Charging at home

In the UK, regulations covering new private charge points of less than 50kW sold in Great Britain for use in a domestic or workplace environment were introduced in 2022. These are called The Electric Vehicles (Smart Charge Points) Regulations 2021 (the “Smart Charging Regulations”).

The Smart Charging Regulations require in scope charge points to have smart functionality, allowing the charging of an electric vehicle when there is less demand on the grid, or when more renewable electricity is available. They also require that charge points meet certain device-level requirements, enabling a minimum level of access, security and information for consumers.

New features have been introduced on our private EV charge points which are designed enable conformity with the Smart Charging Regulations.

Default charging periods are determined to avoid peak hours (when demand on the grid is high), as follows:

8am – 11am Monday to Friday
4pm – 10pm Monday to Friday

If you have an existing charger, which was purchased after 30th June 2022, default charging schedules will be added as part of regular, over-the-air updates.

There is still the option for you to set your own schedule parameters or edit the default charging schedule to suit your charging needs. This means that, although the default settings will be outside of the above hours, you as the owner could override this and select charging times based on your activities, schedule.

A randomised delay has been introduced to ensure that chargers don’t all start to charge at the same time. Many people, for example, will schedule charges after work, or to match their electricity tariff. Placing an automatic delay at the start of each charge session therefore limits demand on the grid from increasing too quickly. The delay can currently be up to 10 minutes but will vary each time. While the randomised delay function cannot be turned off permanently, each delay before the charge session may manually be overridden.

The bp pulse web portal is designed to indicate that a randomised delay period is being applied at the start time of the charge session. You’ll also be notified by the Status Indicator, which will emit Blue (Idle) pulsing LEDs that ‘counts down’ (where each LED represents the nearest minute) to the start of the charge, at which point the Status Indicator will change to pulsing Green (Charging).

The bp pulse home smart indicates an active randomised delay at the start of a scheduled charge session with the Status Indicator. Up to 10 pulsing LEDs are used to indicate the number of minutes of delay are added. 1 LED = approximately 1 minute of delay. The Pulsing Blue LEDs count down until the delay is complete, then the scheduled charge session will commence.

Yes, the randomised delay will not prevent you from unplugging your car as usual.

Yes, the randomised delay applied at the start of the charge session is repeated at the end of the charge session, before stopping. Therefore, the desired overall duration of the charge session remains unchanged, other than shifting by the random delay being applied.

No. The randomised delay simply shifts charge sessions to prevent huge peaks in demand on the grid (which would otherwise occur with multiple charge points being scheduled to charge at the same time, such as the UK Government defined default off peak charging periods). The battery management onboard your vehicle should prevent overcharging. Once your vehicle battery reaches fully charged state during a charge session, the charge session should stop automatically.

No. The randomised delay is only applicable to private chargers. When you plug into an on-the-go public charger your charging session will begin as normal.

No. The delay is always random and can vary from a few seconds up to the maximum duration of 10 minutes.

Override of the randomised delay can be made via the web portal, or locally, by using the function button and the bottom of the charger. Press and hold the function button for 3 seconds to cancel the current randomised delay and start the charge session immediately.

During the randomised delay period, tap the 'Charge now" button in the web portal to override the randomised delay. It is not possible to disable the randomised delay function as this is not permitted by government regulations.

Correct, the Smart Charging Regulations do not permit disabling randomised delay. However, each randomised delay can be overridden manually, once the randomised delay is underway.

You still have full flexibility on when you would like to charge and can charge within peak hours.

You can adjust the charge schedule anytime via the web portal - (https://portal.bppulse.co.uk/login) to align with your tariff.

No. If you have a schedule set, the preset default charging schedule will not overwrite the existing schedule. Adoption of the preset default charging schedule can be made at any time from within the web portal - https://portal.bppulse.co.uk/login

This might be because a randomised delay is underway. Up to 10 pulsing Blue LEDs indicate the remaining delay is being applied. Either wait for the delay to complete for the scheduled charge session to start or override the randomised delay to start the scheduled charge session immediately.

This is likely because a randomised delay was placed before the scheduled charge session was allowed to start. The randomised delay used at the start of the scheduled charge session is also applied to the stop time. The overall duration of the charge remains unchanged.

If a scheduled charge session is pending, a randomised delay is always automatically applied. If the cable is unplugged before the scheduled charge session has begun (during the randomised delay period), a randomised delay value is determined each time the scheduled charge is due to start.

Up to 10 pulsing blue LEDs are used via the Status Indicator to visually represent the pending/remaining randomised delay applied.

This will likely be the resulting effect of the randomised delay being applied to the start and stop times that are set in the schedule.

You can do this anytime via the web portal - https://portal.bppulse.co.uk/login. Locate the schedule, edit and save the changes you wish to make.

No problem, just ensure there are no active scheduled charge sessions and the charger will simply charge your vehicle from the moment you plug in. Disconnecting the vehicle or stopping the charge via the vehicle will stop the charge. To ensure only authorised users use your charger we recommend you disable the charger when not in use via the web portal - https://portal.bppulse.co.uk/login

There are additional changes coming later in 2023 which specifically concern security enhancements and cyber security requirements. The nature of a number of these changes means that not all are able to be retrospectively applied to existing chargers.

All you need to do is make sure that your charger is connected to power and to your home Wi-Fi network, ensure that this connection remains throughout the whole duration of the update and the charger will automatically do the rest. There’s some help here on how to make sure your charger stays connected to power and Wi-Fi.

Ensure your charger is connected to your home Wi-Fi network.

Your charger will automatically be updated, but you do not have to use the preset default schedule. If you already use scheduling, for example, to take advantage of off-peak electricity tariffs, this is fine. Your schedule will remain as you programmed. The only change you will see will be the deployment of the randomised delay at the schedule’s start and stop time.