How is a private EV charger wired to a flat’s own meter in a communal car park?
A private charger is fed from the flat’s own supply rather than the landlord’s, so the cable starts at the flat’s meter and ends at the parking bay. In most blocks the meters sit together in a meter room or a bank of cupboards. The question is whether there is a route from that position to the bay that a cable can follow. Where the meter room is next to the car park, the cable run is short and the installation is no more involved than fitting a charger on a house driveway. Where it is on another floor or the far side of the building, the cable has to pass through communal areas in containment, with fire stopping wherever it crosses a wall or a floor. That is what makes or breaks the idea.
The charger itself is fitted to the same standards as any other, with RCD and open PEN fault protection on the circuit. It is certified for the managing agent’s records. Whose consent is needed, and what a licence to alter involves, is covered on our can I install an EV charger if I live in a flat page.
To give an example, at Wickliffe Court in Hendon we installed three chargers with six future ready points across nine bays, each one connected to the resident’s own electricity meter. The residents’ committee did not want a shared platform or a subscription. At Hill Court in Highgate we did the same for five chargers and three future points on eight individual circuits, so every resident pays their own supplier for their own charging and nobody else’s.
When is a charger on your own meter better than the block’s communal chargers?
A charger on your own meter is better when you want to charge on your own tariff and nobody else is involved. The electricity goes through your flat’s meter at whatever rate you pay your supplier, including an overnight EV tariff if you have one. There is no platform fee and no margin on the kWh rate, and the charger is yours to take with you or leave in place when you sell. A flat’s supply is single phase, so a private charger is a 7kW unit, which fills a typical battery overnight.
The communal network is better on speed and on cost per charger. A communal supply is usually three phase, so chargers on the block’s network can be 22kW where the supply allows, which a single phase flat supply can never give you. A bay on a managed network also costs less to add than a private run, because the infrastructure is shared. Each private charger needs its own cable from the flat’s meter, its own EV fuse board with surge and RCD protection, and its own load management device. At Wickliffe Court and Hill Court every charger had all three. On a communal network those are provided once for the whole car park. There are pros and cons either way. Where the block has no network and none planned, a private charger on your own meter is often the practical route, unless more residents want chargers, at which point a communal network starts to make more sense.
What does a private EV charger in a flat’s parking bay cost?
Where the charger location is within 10 metres of the flat’s meter, the job is covered by our standard installation cost. With the £500 grant applied, a 7kW smart charger costs from £462 fully installed, supplied, fitted, commissioned and certified. Before the grant that is from £962, so where you qualify the grant covers more than half of it. Beyond 10 metres the cost goes up per metre of cable, and every wall and floor crossed and every fire stop adds to it, so as a budget the standard figure is the starting point and the survey sets the exact price. Each charger carries its own EV fuse board and load management device within that, and the quote separates the charger from the cable run so you can see where the money goes.
The £500 EV chargepoint grant for renters and flat owners can apply to a private charger in your own bay. The resident applies, the freeholder or managing agent provides a short note of consent, and we handle the installer side and deduct the grant from the invoice. We did exactly that for a resident at Tudor Lodge in north London, who had his charger running the day it was fitted. The full service, including case studies, is on our apartment block EV charging page.
