Question reference: S6W-02742
- Asked by: Claire Baker, MSP for Mid Scotland and Fife, Scottish Labour
- Date lodged: 7 September 2021
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Current status: Answered by Graeme Dey on 22 September 2021
Question
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to recent reports that a significant proportion of publicly-available electric vehicle charging points are not working.
Answer
CPS has transitioned to a new charge point network operator (CPNO), with all charge points and members being migrated from BP Pulse to SWARCO on the 27 th July. This was the outcome of a rigorous tender exercise to find a new operator to manage CPS on behalf of the Scottish Government.
Migrating over 2000 charge points and 32,000 driver accounts is a significant undertaking which required months of planning and preparation by a range of technical and operational specialists.
The process of bringing the entire ChargePlace Scotland estate online for the first time under one operator has been a huge undertaking. And while some interruptions had been expected, the level of disruption many drivers have faced was regrettably on a scale we did not foresee. Transport Scotland officials understand how critical it is for EV drivers to have access to a comprehensive and reliable network and we fully appreciate the service levels members expect from CPS.
I am pleased to update you that the network has now been stabilised and significant progress has been made in resolving some of the key issues which initially affected drivers, including RFID card access, customer account set-up and, above all, charge point availability. The network now has over 1800 publically available charge points connected and in working order. We are now in a second phase of the CPS migration programme, with the team endeavouring to resolve outstanding charge point repairs as a matter of urgency.