Ohme & Installation

Yes! Head over to our Compare Chargers tool for snapshot view and see the best features for our range of electric car charging points.

Many customers will not need any upgrades to their electricity supply before having an EV charger installed.

All installers are however required to notify the local Distribution Network Operator (DNO) of any EV charger installations, who will advise you and us if an upgrade to your property’s main fuse is necessary.

This depends on your property’s “maximum demand” estimate, (which is submitted by our in-house technicians to your DNO as part of our process), the size of the main fuse or if your property is on a looped supply (connected to your neighbour).

Any potential works will be handled by your DNO and they will contact you directly if this is the case.

Smart Home Charge is a nationwide installer, covering England, Scotland and Wales.

We have experienced engineers covering all major cities and regions, but there might be the odd nook or cranny we can't get to quickly.

Find out if we install EV chargers in your area with our location checker.

Yes.

Our engineers will complete the initial setup and pairing of the charger app via WiFi or 3G (depending on the product) with the charge point itself as this is considered as part of the installation.

All Ohme EV chargers installed from January 2023 onwards include Ohme's solar charging features as standard.

These features, known as Solar Boost and Solar Only, help you make the most of any excess solar energy generated by your home.

• Solar Boost uses a combination of surplus solar energy and grid electricity to maintain a charging speed that suits your needs.
• Solar Only charges your EV exclusively using excess solar generation, helping you maximise self-consumption and reduce reliance on grid electricity.

You can learn more about Ohme's solar charging features here.

Using an Ohme charger with home battery storage

Ohme chargers cannot distinguish between electricity coming from your home battery or the grid. This means that if your home battery is set to discharge while your EV is charging, your Ohme charger may draw power from the battery.

To avoid this, Ohme recommends configuring your home battery system so that it does not discharge while your EV is plugged in and charging.

Since the Ohme ePod is an untethered EV charger with a universal socket, it will work with both Type 1 and Type 2 charging cables.

The Ohme Home Pro on the other hand only comes with a Type 2 charging cable built-in, meaning it will not work with Type 1 vehicles.

No, you don't need a smart meter in order to have an electric vehicle charger installed.

However, if you intend to take advantage of the many EV friendly tariffs available and save hundreds per year on your via smart charging, then you will likely need a smart meter to access them.

Check out our energy tariff comparison tool to learn more.

No.

You can still have an electric vehicle charger installed even if you don't have off-street private parking, but it can make an electric car charger installation more complicated and costly depending on the situation, the cable run and layout.

You can find out more about EV charging without a driveway in our dedicated guide.

We understand you want to know when we will be installing your EV charger as soon as possible. There are a number of mandatory steps that must be completed before we can give you a firm date (see below), but fortunately our lead times are short in all but the furthest corners of the UK.

Key steps we must complete before giving you a firm date include ordering the charge point, which is ordered as soon as you pay, completing the remote site survey, and completing the DNO notification (which can sometimes lead to delays if your DNO wants to carry out works).

We do this so we can provide a firm date knowing all the required steps are completed, helping to avoid delays.

We think this is a fairer and more transparent way of doing things, rather than making false promises about a date at the start and having to change this later.