Payment is the metric that matters for EV drivers

EV chargepoints claim near-perfect uptime. But high rates of failed payments mean drivers feel differently. Keith Brown, founder of Paythru, looks at what we should do about it

Uptime – the percentage of time that an electric vehicle charger is functioning – has long been the industry benchmark for reliability. And here, the industry can take pride in itself: recent comprehensive research from US-based ChargerHelp found that average charger uptime is around 97%, suggesting near-perfect performance.

However, the same research reveals that only 71% of charging attempts are successful. This gap between uptime and successful charges exposes a problem the industry has been slow to confront: just because a charger is technically available doesn’t mean a driver can use it successfully. Even if the hardware, network, and energy supply perform flawlessly, a single weak link can derail the experience. 

Often, that weak link is the payment.

The blind spot in reliability metrics

Uptime indicates whether a charger is powered on, but it doesn’t capture what happens when a driver arrives and attempts to start a session. A charger that’s operational but fails to deliver a charge due to a software glitch or rejected payment might still be considered “available”.

Still, it isn’t  “available” to the driver in any meaningful way. In fact, it’s worse. A driver can avoid the 3% of chargers that their app says are unavailable, but may go out of their way to one of the 29% of “available” chargers that won’t charge their car.

For drivers, even one failed session can undo months of trust in EV charging. And when confidence drops, the adoption of electric vehicles slows. 

To provide meaningful information to users – and help chargepoint operators (CPOs) design out problems that undermine trust – the industry must move from measuring availability to assessing usability – from tracking what’s online to understanding what actually works for the driver.  

Payments: the real ‘moment of truth’

Every charging session has a moment of truth: the payment. A driver taps a card, opens an app, or scans a QR code, expecting the same frictionless experience as they get when buying coffee or groceries. However, if this process fails – if the card is declined, the app freezes, or the payment software won’t complete the transaction – the session also fails, regardless of the uptime statistics. 

Hardware faults are frustrating, but they are cut and dried. Payment failures are stressful. They create uncertainty about whether a payment was processed, refunded, or lost. Drivers are concerned about trying again, lest they be charged several times (which they sometimes are if the payment process is not well-designed). 

Much of the challenge stems from fragmentation. The UK’s rapid roll-out of chargepoints has produced a patchwork of hardware, firmware, and payment systems, each using different standards and interfaces. What looks like progress in scale has introduced complexity at individual chargepoints, where different systems don’t quite work together. 

Drivers can pay with a bewildering mix of apps, cards and digital wallets, while numerous acquirers, gateways, and management systems attempt to communicate across a growing web of APIs. 

Most people don’t think of the software that enables the payment as being a stack of different systems, but between the user, chargepoint and backend, there’s a lot of software complexity to handle. It’s often like a game of Jenga, everything is fine as long as the delicate balance holds, but a small error at any weak point can bring it all crashing down. 

For new or occasional EV users, this uncertainty can quickly become a deterrent. Drivers will go electric when the experience is straightforward – when they can find a charger, plug in, pay, and drive off without any hassle. This depends on a payment process that works. 

A hidden KPI: measuring payment success

The research recommends tracking Charge Start Success Rate (CSR) as a better measure of reliability. That’s a step forward, but it still overlooks one vital element: a charging session isn’t truly successful until payment is complete.

That’s why many now advocate for a complementary measure that should be reported. Tracking payment success rate alongside CSR would provide a fuller, more transparent picture of reliability – one that reflects the driver’s actual experience. It would show how often payments succeed without declines, errors, or delays, and highlight where the real barriers lie. Tracking this additional measurement alongside CSR would also give regulators and policymakers a more accurate picture of network reliability. 

Closing the reliability gap

Once the reliability gap is reported correctly, bridging it means focusing less on hardware uptime and more on system integrity. Rather than layering more payment providers and software onto existing infrastructure, CPOs need smarter integration and orchestration – bringing coherence to a fragmented landscape. 

By unifying payment systems under shared protocols and standards, CPOs can reduce points of failure and ensure a consistent experience across networks. Open standards, such as OCPI, already enable different systems to communicate seamlessly. The next step is to treat payment data with the same rigour and visibility as energy data. An orchestration approach that unifies hardware, software, and payments can deliver the coherence the industry currently lacks.

When payments are processed through consistent, interoperable systems, they cease to be a source of friction and become a foundation for trust. Drivers shouldn’t notice when a payment succeeds instantly, and that’s precisely how it should be.  

The next phase of reliability

To accelerate EV adoption and build lasting confidence, the industry must look beyond uptime and start measuring what really matters. And once they measure it and judge their success by it, they will be incentivised to design payment systems that address the real problems users face. 

When every transaction simply works – from the moment a chargepoint is identified to the point the driver leaves happy, having paid for a full charge with no problems –  then the EV industry will be able to truly boast of near 100% uptime.
 
Keith Brown is founder and managing director of Paythru