Seven mistakes employers make with EV charging benefits

EV charging is one of the easiest benefits to add and one of the easiest to get slightly wrong. These are the mistakes we see most often.

1. Funding the car but not the fuel

A car scheme without charging support leaves the biggest ongoing cost with the employee. It is the equivalent of giving someone a petrol company car and asking them to fund the pump.

2. Assuming everyone charges at home

Around a third of UK households have no off-street parking. Design a benefit around home charging and you exclude the drivers with the highest costs.

3. Treating free workplace charging as fairness

Free charging at work rewards the people who can get a space, which is usually early arrivers and office-based staff. Field and hybrid workers get nothing.

4. Paying a flat mileage rate and hoping

A single pence-per-mile figure over- and under-pays at the same time. Over-payment creates a tax exposure; under-payment lands hardest on public-charging drivers. Reimburse solves this with per-driver actual cost.

5. Launching without communications

The benefit gets announced once, in a long email, and take-up stalls. A short plan through to the first payslip makes the difference.

6. Rebuilding rather than bolting on

Employers often assume charging means changing lease provider or re-tendering the car scheme. It does not. Charging bolts on to any existing scheme.

7. Not measuring anything after launch

Take-up, average saving, and the home versus public split will tell you within one quarter whether the benefit is working and who it is missing.

Getting it right

The pattern behind all seven is the same: benefits designed for the average driver quietly fail the drivers with the greatest need. Cover home, workplace and public charging, measure the split, and communicate the personal saving.

Next steps

Calculate your savings or book a demo to review your current setup.