Day 2: The Bath Debacle

Rather ambitious perhaps, but my second day of owning EV and I was due at the University of Bath for a conference - 16 miles away from my home; I had also had my usual school run trips to complete, which accounts for between 12 and 18 miles.  After the problems charging at Ikea through Ecotricity the night before, my battery was down to 60 miles.  It's not easy for me to trickle charge at my house over night because I do not have an outside socket.  So, I took the decision to wait and charge at the University of Bath while I attended my conference.  That way, I'd have a full battery for the way home and wouldn't need to charge again until the following day.

The Sat-Nav on EV didn't take me to University of Bath from the postcode given on their website.  It took me nearby, but I did waste a couple of miles attempting to find the campus.  Once on campus I'd read that the EV charging points were in the East car park.  I dutifully followed the signs around the campus to the East car park.  There are signs for disabled spaces and coach parking, but none that direct you to the EV charging points.  At this point I should add I was getting a little stressed for a few reasons:

• The conference started at 10.30 and because I hadn't been able to find the campus I was running late.
• The EV charging bays at the University of Bath are only reserved  for EVs until 10.30, after which point they are open for any vehicle to use. 
• I was down to 25 miles on my battery and knew that I'd need a charge to get home without worrying.

With the clock ticking towards the magic 10.30 cut off, I stopped driving around the (large) East car park, found an attendant and managed to get directions to the EV charging bays.  As I arrived at a space the time was 10.28 and there were no fewer that 6 cars waiting to jump into the unused EV bays.  I pushed in front, parked in the correct space and half let out a breath of relief. 

The EV charging points at the University of Bath are run by PodPoint - currently free to charge as long as you register for a swipe card, although I fear that the free charging days are severely limited.  There were two other EVs charging at the University of Bath that day (5th November 2014).  I was confident that it would all be plain sailing from there on in.  

Late for my conference, I got my lead out of the car, went to the POD Point and tried to swipe my card.  The display screen on the charging point said 'initialising'.  I waited, it still said 'initialising'.  I waited some more.  The clock was ticking, I had already missed registration for my conference and the Keynote was about to start. I checked the next POD Point along: 'initialising'.  Bugger, I could feel the tension rising again. I checked the POD Point that was charging the other two vehicles: 'charging has been temporarily suspended'.  So, for the second time in two days and in as many attempts at a public charge, the points were out of order and I was unable to charge my EV.  

By this time I decided to cut my losses and attempt to charge my car at Bath Spa University (BSU), which is a few miles away.  I am a member of staff here and although I haven't seen anyone charging their car, I knew where the charger was, that it was a POD Point charger and that I had until 11am before the spaces were, once again, opened up to non-EVs.  

I made it to BSU just in time for the 11am cut off.  I swiped my card, plugged EV in and waited. EV started to calculate time remaining - a promising sign.  I waited to hear the charge start and to see a charge time on EV's screen.  Nothing.  Went back to the charge point screen, at this point I noticed that the LEDs running down the side of the charging unit had changed from blue to red. My heart sank. The screen on the unit had come up with an error message asking me to call POD Point.  My battery was now down to 20 miles. 

The man on the phone at POD Point was helpful, he called me back so that I didn't have to pay the 0845 charges from my phone.  He tried to access the point remotely but could find no errors with the point.  Eventually it was decided that he'd need to contact the maintenance team at BSU and ask them to reboot the point in an attempt to help me.  He promised me a call back.  After about 10 minutes I had a call from site the maintenance manager at BSU, he and a member of his team came down to the charging point and attempted to reboot the machine, to no avail.  The maintenance manager was lovely and did everything he could to try and get the charging point working.  But, after half an hour, it was decided that while they tried to converse with POD Point, that I should plug my car in at their Security Lodge and trickle-charge to give me enough battery power to get home.  He promised to keep me up-to-date with the charging point and when it was repaired.

Not a good start to my EV public charging: 3 units tried, 3 units unable to charge the car.

I knew that I'd need my car fully charged for the next day so I called Ecotricity to ask if there was an ongoing problem with the Ikea charging point to save me attempting to trickle-charge at home overnight.  Ecotricity promised me that it was just unfortunate that I'd tried to charge at that time: they'd had a freak hour of downtime that had knocked out all of their units and their phones.  They reassured me that if I tried again, the unit would be up and running.

I got to Ikea, now wise to both the location and the manoeuvres needed to get into space, swiped my Ecotricity card, plugged in, and... success!!! Finally, after a day of running around, a missed conference, and the 4th attempt at public charging, EV was hooked up and charging away happily.  Thank you Ikea and thank you Ecotricity.

Still, the odds don't look promising 4 attempts at a public charge, 1 successful.

 Session in progress, a happy sign!

EV drinking up the juice at Ikea Bristol