Amsterdam, January 23, 2023 – More and more employers are electrifying their fleet. People chose electric cars over fossil fuel cars more often, and by already electrifying as a company now, you show that you’re progressive. The Climate Agreement stated that in 2030, The Netherlands has to decrease their CO2 emission by 49%; in 2050 that has to be 95% already. Clean transport helps to reach these goals. For example, every new car that gets released on the market from 2030, needs to be 100% electric. It’s wise to prepare for this as an employer, and to start with the installation of one or more charging stations.
However, not only employers should consider this. HOA’s (Home Owner Associations), and store- or restaurant owners who are in possession of parking lots, also need to consider getting charging stations installed on their grounds.
Before you start the process of getting charging stations installed, it’s important to think a few things over carefully before you make any decisions. You’ll need to make the choices of installer, which brand charging station you want to get installed, and which administrator you’d like for your charging stations. In this article, we’ll explain which things to take into consideration to be able to make the right choices.
How to choose the right administrator
This is the first step. Most organizations assume the process starts with choosing which charging stations they want, but the administrator of your charging stations is just as, if not more, important. You want to avoid having made the decision on charging stations, only to find out from the administrator that these don’t fit with your situation at all.
Some administrators tie you to one specific charging station brand. Aside from that, it’s not always a possibility to choose your own installer for the installation. With an agnostic and flexible platform, employers can combine different charging stations: for example AC- and DC charging stations, but also different brands. This way, you can manage both the charging stations at your office location, as well as those at the homes of employees. It won’t matter whether employees have a different brand charging station than you have at your office location.
Thanks to this flexibility, you can also switch to a different brand if you want to. Lately, it’s become clear that this can be extremely helpful, for example; take the shortage of chips into account. This way, you’re always free to choose different brands.
A flexible charging station administrator is also interesting if you plan to grow your company, and acquire other locations. Chances are that they already have charging stations installed near that office location. With an agile platform, you can easily connect these to your account for managing charging stations. The same goes for already existing stations at the homes of employees.
What is very important, especially for HOA’s, is for a charging station administrator to have the option for automatic settlement. When you decide on charging stations in a shared parking garage, you want the costs for electric charging to be settled fairly between the people who actually use it. You don’t want people to pay for the charging sessions of their neighbor, or the other way around.
Great support match
The choice for a charging station operator is extremely important, because this is the party you’re in most contact with as a company. When any problems arise, you call the operator’s helpdesk. You want to make sure you’re in good hands, because they’re the first responder when anything goes wrong.
Installing your charging station
After choosing a charging station operator, you’re linked to an installer. The installer will look at your situation, and advise you on which brand, and which type of charging station best fits this situation. The installer also makes sure the connection to the platform with which you can manage your charging stations is made.
E-Flux as a charging station provider
With E-Flux’s eMobility platform, you can easily manage every charging station, and all charge-cards from one online dashboard. Because E-Flux is agnostic as well as flexible, you can easily combine this all from one single platform.
Which benefits do you get with E-Flux?
Automatic settlement and reimbursement
Every charging session is on record, and automatically settles between employee and employer. Declarations for charging at home are automatically reimbursed to the employee by E-Flux on a monthly basis. You also receive a monthly invoice with subscription costs, and a “self-billing” invoice with the reimbursement of charging sessions of visitors who charged their EV at your office location.
For HOA’s, electricity costs are automatically recorded and reimbursed per resident. E-Flux then sends each resident an invoice with their charging costs, which is automatically settled with the HOA.
Able to connect to several brands
With E-Flux you can choose from more than 40 charging station brands. You can combine and manage all these brands from one account. Manage the charging stations at the office location, as well as those at the homes of employees. Employees can have a different brand than the stations installed at the office.
Set charging tariffs
Through E-Flux, it is possible for employers to set a kWh tariff, a starting tariff, or an hourly tariff at office locations for guests and visitors. At the homes of employees, employers can easily set a kWh reimbursement tariff, which can be changed at any given moment.
Remote assistance
With E-Flux, installers get access to a technical dashboard. This way, they can offer remote assistance, as well as resolve any malfunctions, download log files, and make changes in the settings. This saves the employer expenses, because there are no travel expenses to be paid, and everything can be done remotely.
24/7 support
Should you need help, our helpdesk is available to offer you and your employees the support you need on a 24/7 basis.
