Electric vehicles aren’t a nightmare—until you end up at a charging station like BP Pulse at Guys Cliffe SF Connect near Warwick. Here’s what went wrong.We arrived with 10 miles left on the battery and tried to start a charge using a bank card. The machine refused to accept it. For some reason, BP Pulse simply doesn’t like Lloyds Bank debit cards—the terminal kept saying the payment was denied.So we tried the next option: download the BP Pulse app, register, and pay through that. The payment finally went through—but there was no £10 or £20 option. The minimum pre-authorisation was £60.Why does BP have to take £60 upfront?Why are they allowed to hold customer money for 2–3 days, even if the user only charges £10 worth of electricity?It’s terrible design. They clearly don’t have the technology to let the customer choose how much they want to pay before charging.And things got worse.Because we only had 10 miles left, we couldn’t leave. We called BP customer support. The support person was very kind and tried his best—he could see our payment coming through and attempted to trigger the charge remotely. He tried at least 10 times, on both charger 1 and charger 2. Every attempt activated and then immediately failed with no explanation.At this point, it seemed obvious that BP Pulse doesn’t work with Lloyds TSB cards, and it also doesn’t work reliably with Teslas.We spent another 40 minutes trying. The support agent didn’t give up, but the chargers simply would not start. He asked us to try initiating payment via the BP Pulse website directly. We did—another £60 pre-authorisation swallowed—but again nothing worked. Yes, I know the money will eventually be refunded, but they still hold it for days.We eventually limped over to the nearest Tesco charger… and it worked perfectly, first try.So here’s the nightmare:You arrive at a BP Pulse station with 10 miles left, you are forced to pre-authorise £120, nothing works, the money is still held, and you waste 40 minutes on the phone with support who cannot fix the issue.So here’s what you need to beware of with BP Pulse:They take £60 every time you attempt to start a charge.They are incompatible with some banks, including Lloyds.They are unreliable with Teslas.They charge £0.89 per kWh, nearly double Tesla’s price—and still provide worse service.With all that, do you get the service you pay for? No, you don’t.So what exactly is going wrong with BP Pulse as a company?Outdated technology.Poor payment systems.High prices.No effective oversight.EVs may be subsidised, and charging providers can seemingly charge Willy Nilly—but BP Pulse is leading the race in the worst possible way.
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We’re energising the future of transportation by developing fast and convenient charging solutions for consumer and commercial electric vehicles.
Over the course of more than 10 years, we have designed and developed innovative electric vehicle charging solutions that enable EV drivers to charge at home, at work and on the go.
On our mission to make charging fast and hassle-free, our charging points have been used over 35 million times to enable around 200 million miles of zero tailpipe emission driving.
> 35 million
electric vehicle charging sessions delivered
200,000 miles
of zero tailpipe emission driving enabled
> 50,000 drivers
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