Electricians Blog

What Are The Benefits Of Having A Home Car Charger?

Every evening, as we hit the sack, many of us plug our smartphones in to charge overnight. We wake up in the morning with a full battery, ready to start the day. However, this routine is often not extended to our electric vehicles. But just think about how easy it would be to charge your car every evening at home and never have to worry about finding a public charging point again.

This is by far the most obvious benefit of installing a car charger at home, but there are many more things to think about. Once you understand these, it won’t be difficult to see how this type of equipment will be hugely advantageous to you.

Faster Charging

Waiting for anything to charge can be a tedious task, but when it comes to your vehicle, the last thing you want is to be waiting around for the best part of a day before you can get on the road. Of course, you could charge overnight or when you know you are going to be at home for a significant period of time, but even so, faster is always better.

Using a public charging station can take a very long time. There are rapid charging points but these can cost significantly more to use. There is the option to charge the car using mains power, however, this method can take six hours, at minimum.

Installing a car charger at home can mean that your car’s battery could be filled within as little as an hour, depending on the charger you have. However, at a maximum, you would expect to wait no longer than seven hours.

Inexpensive To Install

There is a lot of misunderstanding surrounding electric car charging with many homeowners fearing that installing this type of equipment is going to break the bank. However, what a lot of people don’t realise is that this can be done for a lot less than you might think.

First of all, you must consider that there is a UK government scheme that helps homeowners install a car charger. The government will pay 75% of your installation fees up to a maximum of £500, so it’s certainly worth looking into.

Furthermore, running the charger might not be as damaging to your energy bills as you may have thought. Of course, you first need to consider what you will save in fees for using public chargers. While those at certain places are free for customers, many public charge points incur a fee.

While every car and charger will vary to a degree, on average, you can expect to pay as little as £3 for a single charge. This is comparatively lower than the average cost for a rapid charge at a public station which may cost upwards of £7.

Increase The Value Of Your Home

We are all looking for ways to boost the value of our property and installing a charging point could be a huge selling point. In 2030, the sale of all petrol and diesel vehicles will be banned in the UK so homes with a charging point are going to be in very high demand.

However, even if you wish to take your charger with you when you move, uninstalling and relocating these pieces of equipment is not a huge challenge.

Potentially Better For Battery Life

Let’s compare your car battery to your smartphone once again. When you charge your battery fully at every charge, its health is drastically better than a battery that is charged in dribs and drabs over the course of the day; most people are familiar with this concept.

It isn’t too much of a stretch of the imagination, then, to think that your car’s battery behaves in a similar manner. Having a charger at home means that you will be able to do a full charge every time rather than hooking up to a public charger for a couple of hours while you go shopping or to the cinema. Over time, this could mean that your battery life is significantly improved.

Find out what is involved with fitting a home charger in our next article.