[Pault]

I've probably missed something obvious but new owners might want to read this

I've only had our Ioniq for a two or three weeks and have not got a charge point yet. So I have been using the Rapid charger at the top of our road but got a shock when I looked at my bank online and saw I had paid £5 !

So when my wife said she wanted to go shopping this afternoon I volunteered to take her as the supermarket has a free 7kW charger. This was also a chance to try out the supplied cable for the first time and it was so easy. Park up - connect to car - connect to charger and it starts up. You then have 15mins to open up their app, find your charger and confirm you want longer. It was impressive.

After an hour and a half It started to blow icy rain showers strongly across the car park so I thought it was time to stop and move the car nearer the exit. I didn't look at instructions but remembered the emergency mains charger would not release until I cut the power so knew I had to pull the cable out of the charge point first - only it wouldn't. There must be an off button - there wasn't.

Mildly irritated I looked at the instructions on the app but it wouldn't allow me to click on the actual charge point but I found the detailed instructions elsewhere on the site and it said to stop charger remove from car.

Ahh, both ends are stuck on and I can't get either off. I rememered seeing Locking Options in the manual and was relieved to see an option that said Never Lock. So I found the options but there were only two - always locked or locked when charging. I then found something mentioning a cable release button but now with a full gale blowing and a wet wife back in the car I could not find anything more about it amongst all the warnings about this and that and a very poor index.

5.30pm on a Saturday - would PodPoint be open - phew they were and got a very helpful woman who said she could help. She wanted all our details - fair enough - then our email and then the PodPoint number. I said it is, driving rain can I give you the postcode of the Tesco store, instead. - no the number would be better - get the number - she mistypes it and I have to go out again. Loads of apologies and so I said Dont worry its not your fault - I'm not one of those people who will shout at you. She said she was ready to reset and we should be quick because it lasts only a second or two. Now hand on cable wife on phone shouts Now - pull and nothing. She tries again a few times and either she has the wrong pod or the system doesn't work like that. Back in the car and very wet and cold she says Don't worry, I will call our PodPoint Emergency Team. I could see wife going home in taxi and I stuck for hours but before I could get my head round this depressing prospect she said "All we, need is a photo of the charger showing the supermarket in the background, a photo of your car with the pod in the background and a close up..... Before, she got any further something snapped. Luckily, my wife recognised the look on my face and probably guessed (correctly) that my next words would involve the old Land Rover and the ease with which the pod would release our cable when they both met. So my wife was very reasonably explaining that it was pitch black, driving sleet and you couldn't even see the petrol station which was 20m away.
A friendly sounding guy started to talk to her and just as I was thinking there had to be an emergency stop somewhere and where was the fuse box when an error message came up on the screen in the car. I looked in the mirror and the pod was flashing red. With one movement I was out of the car, the cable came out and was out of the car and into the boot in seconds. I even put the black covers on the charge port in the right order and away we went. I've had another look in the manual and still can't find the cable release button.

FWIW The guy on the phone said that if you stop and start the car about 5 times in quick succession ending on an off then the pod usually thinks somethimg is up and stops charging. Why they didn't put a stop button on escapes me.

 

[IoniqHugh]

I've probably missed something obvious but new owners might want to read this

I've only had our Ioniq for a two or three weeks and have not got a charge point yet. So I have been using the Rapid charger at the top of our road but got a shock when I looked at my bank online and saw I had paid £5 !

So when my wife said she wanted to go shopping this afternoon I volunteered to take her as the supermarket has a free 7kW charger. This was also a chance to try out the supplied cable for the first time and it was so easy. Park up - connect to car - connect to charger and it starts up. You then have 15mins to open up their app, find your charger and confirm you want longer. It was impressive.

After an hour and a half It started to blow icy rain showers strongly across the car park so I thought it was time to stop and move the car nearer the exit. I didn't look at instructions but remembered the emergency mains charger would not release until I cut the power so knew I had to pull the cable out of the charge point first - only it wouldn't. There must be an off button - there wasn't.

Mildly irritated I looked at the instructions on the app but it wouldn't allow me to click on the actual charge point but I found the detailed instructions elsewhere on the site and it said to stop charger remove from car.

Ahh, both ends are stuck on and I can't get either off. I rememered seeing Locking Options in the manual and was relieved to see an option that said Never Lock. So I found the options but there were only two - always locked or locked when charging. I then found something mentioning a cable release button

.

It sounds quite frustrating! I find the Pod-Point and other providers really reliable, however there are some instructions you need to follow depending on what type you are on; Some require that you stop charging on the app first. However the only problems I had were with the car and not the charger. You have to sometimes lock and unlock the car again to allow you to disconnect the car from your lead. Once you are disconnected from the car, the lead will usually disconnect from the charger easily enough. Perhaps others will confirm this, as I just do it on ‘autopilot ‘ these days and I think this is the order! Senility prevents me confirming until I go once more and see Somebody will probably correct me, but at least it’s worth trying in the interim

 

[Rupert Wilson]

Completely understand your distress, we had a similar scenario the first time we used a 7kW destination charger and ended up rummaging in the boot to find the emergency release cable. However, don't panic in reality it's really really simply to unlock the cable/release the cable and finish a charge. Simply stand by the car with one hand on the plug at the car end and then with your other hand on the remote keyfob unlock the car twice in quick succession. You will hear the cable unlock so immediately pull it out of the car as it relocks within a few seconds. That's it simple, after a while it just becomes second nature. The only other thing I would say is that on some (all?) Polar destination chargers you can only release the cable from the charger with the RFID card or contactless card. Hope this helps?

 

[Pault]

Thanks for the replies guys

I now realise that mine was not a unique experience. I think it was made worse by the horrific weather coupled with the end of daylight. When I connected up the sun was shining and the rapidly deteriorating conditions added to the sense of drama. I was quite surprised because for a few minutes I definately felt a mild feeling of panic as I searched through the manual in vain.This soon turned to irritation and finally anger when I realised the pod point representative's soothing words were just from a script and she had not engaged with our situation.

Anyway, I now have things to try and also a emergency release so I am just about to go back and have 2 or 3 x 20 minute sessions on the same pod point so I am not put off in any way.in the future.

I'm still amazed there is no emergency stop. This point is so close to the petrol station you would think that any high current device would have a way of being turned off.

This is so typical of the dumbing down of everything and we consumers being treated like morons. All over their website they trumpet how simple the pod point is to use - so simple that there is no way to turn the ** off.

Thanks again

 

[srichards]

If there's a physical open charge port door button inside the car I usually find pushing that forces an end to a charge and makes the charger let go. Once unplugged from the car the charger will usually disengage the locking. Some need a shove in before they will come out as well. The AC own cable ones seem to be more problematic.

 

[IoniqHugh]

If there's a physical open charge port door button inside the car I usually find pushing that forces an end to a charge and makes the charger let go. Once unplugged from the car the charger will usually disengage the locking. Some need a shove in before they will come out as well. The AC own cable ones seem to be more problematic.

Don't really need to do this in Ioniq....just have to get used to a simple routine 1. Unlock the car. 2. remove gently from car first 3. Remove lead from charge point. 4. Relax and enjoy. If all fails, repeat ........simples
I guess every car type has it's routine, but after a few goes you won't even think about it. I asked the better half what she does, as she has done about 20,000 miles in it...and she said, "I don't remember but it just works"......we all get used to it, and will not be concerned about high voltage or the location after a while....just enjoy!

 

[Eclectic]

The problem is the post recognizing that you are stopping the charge. The procedure should be, to start charge, plug into the post first, then the car. To stop charge, stop the car charging by whatever means it uses (a button on the key fob or in the car in the case of my Zoe) and unplug the car, then from the post.

 

[Zoefan]

This is a familiar situation. I was at Bluewater shopping centre on a Pod-Point 7kwh charger and got back to the car at 10pm. I managed to release my cable from the car after stopping charging but not from the Pod-Point. I rang the number on the Pod-Point more in hope than expectation but a lady answered and told me she could try switching off the point and putting it on again and I would have to pull the cable out just as she switched off and reactivated. I was lucky and it worked. Otherwise I would have had to abandon my cable.
I have been very wary of isolated Pod-Point posts since then

 

[Pault]

Breaking News - I was so wrong .....

It appears that Pod Point really may be sincere when they express concern. This is because they haven't forgotten about us as we've just received an email asking if we could send them a photograph of the podpoint if we are still stuck to it. The only problem is that it was written at 9.28pm which is around 27 hours after we tried to get the cable out. I can't imagine anyone just waiting 27 hours for help.

It's not fair if I attach a copy of the email as it has got the name of the Customer Support Team Leader on it. Also, they are probably just thinking it would only be the cable that was still stuck. However that does not excuse the fact that I checked the same pod on the app this morning before setting out to get back on the horse and try out the techiques that Rupert & Hugh suggested (which worked perfectly). So if the Team Leader had checked the pod she would have seen three separate charging events in the history (plus anyone else that might have been there).
You can't knock the follow up completely but it would have more appropriate to have just said sorry for the trouble you had. It's not a cut & dried situation anyway because you could argue that the Ioniq was the one that would not release and allow the podpoint to unlock.
What i cant get away from though is the lack of any way to stop the charge. Just imagine if you saw smoke coming from the charging port on the car. Your first instinct would not be to unplug the car but to stop the charger. Surely it should be manditory to have an emergency stop. You can understand that there is no issue with a corded charger because even if a low life stopped one malicioulsy, they couldn't steal the cable but that is different with uncorded ones where they could switch it off and unplug both ends of the cable. There must be a solution though surely .....

 

[Phil68]

Breaking News - I was so wrong .....

It appears that Pod Point really may be sincere when they express concern. This is because they haven't forgotten about us as we've just received an email asking if we could send them a photograph of the podpoint if we are still stuck to it. The only problem is that it was written at 9.28pm which is around 27 hours after we tried to get the cable out. I can't imagine anyone just waiting 27 hours for help.

It's not fair if I attach a copy of the email as it has got the name of the Customer Support Team Leader on it. Also, they are probably just thinking it would only be the cable that was still stuck. However that does not excuse the fact that I checked the same pod on the app this morning before setting out to get back on the horse and try out the techiques that Rupert & Hugh suggested (which worked perfectly). So if the Team Leader had checked the pod she would have seen three separate charging events in the history (plus anyone else that might have been there).
You can't knock the follow up completely but it would have more appropriate to have just said sorry for the trouble you had. It's not a cut & dried situation anyway because you could argue that the Ioniq was the one that would not release and allow the podpoint to unlock.
What i cant get away from though is the lack of any way to stop the charge. Just imagine if you saw smoke coming from the charging port on the car. Your first instinct would not be to unplug the car but to stop the charger. Surely it should be manditory to have an emergency stop. You can understand that there is no issue with a corded charger because even if a low life stopped one malicioulsy, they couldn't steal the cable but that is different with uncorded ones where they could switch it off and unplug both ends of the cable. There must be a solution though surely .....

Like you I've had my Ioniq 2-3 weeks by now. The first time I charged it was at home using my tethered Chargemaster charge point (kindly supplied by our government and Renault). As it was a trial I didn't want to fully charge the car, but couldn't find a way to stop it. (My ZOE had a Stop Charging button on its touch screen.) At the time I hadn't realised that the charge point had a key operated on/off switch. What I did find was a menu that could restrict the Percent Charge. The default was 100%, so when I reduced that to 80% the car realised that the charge state had already passed that and stopped the charge, and so allowed me to unplug the charger.
I still don't know the right way to stop a charge!

 

[Phil68]

I still don't know the right way to stop a charge!

 

[Peter Cittern]

I unplug at the car. May need to unlock the car twice, first time unlocks the doors, second time unlocks the cable

 

[Ralkbirdy]

From observing the Zappi, it seems that, unlock the car twice and charging is interrupted, it continues if the socket is not released.