Oh my gosh?!!
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That sounds most plausible. The Electrify America rollout was a disaster, especially when Tesla and Ionity (Europe) had already shown that well-designed systems could be extremely reliable.
It is apparently a lot better now, but the damage has been done. Maybe if they rolled out a competent network to start hybridization wouldn't seem as attractive as it does now?
If Electrify America had come out of the gate with Ionity level reliability, the US market might look vastly different right now. We're shopping for a secondary car right now, and even with lightly used EQS models in the mid $30k range, we're not even considering them.
It is apparently a lot better now, but the damage has been done. Maybe if they rolled out a competent network to start hybridization wouldn't seem as attractive as it does now?
If Electrify America had come out of the gate with Ionity level reliability, the US market might look vastly different right now. We're shopping for a secondary car right now, and even with lightly used EQS models in the mid $30k range, we're not even considering them.
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I wonder if this is a result of Mercedes shedding their gasoline-powered engine development and engineering group, or at least gutting it in anticipation of electrification. I know VAG and Porsche has reversed course and is committed to developing gasoline, gasoline-hybrid and electric propulsion systems going forward, which to me is a better strategy. The transition to EV isn’t as abrupt as many in the industry believed and it will take time to adopt. Range anxiety and charging infrastructure is still trying to catch up and lags the development of EVs itself imo.
I didn't use the regular app of Electrify America, but I used the BMW app which adds Electrify America (Plug and Charge) feature along with 3 years of free supercharging. I didn't need to even look at the charger. All I had to do is to plug, and the charger immediately recognized the car and started to charge. My credit card is synced with my account and got automatically charged too. The system seems to be working well, at least thanks to BMW Plug and Charge feature. I have no idea how it is with other brands though or even using the Electrify America native app.
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Maybe there is something I am missing? Are we talking about the number of chargers? or they way they function?
I didn't use the regular app of Electrify America, but I used the BMW app which adds Electrify America (Plug and Charge) feature along with 3 years of free supercharging. I didn't need to even look at the charger. All I had to do is to plug, and the charger immediately recognized the car and started to charge. My credit card is synced with my account and got automatically charged too. The system seems to be working well, at least thanks to BMW Plug and Charge feature. I have no idea how it is with other brands though or even using the Electrify America native app.
I didn't use the regular app of Electrify America, but I used the BMW app which adds Electrify America (Plug and Charge) feature along with 3 years of free supercharging. I didn't need to even look at the charger. All I had to do is to plug, and the charger immediately recognized the car and started to charge. My credit card is synced with my account and got automatically charged too. The system seems to be working well, at least thanks to BMW Plug and Charge feature. I have no idea how it is with other brands though or even using the Electrify America native app.
Broken chargers, chargers that wouldn’t initiate, slow speeds (as low as 6 kW sometimes, but often 80 on a 150 kW unit with a car that had a curve to pull 150), app issues, payment issues, random charger failures midway, having to move to different chargers repeatedly, lack of stations to complete certain trips. The list goes on!
It’s all extremely well-documented online. I’ve read it’s gotten a lot better, as your experience shows. However - that was after owning a Tesla and having zero issues whatsoever. We drove everywhere in it, including an 8 hour road trip day one.
They saw this charging experience as “make it or break it” from the beginning. With the instructions on-screen my grandparents could have taken a trip with almost no prior knowledge. In fact we met a 90 year old in Tucson in early 2019 who was so enamored by the ability to take long trips in his EV that he was just taking trips for the hell of it.
My view is heavily colored by those earlier days, but I’m very glad to hear you and others are experiencing seamless charging.
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