Driver experience is the #1 priority. Electric Era is the only EV fast-charging provider that financially guarantees both first plug-in success and per-port uptime.
A reliable EV fast charger does two things: it’s working when a driver arrives, and it starts charging the first time the driver plugs in. For a retailer, each failed visit is a customer who drove to your store and left unhappy. Four questions decide reliability:
Per-port uptime measures how often each individual charger is working. Station uptime measures how often a site has at least some chargers working. Electric Era guarantees 98% per-port uptime, and our trailing 12-month average is 99.5%.
Charger 1Charger 2
Charger 3Charger 4Many providers count a station as “up” when more than half its ports work. Under that rule, a site can report 100% uptime while half its chargers are broken.
98% uptime allows about 175 hours of downtime per port per year. 99.5% is about 44 hours.
Is your uptime per port or per station? Is it guaranteed, and what happens if you miss?
First plug-in success is the share of charging sessions that start the first time a driver plugs in, with no retries, no calls to support and no moving to another charger. It is the closest measure of what drivers actually experience, which is why it is Electric Era’s reliability north star.
Uptime tells you a charger was online. It doesn’t tell you whether a car actually started charging. A port can be “up” and still fail a handshake with a vehicle or reject a payment.
Electric Era guarantees a first plug-in success rate of 85% or better. If we miss, we refund O&M fees in proportion to the miss. We’re the only EV fast-charging provider that puts money behind first plug-in success, not just uptime.
We build the charger, the battery, the software and the firmware, and we see every session. When a vehicle model or software version starts causing issues, we spot the pattern and push a fix immediately.
User error and confusion are among the biggest causes of failed sessions. Tap-to-pay and clear on-screen instructions help drivers start charging on the first try.
Electric Era treats charger reliability as a software problem. Most issues are fixed automatically by the charger itself in seconds. Our 24/7 operations center fixes nearly all remaining issues remotely. Together, that’s over 99% of issues resolved without a technician on site, and the rare truck roll arrives already knowing what’s wrong.
Built-in recovery software detects, isolates and recovers from known faults, usually before a driver notices.
Our 24/7 Network Operations Center pushes an over-the-air software fix.
The technician comes with a diagnosis, the right parts and tools, and fixes it on the first visit.
| Comparison | Typical network | Electric Era |
|---|---|---|
| First line of defense | Customer/driver complaint or support call | Automated alert and software that recovers automatically |
| Remote fixes | Limited, often a reboot | Over-the-air software updates, 24/7 |
| Truck rolls | Often to diagnose, then again to repair | <1% of issues, with diagnosis and parts |
| As the network grows | Support staff and OpEx grow linearly with station count | Gets more reliable with every site |
Electric Era designs and builds the entire charging system: hardware, software, firmware and the power electronics inside. Because we own every layer, we see nearly everything between the grid and the car, and we can change any part of it with a software update.
Every component reports what it’s doing, live, on one shared system.
A local controller at each site can adjust power in under 3 milliseconds.
We wrote the code at every layer, so we can update any of it over the air.
No finger-pointing between hardware maker, software vendor and operator.
Look for a provider that guarantees first plug-in success and per-port uptime in the contract. Electric Era is the only one that financially guarantees first plug-in success (85% or better). We also guarantee 98% per-port uptime.
The federal NEVI program requires at least 97% average annual uptime per port. A strong provider guarantees above that, measured per port. Electric Era guarantees 98%.
There are two separate problems. Downtime: chargers go offline because of hardware faults in the power electronics or cooling, software and firmware bugs, lost network connections, problems with the site’s power supply, or physical damage like cut cables. Repairs are slow when problems are only found through driver complaints and every fix needs a technician visit. Failed sessions: even when a charger is up, a session can fail on the handshake with the vehicle, on payment, or because the driver isn’t sure what to do. Electric Era’s chargers recover from most faults automatically, and we fix session failures with software updates across the network.
Yes. Electric Era’s 2026 State of Retail-First EV Charging report found stations with reliability scores of 90 or higher averaged 17 sessions a day, versus 3 for stations below 90. Drivers stop returning to chargers that fail them.
The share of sessions that start charging the first time a driver plugs in, with no retries or calls for help. It measures what drivers actually experience, which uptime alone does not.
The charger’s software detects and recovers from known faults on its own. If that doesn’t work, our 24/7 operations center pushes a software fix over the air. Together that resolves over 99% of issues remotely.
Yes. “Level 3” is the common name for DC fast charging, typically 50 kW and up. Level 2 is slower AC charging.
Match the charger to how long customers stay. For visits under an hour, like grocery, c-store or quick-service, Level 3 gives drivers a meaningful charge during the visit. Level 2 suits stays of several hours.
No. Electric Era builds and operates battery-backed DC fast-charging stations for retailers.
