The hidden costs of personal EV charging, and the salary sacrifice solution

Electric cars are cheaper to run than petrol ones, on average. That average hides a lot of variation, and a meaningful number of drivers are quietly paying far more to charge than they expect, with no tax relief on any of it. Here is where the hidden cost comes from, and what actually fixes it.

The gap between "average" and "your" charging cost

Most EV cost comparisons assume home charging on a cheap overnight tariff, often a few pence per kWh. That is a real and very good deal, if you can get it. It is just not available to everyone.

Roughly nine million UK households have no off-street parking, which means no home wallbox and no access to those cheap overnight rates. For those drivers, charging happens on the public network, where rapid and ultra-rapid charging commonly costs 45 to 60p per kWh, sometimes several times the cost of a cheap home tariff, and can be more expensive per mile than driving a petrol car.

The costs that do not show up in the headline numbers

• Public charging pricing: rates vary by network, connector speed and even time of day, and are rarely as visible upfront as a fuel pump price
• Multiple apps and cards: without a single app or card covering most networks, drivers either overpay for convenience on unfamiliar networks or spend time hunting for the cheapest option
• No tax relief on any of it: whether a driver spends £200 or £2,000 a year on charging out of their own pocket, none of it currently gets any tax treatment, unlike pension contributions or a salary sacrifice car lease
• Workplace charging inconsistency: some employees have free workplace charging, others have none, and there is often no attempt to equalise that

Put together, two employees doing identical mileage in identical cars can have wildly different annual charging costs, purely based on where they live and what charging is available to them.

Why salary sacrifice is the right fix

Salary sacrifice does not change where someone charges, but it does put charging cost on the same tax footing as other benefits. The employee pays for electricity out of gross salary, saving their combined income tax and National Insurance rate: 28% for basic rate taxpayers, 42% for higher rate, 47% for additional rate.

Because the saving is a percentage of what is actually spent, it does the most for the drivers carrying the biggest hidden cost today, those relying on public charging. A driver spending £800 a year on public charging saves roughly £220 to £375 a year depending on tax band, money that a driver with a driveway and cheap home charging was never losing in the first place.

You can see the effect for a given charging mix using the savings calculator.

How it actually works for the driver

The Charge Scheme covers charging wherever it happens, through one app and one charge card, powered by Plugsurfing, covering 76,000+ public chargers alongside home and workplace charging. There is no need to switch network provider or memorise which app works where.

1. Charge as normal, at home, at work, or on the public network
2. Submit mileage monthly through the employee portal
3. See one consolidated monthly statement
4. The deduction is applied through payroll automatically

Full detail on the mechanics is in how salary sacrifice charging works, and employees can find the driver-facing version on the employees page.

What employers need to know

The scheme bolts on to any existing EV salary sacrifice or company car scheme, with no change needed to the underlying lease. Setup for HR teams is covered on the HR teams page, and there is no cost to the business to run it, since employer National Insurance savings typically offset any admin.

Next steps

If you want to understand what the hidden cost of charging looks like for your workforce, book a demo and we will run the numbers with you.