User profiles for the corporate charging infrastructure
Electromobility in the workplace involves managing a number of different processes, in particular the billing of the energy costs associated with charging an electric vehicle. In general, there are three user profiles for charging infrastructure in companies:
- employees with company or service vehicles
- employees with their private vehicles
- visitors.
Depending on the profile, the company will decide whether or not to cover the costs of charging electric vehicles.
What is a management or back-end system?
To manage these different user profiles and the different application rates, there are service providers specialising in electromobility services who can manage your charging infrastructure and its users with what is known as a management or back-end system.
This management system involves integrating the infrastructure into a web platform, so that the charging stations and their users can be monitored and managed remotely. This is why it is essential to have intelligent charging stations that can communicate data such as the charging station number, the transaction, the user, and the start and end of the charging session to the back-end via the OCPP (Open Charge Point Protocol) communication protocol.
What are the different types of pricing?
There are different charging models.
- Simple pricing: the charging session rate is expressed in euros per kilowatt-hour (€/kWh), euros per minute (€/min) or a combination of the two. The aim is to apply the same rate 24/7.
- Complex tariffs: complex tariffs allow you to apply different tariffs depending on the day or time of day, but also to apply additional tariffs from 30 or 60 minutes of charging. For example, a charge would be €0.50/kWh and after 30 minutes of charging, the charge would be €0.50/kWh + €0.40/min (hypothetical prices). This is particularly useful when using fast chargers to prevent users staying on the charger for longer than necessary and blocking other users in the queue.
The VAT to be applied for an electric vehicle charging service is 8%.
Note that if your charging stations are accessible to the public, you must apply the European AFIR regulation (Alternative Fuels Infrastructure Regulation) so that visitors can charge and pay as they go via a payment instrument widely used in the European Union (QR code, bank card reader), as well as clearly and easily displaying the tariff applied.
Managing the invoicing of charging sessions
In order to be able to re-invoice the energy costs associated with charging, the service provider can either provide charging session data per user, or take care of re-invoicing users and reimbursing the company that provides the charging infrastructure. In other words, billing is either internalised within the company, thanks to the creation of load session reports generated by a billing management system, or outsourced and the service provider takes care of everything. In both cases, the charging infrastructure needs to be integrated into a management system supplied by a service provider.
Managing charge reimbursements at home
If your company decides to cover the electricity costs incurred at home for charging a company car, some service providers offer to integrate the intelligent charging station installed at the employee's home into the company's management system and reimburse the user directly at a rate agreed between the employer and the employee. In return, the service provider invoices the company that provided the charging station.