EV charger installers: survey and install day texts

A home charger install looks like a one-day job, and for the electrician it mostly is. For the customer it's a few weeks of small steps: a survey or a set of photos, a quote, a grant application if they rent or live in a flat, permission from a landlord or freeholder, an install date, a morning with the power off, and then a new box on the wall that doesn't start charging the moment they plug in. Each step has a question attached, and EV charger installer texts are the cheapest way to answer them before the customer picks up the phone.

This post covers the grant figures, the paperwork the grant asks for, what the Smart Charge Points Regulations mean for the handover, and a set of texts from survey to install day.

What the grant figures show

The Office for Zero Emission Vehicles publishes figures for its EV chargepoint grant for renters and flat owners. By 1 July 2026 it had paid for 26,504 sockets across the UK, worth £9,247,312 in grants.

Installations ran at between 413 and 717 a quarter through 2022 and 2023, then jumped from 714 in January to March 2024 to 1,717 in the next quarter and 2,612 the one after. Since then every quarter has landed between 2,687 and 3,136, the highest being July to September 2025. Two cautions come with the table. OZEV says "Grants can take several months to process after installation", so recent months "are expected to be low" and rise in later releases. And from April 2026 the grant moved to a new application platform, with the old portal closing to installer claims on 26 May 2026, so the spring 2026 figures (407 sockets in April, 69 in May) say more about the changeover than about demand.

The renters grant is only one of OZEV's schemes. Its tables for the same date count 1,912 sockets under the grant for residential landlords, and 71,917 under the Workplace Charging Scheme since that scheme's first installations in December 2016, worth £26,657,868. An installer working across all three deals with landlords, letting agents and facilities managers as well as drivers, and each of them wants different updates.

The grant, and the documents to chase

GOV.UK's guide sets out the current terms: "75% off the cost of buying and installing a socket, up to a maximum of £500". It's for people who live in a flat they own or who rent, with "private off-street parking", and an eligible vehicle (owned, leased or used for work for at least 6 months, or on order). Homeowners living in a house can't apply.

The order of events matters for the texts. The customer gets a quote from "an OZEV-authorised installer", gathers documents and applies. The documents GOV.UK lists are:

• "a dated quote from your installer";
• "written permission from your landlord, freeholder or property manager";
• written permission from the council for a listed building;
• "a utility bill showing your name and the address";
• the tenancy agreement, if they rent.

Then "Once OZEV has approved your application, they'll let you and your installer know. Your installer can then start the work." After the install, "Your installer will claim the grant on your behalf", and the grant is "paid directly to your installer".

Any of those steps can stall, and the landlord's written permission is an easy one to lose track of (the customer asked, the agent said it'd be fine, and nothing arrived in writing). A short text a week after the quote, listing exactly what's still missing, is a cheap way to keep the application moving.

What the regulations mean at handover

The Electric Vehicles (Smart Charge Points) Regulations 2021 came into force on 30 June 2022 and apply to most charge points sold after that date, apart from certain public chargers and rapid chargers of 50 kilowatts or more. Two of the rules produce support calls if nobody explains them.

The first is off-peak charging. A charge point must come with "pre-set default charging hours which are outside of peak hours", and the regulations define peak hours as "8am to 11am on weekdays and 4pm to 10pm on weekdays". When the charger is first used, the owner can accept those hours, remove them or set different ones, and they must be able to "override the default mode of charging" whenever they like. A customer who plugs in at 6pm on a Tuesday and sees nothing happen is seeing the regulations work as intended.

The second is the randomised delay. The charger must operate "with a delay of up to 600 seconds", random to the second, at each relevant time, and the owner must be able to cancel it. Ten minutes of nothing after plugging in looks like a fault.

Both are easy to explain in a handover text, which the customer can look back at a week later when they've forgotten what the electrician said. The regulations also require a "statement of compliance" when a charge point is sold, signed and dated by the seller, which is worth pointing to in the same message.

One more rule gives the handover text something useful to say. A charge point has to measure the electricity it delivers and for how long, and the owner must be able to see it for each charge, for each month and for the whole of the last 12 months. Customers on a cheap overnight tariff want to know what charging is costing them, and "your charging history is in the app under Usage" (or wherever your charger keeps it) answers that before they ask.

EV charger installer texts, from survey to handover

Written for a fictional installer, Fenwick EV. All of these are service messages about a job, so none needs an opt-out line.

Survey booked:

Fenwick EV: your home survey is booked for Wed 11 Nov, 10:00 to 12:00. We'll need to see your fuse board, meter and where the car parks. Reply if that slot doesn't work.

Photos, for firms that quote remotely (a text can't carry pictures, so send a link to your own upload page):

Fenwick EV: to quote without a visit, please upload 4 photos (fuse board, meter, parking space, route between them) at fenwickev.co.uk/photos/R82K. Questions? Just reply.

Grant documents still missing, a week after the quote:

Fenwick EV: for your EV chargepoint grant we still need written permission from your landlord or freeholder. Your quote and utility bill are done. Reply if you need a template letter.

Install booked, once OZEV approves:

Fenwick EV: good news, your grant's approved. Install booked for Mon 23 Nov, arriving 08:00 to 09:00. Power will be off for part of the visit. Please keep the parking space clear.

On the way, which our post on on-my-way texts for trades covers in more detail:

Fenwick EV: Dan is on his way, about 20 minutes. Grey van, AB12 CDE.

Handover, the one that saves the most calls:

Fenwick EV: all done. Your charger is set to avoid 8 to 11am and 4 to 10pm on weekdays by default, and may wait up to 10 minutes before starting. Both can be changed in the app. Your statement of compliance is in your email.

And the grant claim, which closes the job:

Fenwick EV: we've claimed your £500 grant from OZEV. They'll email you to confirm the claim; please check and reply to them so it can be paid.

The grant claim text mentions OZEV's email on purpose. GOV.UK says "OZEV will email you to confirm whether their claim is correct", and a customer who ignores it can hold up the installer's payment.

Running it day to day

An installer's diary is the obvious source for the timed texts. The survey confirmation and the install reminder can be scheduled when the booking is made, with a reminder the afternoon before. If your job management software can call an API, CaptiFi Connect takes a schedule_at time up to a year ahead and cancels a scheduled text (refunding its credits) if the date moves; a CSV export from the diary does the same job for a small firm.

The grant chasers are a list job. Keep a list of customers waiting on documents, send the chaser to that list each week, and remove people as their paperwork arrives. Because chasers go to a list, they keep to campaign quiet hours (21:00 to 09:00 London time by default), so nothing lands late in the evening.

Replies matter more in this trade than most, because customers have questions that don't fit a form ("does the cable reach if I park nose in?"). Send from a number people can reply to, and replies land in the two-way inbox where whoever is in the office can answer or pass them to the electrician. Delivery reports show which texts failed, which matters most for the install-day message: a customer who never got it may have parked across the drive.

Review requests and marketing

A text asking a happy customer for a review a week after the install is useful, and our review request page covers the wording. Be careful with anything beyond that. The ICO says a message that "actively promotes or encourages people to make use of a particular service, special offer, or upgrade" is likely to be marketing, and that a service message with marketing in it "will count as direct marketing". A handover text that adds "ask us about solar panels" has become marketing, which needs consent or the soft opt-in and an opt-out. Keep the job texts about the job.

Common questions

What texts should an EV charger installer send?

The useful set is a survey confirmation, a photo request if you quote remotely, a grant documents chaser, an install date confirmation, an on-the-way text and a handover message. Each answers a question the customer would otherwise phone about.

Can renters get a grant for a home EV charger?

Yes. GOV.UK's EV chargepoint grant for renters and flat owners gives 75% off the cost of a socket and its installation, up to £500, for people with private off-street parking and an eligible vehicle. An OZEV-authorised installer must do the work and claims the grant once it's finished.

Why doesn't my new EV charger start charging straight away?

Home charge points sold since 30 June 2022 come with default charging hours outside weekday peaks (8am to 11am and 4pm to 10pm) and a random delay of up to 600 seconds before charging starts. The owner can change the hours and cancel the delay, usually in the charger's app.

Do installer texts about grant paperwork need consent?

No. Texts about a customer's own job, such as missing grant documents or an install date, are service messages. Adding an offer for another product would make the text marketing, which needs consent or the soft opt-in plus an opt-out.