How to Activate your Complimentary ChargePoint Card (P.S. it has a limited life span)

I'm still waiting to actually see a charger, of any type, anywhere. I've never seen one except when I went looking for one close to my house (it's somewhere I've never visited for any other reason). I'm going out tomorrow (guess why) so I checked - the nearest ChargePoint charger is 4 miles away from where I'll be. I'm going on vacation in a little while so I checked around where we'll be - no stations anywhere I ever plan to go (company campuses, college campuses, stores I've never heard of, etc., but nowhere I'll be). There aren't any at any grocery stores, restaurants, or any other type of store or establishment I've ever been to in my life. The only ChargePoint that's even close to somewhere I go is about half a mile from that place, and it's free and doesn't require a card.

Pretty sad state of affairs, actually. I haven't pulled my card out of its envelope and even looked at it. Might not even be in there for all I know.

 

Mine is allegedly coming in on the 23rd plus or minus a day or two!

For me, the "final solution" (haha) for charging outside of home will be the City of Austin's $55/year charge-anywhere-in-town program, partnering with ChargePoint. Nevertheless, this card will "tide me over" while Austin (TX) does all the paperwork, etc.

They also have a program to subsidize half the cost of the Clipper Creek LCS-30P EVSE we got installed in Februaryish.


iPhone ? Pro

 

I've been in 90-100 degrees here in Anaheim, with the Prime parked in full sun for a couple hours, I've added medium tint, and Softex was wonderful. Believe me, I hate heat!! My seat was warm, so no problem. . The remote climate on Entune for my Advanced works very well; no line of sight required. When 3 year subscription runs out, I won't renew; I'm not THAT spoiled!

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Ah, good to hear that Softex doesn't tend to get blisteringly hot like traditional vinyl! Luckily, in the little-over-a-week we've had ours, it's been rainy or overcast most of the time, and I've mostly been able to park in garages, so I haven't had to test how hot it gets. Yet!


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Mr. Jay, that's been my experience here in Anaheim: no accessible, usable ChargePoint stations when you're out shopping or eating. My ChargePoint subscription ran out today, and I still had more than $98 left; ridiculous!! Maybe if they gave you a year it might prove useful?! BTW I did just a week ago discover that all the Walgreens in this area have single ChargePoint chargers, which half the time were already occupied, and I never shop at Walgreens. The 1 time I charged at a Walgreens, I did buy some minor cleaning supplies to kill time.
BTW, the fee here was $0.22/KW. I had in the past with my 2012 PIP, seen $0.66/KW.

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I found some ChargePoint stations at parks. I went yesterday and started an ad-hock charging session by calling them (I still haven't taken my card out of the envelope). It's incredibly boring to sit and watch your car charge. I could only stand it for about 40 minutes. But there is one at a park I'm going to be at today for about 2 hours so I guess that will be my first real charge using the ChargePoint network. It's all free so I still don't think I'll end up using a penny of the $100 on my card, and I still haven't activated it.

 

Enjoy the park. Ours have lots of trails. We hang out for a picnic. One we kayak at. Another has free high-speed Wi-Fi.

 

There's not a single thing to do at this park other than watch my car charge. My family is still at home.

On the plus side, I was able to register my card without having it just using the ChargePoint application and my VIN, and the NFC worked to activate the charger, so no calling in for an ad-hock session.

 

So, that charge worked fine and I was full when I left. The park was rather full and people in regular cars had no seeming issue with parking in the 5 of the available 6 charging places I wasn't occupying.

The ChargePoint app has NFC which works great for starting a charge. Too bad there aren't any chargers at any of my regular destinations. I suspect I won't use the network again for the rest of the year at least.

 

There's probably not much way around the fact that availability of chargers is heavily dependent upon your local community, and ChargePoint/EVGo, investment in charging equipment. In the case of Austin (TX), availability is pretty good, thankfully. Maybe not exceptional, but pretty good.

However, you are part of your community. I just left a comment card at the grocery store we usually go to, called Central Market, suggesting they prod ChargePoint into adding a second charger on their site. I pointed out that the Whole Foods not far from home has a half-dozen or so chargers. With a little luck, that will lead to them installing an additional charger.

We might be able to work with local owners' groups for Nissan Leaf and other EVs.


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I'm not sure there's much use in chargers at grocery stores. My typical grocery store visit is about 10 minutes and my typical Costco visit is about 20 minutes. Can't get much charge in that time. Restaurants are longer but visited more rarely. Really, I find charging at home and at work to be sufficient for nearly all my needs.

 

Dup.

 

This was my initial L2 EVSE installation at home:


About four months later, I "loaned" my L2, JuiceBox 40 Pro to Propst at 717 Pratt Ave, HSV where it does a lot more good:


In this case, donating $500 of EVSE means I can charge up when shopping at: Propst Drugs; Star Market (same owner); dry cleaners, and; 1892 a restaurant bar. Typically $0.25-.50 of electricity makes shopping in 5-Points a fair deal for everyone. They get my business and I get enough to cover the drive.

Bob Wilson

 

There are two kinds of grocery-store visits, as I see it: There are the "dang, I'm out of eggs to make pancakes" visits, and there are weekly stock-up-on-everything visits.

The latter, for us at least, takes long enough to recharge the ~15 miles of distance to get there. For the former, "grab something and go" sort of visit, we generally go to a closer grocery store, so we don't burn down the battery much anyway. For the weekly visits, the difference in quality and variety is enough to be worthwhile going the greater distance.

In short, situations and needs vary, not surprisingly.

Perhaps the main thing that hurts their chances of adding a second charge is their somewhat-, but not extremely-, limited parking.


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Propst took my recommendation and put the 50A circuit in the alley, the least popular place to park. It is furtherest from the front door and sometimes blocked by delivery trucks ... that soon move out. The goal is to add customers who choose to park in the least popular place and shop locally.

Bob Wilson

 

I am surrounded by chargers on the left coast. Most of them are in use when I need them, or they are just inconvenient enough to not bother with. My card will expire next month with over $95 on it, and I share it with a coworker that has an EV. I charge at home, and focus on getting the most out of that.

 

My card just expired a couple days ago. I had about $98 left of credit! Out here in Southern California there are millions of mini malls, where you can shop, you can eat, get your dry cleaning etc etc. Many of these malls have Costco's, or Walmarts, or other chain stores. Currently in Anaheim probably 95% of these don't have a charge station. That's my problem!!

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I'd have to see the setting, especially at night , but admittedly I'd probably be OK with that.


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My Toyota-supplied charging time will probably expire well before I use it up, but for a more-positive reason: I promptly signed up for the City of Austin (TX) charge-all-you-want-for-$50-a-year program.

I did, however, burn it down to $75ish before that program kicked in.

I'm very lucky that Austin is a pretty EV-friendly place, and especially that there are 5-6 chargers at my work place. Then again, if that weren't the case, I probably would have just bought a regular Prius...


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If only Sirius would take a lesson from ChargePoint.

Bob Wilson