche explained the charge.

 

[Awaz]

I'm just curious whether others have decypthered this and could share their experience of what happens after 240 (respectively 60) minutes.

I did AC charging for 240 minutes, but went over by 2 minutes. The app showed it would be £0.44p and 20p per minute if I went over.
11.25 KWh @ 44p is £4.95 plus 40p for the 2 minutes going over = £5.35
So, 20p penalty rate starts after the first 240 minutes.

Edit: But Porsche robbed my by 1p

 

[rcomeau]

I did AC charging for 240 minutes, but went over by 2 minutes. The app showed it would be £0.44p and 20p per minute if I went over.
11.25 KWh @ 44p is £4.95 plus 40p for the 2 minutes going over = £5.35
So, 20p penalty rate starts after the first 240 minutes.

Edit: But Porsche robbed my by 1p

That still seems weird. It is perfectly reasonable and legitimate to pull into a hotel at 8pm to check in for the night and plug in for 12 hours to recharge overnight and leave first thing in the morning. In that scenario, it should be perfectly reasonable to pay for the electricity delivered in those 12 hours. At 44p per kW for the electricity, that more than covers the electricity and a reasonable fee for the delivery via the charge station. The purpose of a blocking fee is to prevent one from charging to full and then hogging the plug for hours needlessly after the legitimate charging session. To tack on 20p for what one would consider reasonable and legitimate use of the service (as one would expect to was intended) makes no sense. Maybe at a shopping mall where it is more intended for hybrids to top up while shopping, buy at a hotel where the most common use time is overnight, it is crazy. Maybe this was conceived when it was all hybrids and they have not caught on to the needs of full EVs despite selling 2 of them?

If you were to unplug and start a new session, would that 4 hour clock restart? Imagine heading out to your car at 1am in your PJs to restart a session (or move to the next spot and replug). Really bad planning on their part.

 

[Awaz]

@rcomeau
My clarification of what happens after 240 minutes was very specific to the question raised by @FastCHarge. I wasn't getting into the debate of whether it's fair or not.

What you have mentioned is a different issue as to what Porsche should or should not do, but as for now, they have made it clear what Porsche Charging prices are, which are discounted.

As others have mentioned, if one needs to charge overnight at a hotel etc then use another payment method, but that may not have a discount.

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