In our customer stories series, we shine a spotlight on Indra customers and the real-world benefits they’ve discovered from charging smarter at home.
Dave and Becky are young professionals working within the NHS and living in North Wales. They have been driving EVs for years and have experience using other branded chargers, but recently made the switch to an Indra Smart PRO. We met with them to discuss how their Indra charger is not only helping with transportation, saving them money, but also how they’re enjoying some of the charger's smart features.
Dave told us, “I swapped from a petrol car to an EV about four years ago as the NHS was doing a salary sacrifice scheme, and electric cars were the big push. So, the first car was a VW ID.3, which was a very nice car to drive. It had a great range and actually wasn’t a big ‘jump’ from petrol to electric, as in, it wasn’t a big change.
But we also got a second-hand electric car - which was my mum’s old car: a VW Up. It has a smaller range, but it’s actually perfect for around Wales, where we live, as there are just tiny, little roads.
It’s got really good efficiency, and for any big journeys, it just makes us stop to charge, which gives us time to get food, get a coffee, and actually makes the journey less of a slog. It makes an activity to stop off at places that we’ve found.”
“I think that if we were driving petrol, we’d still want to stop anyway to break up the journey – so it doesn’t add extra time. And it’s just way cheaper to run than a petrol car, especially with the features that the charger has,” added Becky. “I’ve been driving for less time, as I passed my test in 2022 and my first car was a petrol car, but then we switched to an electric, and that was quite a nice transition, really.
I’d learned to drive in a manual, but then switching over to electric, where there’s, obviously, just the two pedals and no gears, definitely took away a lot of the brain space of driving and made it more pleasant.”
“You just had to be strategic. Thinking about which one needed to be plugged in and when. It involved a bit of car “Tetris” sometimes,” said Becky.
“We sometimes realised we’d have to fork out for the more expensive rate, which is still only 27p/kWh, but is still significantly cheaper than petrol. But I think it was just about planning, when’s it best to charge the two cars? And what range do we need? Because sometimes the cars didn’t need 100% or even 80%, it was just ‘that’s enough to get us where we need to go for tomorrow’ rather than having one car with no charge and one that was full for no reason,” added Dave.
Becky said, “With Octopus Energy, we use the Electroverse app, which shows you where local chargers are on a map, and you just need to be a bit strategic in planning your route.”
Dave told us, “We did a journey to France, just outside of Paris, when we had the ID.3, going from Worcester all the way there. And, it was an easy enough journey, just stopping off. It just meant the places that we stopped strategically were either just to pick up a coffee or food, or sometimes it was to go into a place that we thought was a nice place to view.
So, we’d charge the car for thirty minutes or an hour, or whatever, and take that time to go and see a nice location that we might otherwise have just driven past. And even going into France, the Electroverse worked over there, in Europe, the chargers work the same; it’s not a problem at all.
It doesn’t matter what the language barrier was where we found the charger; it’s just activated from your phone, so it’s no problem if it’s written in a language you don’t understand. On the charger, and the phone itself, it all still works fine, so it wasn’t an issue. The range on the ID.3 was about 250 miles, and I think when I was driving petrol, I never really drove any further than that in one go; I’d usually have stopped at that point anyway.
But yeah, it was a long way, and that’s the furthest we’ve been in that.
We’ve got a friend who lives in Germany, and he drives electric. He drives all over Europe for business, and he says it’s just really easy. I think it’s not a thing to be worried about. If anything, mainland Europe is way better connected than Britain is when it comes to electric charging.”
“Well, with a petrol car, when you’re right down to the dregs, you’ve got to find a petrol station, and it’s got to be open to get petrol. When you’ve got an electric car, you can charge when you get home,” said Dave.
Becky said, “I don’t think we’ve really tried much around here, because most of where we’re going at the moment is to and from work, or to the coast and stuff. And, because it’s not massive motorways, it’s not eating a lot of miles, so we tend to just charge it at home, or at the supermarket.”
“Yeah, Lidl’s a favourite one,” added Dave. “You can go to Lidl, get a bakery item, and in that time get a little bit of charge in the car, that’s quite nice.
I actually find that across North Wales, it’s been alright when I’m working in the community for my job. If I’m seeing a patient when I need a charge, I’ll see where they are located, see where the nearest charger is, and put the car on charge whilst I’m seeing the patient for 30 or 40 minutes, and that time is enough, so it’s not too bad.
We’re not going into deep, dark Wales yet, to see if the valleys have chargers, but I think there’s enough different ones out there. I’ve got three apps on the phone with different charging companies, but once you’ve got them, it’s kind of pretty easy to do.”
Dave Gaskell
How much money does your charger save you?
Dave said, “Even though the cars are a bit more expensive, you actually get that money back very quickly. And the same with a charger, the upfront cost of a charger, people often go, ‘oh, that’s quite a lot of money,’ but, actually in the space of probably six months to a year you’ve got that money back, and then you start making further savings, we’ve found.
I enjoy every now and then reminding myself how much it costs compared to petrol. I’ve worked out the equivalent of a tank of fuel, which is probably £50 but the same in an EV is about £3.”
Becky added, “I was driving petrol during that crisis when petrol was super expensive, so it’s an even bigger difference to me! When we first started going out, we lived about an hour and a half away from each other. So, the majority of the money was just going on petrol to go and see each other, which is a bit of a depressing use of money. We could’ve saved so much.”
Becky said, “I think, for me, it’s got to be the ability to schedule it. So, you don’t need to worry about going out and switching it on yourself. It’s how you know just when it’s going to charge it. You can just plug it in, but then it will wait until the cheaper rate to deliver it.”
Dave said, “I think mine is the nerdy data – it’s quite interesting. The fact it gives you a breakdown and shows you what you’ve charged that month, and also shows you when you’re charging in the month. So, you start to see what days you’re tending to use the most charge, which is what I’ve found is interesting. I can see that over time, you build a really nice picture of going like, ‘ah, for some reason, Tuesdays, we’re suddenly using a lot more charge’. It’s quite fun to look at and satisfying, and I think the app is very clever to have the cheaper rate in green, so it gives you a little satisfaction that you’re getting the cheaper charge. Rather than just a charger that charges, and that’s it, it kind of affirms why we got an EV and charger – because it’s cheap.”
Thinking of starting out into the world of EV driving? Read our beginner's guide to going electric.
Dave and Becky’s experience shows how smart charging takes the stress out of EV ownership, with busy working lives. From intelligent scheduling and clear cost insights to seamless integration with smart tariffs, the Indra Smart PRO helps them charge at the right time, at the lowest cost, without having to think about it. Whether you’re new to EVs or upgrading your home charger, Indra enables smarter, simpler, and more affordable charging at home.
Explore our range of home chargers and see how smart features can work for you.
Dave and Becky Gaskell are young professionals working within the NHS. Dave is a physiotherapist, and Becky works in speech therapy; they have been driving EVs for a number of years.
 | About the author: Sonya is Indra's Senior Content and Marketing Executive. She is a content writer with many years of experience who is now using her expertise to help Indra communicate their branding, products, and the benefits of EV driving for both individuals, society and the planet. |
