UK Live Charger Status

[RPUDNER]

I have subscribed to Premium in the hope of getting live charger status while on route, but I find that most networks are displayed as Unkown in the UK, is this correct? Prgrams such as Zap Map appear to have data from almost all networks, so is it just a work in progress?

 

Networks not working

1. Gridserve - found on UK motorway service stations

2. BP Pluse

3. Podpoint

4. Shell / Allego

5. Instavolt

There will be many more I have missed.

Regards

 

Richard

 

Thanks

 

Richard

[Katya-ABRP]

Hi @RPUDNER,

It is correct that we still lack live status for a good number of networks. It is somewhat difficult to say which of the listed ones we should cover since we don't have any direct integration with any of them besides Allego, but we may still get live status information via other data sources.

I can recommend reading the blog post below on what can be done to improve charger data

/Katya
 

 

[Xtopher]

@Katya-ABRP how do we know what integration a charge network is using? I see some like Instavolt are not available to edit, so assume you have some other integration rather than a public data (e.g. OpenChargeMap). More than happy to try and drum up some integrations with the UK providers, should we just direct them to contact@abetterrouteplanner.com or tweet @RouteBetter?

Can you let me know which of the below you don't have integration with? The below seem to have live updates on other services, so should be possible 

1. Gridserve - found on UK motorway service stations, have announced they would be open to integration with others
2. Instavolt - good and expanding network in the UK
3. Osprey - generally known as a rock solid network in the UK
4. MFG - up and coming, installing good charger stations in the UK
5. BP Pulse

They would be a good list of main contenders to get integrated, Gridserve and Instavolt appear to be the most popular in the UK.

 

[Xtopher]

Looks like InstaVolt is now giving live status - good work! 

Osprey is reporting via PlugSurfing, is that live updates? Would it be better to go direct to Osprey? Happy too give them a nudge

[Xtopher]

Don't know if you guys are beavering away in the background but things appear to be working well for Instavolt. Took literally a day or so for this new charger to show up, awesome! 

 

 

 

Osprey also no longer showing as via PlugSurfing, dont know if you changed anything there. 

Any updates on GridServe? I hit them up on Twitter and they gave it a like so hopefully they are working with you. 

PodPoint have also said they will pass it onto their team but wouldn't hold my breath. 

Finally our EV is arriving so I can test this all in anger

[hoggy]

Can i just ask how (specifically the Tesla SuC) occupancy is derived? It doesn't seem to match the Tesla car/apps version of occupancy. 
Is it a data feed from Tesla or more of an "inferred via GPS" thing from users with the ABRP app on their phone?

Or is it just a bit slow to update?

  

[Samuel-ABRP]

Yes we are in contact with GridServe. Their charging stations look awesome and they seem to expand quite a bit so let's hope it works out well .

 

We get live data for most Aral Pulse chargers which is more or less the same as BP pulse (which only exists in the UK) so maybe check some other locations if you can see live data for BP.

[Xtopher]

20 minutes ago, Samuel-ABRP said:

Yes we are in contact with GridServe. Their charging stations look awesome and they seem to expand quite a bit so let's hope it works out well .

 

We get live data for most Aral Pulse chargers which is more or less the same as BP pulse (which only exists in the UK) so maybe check some other locations if you can see live data for BP.

Awesome news. GridServe have taken over the chargers on nearly all the UK motorway service stations and have big plans to expand so will definitely be a big win to have them onboard. They will be the chargers that people will use the most and will have the most congestion. 
 

I will check out the other chargers and keep Tweeting other network providers  to keep you guys busy

[Xtopher]

@Samuel-ABRP have you had any contact from MFG? I see they have live status in WattsUp app so they clearly can integrate. Your route planning is wiping the floor with other maps, especially with Tronity integration so keen to get the UK providers live status as good as we can 

 

[Xtopher]

@Samuel-ABRP just checked BP Pulse and doesn't appear to get the live status (https://abetterrouteplanner.com/?charger_id=15999501). Most likely on a different system in the UK? 

 

[hoggy]

Find a charge company with a live status map, load said map > Ctrl+Shift+i > Network >Refresh > Filter Fetch/XHR > there's your source data for chargers.
BP Pulse/Polar is even easier - just https://network.bppulse.co.uk/ajax/posts

Status = 0 = Available

Status = 1 = Charging 

Status = 2 = Unavailable
You can find streams for Gridserve, GeniePoint, Podpoint, and Chargeplace Scotland by this method - not tried any more (Whether they let you use them is another matter) 

[Xtopher]

8 minutes ago, hoggy said:

Whether they let you use them is another matter

I would say they'd want something more robust but actually depending on the expected traffic, calling the web status map may be easier than trying to use a proper API as they could just tell you to go for it! 

[Samuel-ABRP]

Web API requires polling, which is ok in some cases but does not scale very well with thousands of chargers and providers. So ideally we prefer their official charge protocol implementations like OCPI.

If you know any other providers that integrated into other apps let me know their contact mail and I'll drop them a line.

Please be more patient with live data, as not every company is as fast as others and it might take some time until everything is worked out.

[Bertthebudgie]

So when planning a route, ABRP seems to simply not choose these chargers where their status is "unknown" and sends you out of the way to a charger where the statue is "known". With so few chargers integrating is is possible to force ABRP to consider these chargers as usable irrespective of whether their staus is known.