[timthorn]

> Most apps/chargers only link your bank account

That's just not true of the UK market. Most fast chargers accept credit cards using a contactless reader - indeed, by law, they will soon all have to. Of the main charging networks app based payments:

Shell - charges to your credit card, BP Pulse - credit account topped by by credit card, PodPoint - credit account topped up by credit card, VendElectric - credit account topped up by credit card, Fuuse/evpoint - charges to your credit card, Mer - charges to your credit card, ChargePoint - credit account topped up by credit card

[idop]

You probably know better than me, but in those 6 weeks I drove in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and I charged a lot, in many different stations. Many did not accept a credit card:

In Scotland, many chargers only accepted some specialty charging card that foreigners can't buy.

Many stations claimed they do accept credit cards, but when I got there, card payments were conveniently "disabled at this time".

Apps that did take credit card _all_ refused to work with non-British billing addresses. The only app I got to work was ChargePoint, and I only succeeded in that after many trails and errors, looking for ways to trick it into thinking I was British and getting it to successfully charge my card (which eventually I did). And they do not charge your card per session, they randomly bill your card based on usage predictions. They still haven't returned me the 75 pounds they stole from me on the last day of my rental, because they figured I was surely going to need them soon.

And again, no receipts anywhere.

All in all, it was an awful experience.

EDIT: I only now notice that I wrote _most_ stations only link with your credit card. That's most probably an exaggeration, I suppose that was just the impression I ended with. All in all, I wasted exorbitant amounts of time on that trip purely on charging. Quite a few stations also failed on me, now that I'm ranting. In Northern Ireland, chargers often could not be used because there was no cell reception so I couldn't use the app, and cards were not accepted. One charger abruptly terminated my session mid-charge and made a scary noise and refused to work again. Turns out the charger stopped because _it itself_ lost Internet connection.

[timthorn]

Ah, Scotland is a whole different country... :) Charging networks in the UK evolved from a set of regional schemes commissioned by the Government under the Plugged-In-Places programme. At that time, it couldn't be assumed that drivers had smartphones and contactless payment was still fairly new, so RFID cards were the exclusive route for accessing chargers. Many of these networks then folded into commercial providers in time, such as Source East being taken over by BP Pulse. During the programme you'd pay £10 for the card for the year, then all charging was free.

Charge Place Scotland continued to be run by the Scottish Government.

> non-British billing addresses

I can feel your pain there.

>And they do not charge your card per session, they randomly bill your card based on usage predictions.

ChargePoint has an auto-topup mechanism when your balance drops below a defined amount. The trick is to set the top up amount to be small.

> And again, no receipts anywhere.

In the app go to "Account" then "Monthly Statement". Select the month you care about, then share it using your email client. A PDF will be attached.

> All in all, it was an awful experience.

The big issue we've had has been with broken chargers and, at least in the past, a proliferation of charge networks. There's more roaming coming now, partly mandated by law, but the reliability issue still remains.

And yes, renting an EV in a market you're not familiar with is a pain. I've had that landed on me when visiting the USA, too.

> I only now notice that I wrote _most_ stations only link with your credit card.

Right - that's what I was disagreeing with.