I have a GE gen 2 5Kw inverter, 2 x 9.5 batteries and 4.8Kw panels currently on OE octopus flux and am in the process of getting an EV. I have looked through the OE website and it says the do support the GE EV charger for their IOG tariff. So my question is, what if any would be the benefit of getting a GE EV charger instead of Ohm, Zappi etc?
Ortwin I don't have a GE charger (or EV for that matter!) but the one advantage to me would be that everything is in the same eco system and thus all devices should talk to each other. However I would search this forum for other GE charger users who will have real world experiances
Please double check the GE EV charger being compatible with IOG assumption, I am pretty sure you are wrong
Ortwin I have looked through the OE website and it says the do support the GE EV charger for their IOG tariff.
I think when they ask if you are eligible, you tell them both car and chargepoint, and they say yes if they support either. Is it possible that it's your car that they support ?
Octopus didn’t use to formally integrate with the GivEnergy EV charger but maybe that has changed. It’s on their list on the Will It Work page but that seems to focus on the EV being compatible. I would check that your EV is supported by Octopus especially if you are thinking of switching to their Intelligent Octopus Go tariff.
I don’t have experience of other chargers but the GivEnergy charger works well for me with IOG and a VW car. It can be seen in the app and portal. I can charge from excess solar or grid. I use the grid at 7p for EV and house battery overnight and export solar at at 15p. I don’t use the Octopus smart charging which can give you extra slots at cheap rate and instead use the schedule I set with the GivEnergy app to charge only between 23:30 and 05:30.
There are other posts in this forum that you might want to look at because other folk have had issues eg not being able to stop house battery from discharging into car but that could be down to install / config problems.
I forgot to mention that my GivEnergy EV charger was sensitive to fluctuations in grid voltage. I got a GivEnergy voltage optimiser installed to fix this with added benefit that it applies to the house load also. Could also be fixed by your local DNO potentially.
The charger is a smart looking device if you are having it fixed to the outside of your house. It comes with a tethered 5m cable. I had my installer fit a much longer one to cater for the best location on the house and how I park my car on the drive and being able to reach the EV’s socket on either off or near side for visiting EVs.
I had another look at the OE compatibility and yes it says IOG will work with the car but does not mention if it is or isn't compatible with the GE EV charger. If I put in the Zappi or Ohme it still does not say about their compatibility, which I know do work.
If I ask it about my old leaf with GE EV charger, it says that's not supported. So it would be your car that's getting the tick.
I have a friend with a leaf and OE initially said it was not supported but they recently had an update to say OE IOG now supported the leaf.
Ortwin I had another look at the OE compatibility and yes it says IOG will work with the car but does not mention if it is or isn't compatible with the GE EV charger. If I put in the Zappi or Ohme it still does not say about their compatibility, which I know do work.
The obvious experiment to do is to select a different car, and see if it instead confirms that the chargepoint is compatible. Eg if I ask about Leaf + Zappi, it confirms that "Great news: Your Zappi smart EV (7.0kW) charger should work with Intelligent Octopus Go". But for Leaf + GivEnergy, "Unfortunately we can't support your car or charger just yet,"
Using car APIs with IOG can be flaky as far as I can see. The exception is Tesla- they just work. The rest are at the mercy of the car maker restricting or limiting access to the API or removing it altogether (looking at you, Jaguar).
The GE charger is pending IOG integration AFAIK and has been for some time (happy to be corrected on this). Search this forum for user's experience on this piece of kit and make your own mind up. Personally, I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole.
I recently changed my charger from an Andersen to an Ohme when I got rid of my Tesla. The Ohme works very well. It cost me about £430 on eBay and another £180 to swap the Andersen out for it.
[unknown] AFAIK and has been for some time (happy to be corrected on this).
Years....
Zakalwe I was using the Tesla with a Hypervolt 2 and it was always a bit iffy. Then the charger broke under warranty and got replaced with the Hypervolt 3 which is compatible and it is much more reliable and we get a lot more extra cheap slots. CT clamp fitted so the GE kit doesn’t know the car exists and just let Octopus get on with it.
I'm on my phone but from a quick scroll the Giv charger doesn't appear at all on the Octopus Charger API list? (Which defines device support or not)
My Tesla was pretty damn solid with only a few glitches in four years of ownership and about 3 years of Intelligent Octopus use. They have an excellent API. Other car makes seem in the dark ages, in comparison.
I wouldn't trust GE to integrate IO....they are not to be trusted with product releases.
Ortwin Double, double check, but I don't think the GE charger is approved for the IOG tariff - yet.
The GE charger was not available when I had my solar, batteries & charger installed so I opted for a Zappi & had to wait for 6 months before our Kona EV & Zappi were approved for IOG in Jan 2024. Been on IOG ever since. Having two apps / control systems is a bit of a pain but I live with it.
[unknown] Hi Simon, I'm looking at the Hypervolt for my set up as we're just switching to an electric car (The old ICE has finally given up the ghost). I'm pleased to hear it works well for you with your GivEnergy system.
However, I'm a little confused about positioning the CT clamp and want to make sure we get this right at the installation phase.
If you say that the GE kit doesn't know it exists, does that mean that you can never charge the car with solar or battery power?
I'm thinking we will switch to IOG tariff and take advantage of 7.5p overnight rates to charge the car, but on occasion we might need to charge outside this time, and would like the option to do that from solar or battery rather than grid.
SimonClarke Hi Simon, I'm looking at the Hypervolt for my set up as we're just switching to an electric car (The old ICE has finally given up the ghost). I'm pleased to hear it works well for you with your GivEnergy system.
However, I'm a little confused about positioning the CT clamp and want to make sure we get this right at the installation phase.
If you say that the GE kit doesn't know it exists, does that mean that you can never charge the car with solar or battery power?
I'm thinking we will switch to IOG tariff and take advantage of 7.5p overnight rates to charge the car, but on occasion we might need to charge outside this time, and would like the option to do that from solar or battery rather than grid.
[unknown] We never charge from the battery- 9.5kw wouldn’t go far! Also never from solar because might as well get paid 15p for it rather than put it in the car when I can do that at 7p. If we wanted to we can charge any time at the day rate of 28+p so never been a problem.
Ange We never charge from the battery- 9.5kw wouldn’t go far! Also never from solar because might as well get paid 15p for it rather than put it in the car when I can do that at 7p. If we wanted to we can charge any time at the day rate of 28+p so never been a problem.
Ange However, I'm a little confused about positioning the CT clamp and want to make sure we get this right at the installation phase.
If you say that the GE kit doesn't know it exists, does that mean that you can never charge the car with solar or battery power?
What you need is for the car charger to be wired first to your incoming supply, and then the CT clamp for your inverters and your inverters to be wired next. If the positioning of the inverter CT clamp is "after" the car charger then the inverter can't "see" the electricity going into the car charger and crucially it doesn't try to discharge the battery into the car when the car is charging.
This shouldn't stop you from being able to charge from solar that would otherwise be exported (or just stop the battery charging if you want to charge off all solar generated). If you wanted to charge the car from the givenergy battery then you'd need to manually discharge the givenergy battery when you're charging the car
Ange
With the GivEnergy EV charger you can choose grid or solar. However as SimonClarke says, you’re better off charging from grid overnight at 7p (car and house battery) and exporting solar at 15p with IOG and export tariffs.
Whilst it’s a nice ‘green’ feeling to charge from solar it will also be slower than grid.