Answer
There may be occasions where you find your charger is offline in the Hive app. As with all technology, signal can be affected by environmental factors and human factors. The connection can also be interrupted due to safety features within the EV Charger itself.
The actions you can take to resolve offline issues with your charger depend on the charger that you have, and the way in which it connects to the Hive platform.
If your Hive EV charger does drop offline, it will continue to work as per your last set schedule setting/charging mode, prior to the charger dropping offline. For example, if charger was set to off-peak charging in the app whilst online, it will continue to charge between the off-peak times you have input via your tariff information whilst offline.
Note: You will not be able to change the charging mode/schedule until your charger is back online and talking to the platform again.
Possible reasons for your Hive EV charger dropping offline:
- Location of your charger – material constructs such as metal, brick, stone or wood can cause signal loss (for example, if your charger is inside of a garage made of concrete and metal). Distance to the Wi-Fi router can also impact EO chargers.
- Mobile masts are down – this can impact the data your charger receives through the SIM card and result in disconnections.
- Poor weather – this can weaken the GSM signal to your SIM card in your charger (particularly thunderstorms with intense electrical activity and snow/ice building up on masts).
- Faulty SIM - Occasionally a SIM card can be faulty.
- Poor Wi-Fi connectivity, i.e. Charger is too far from your router (EO charger only)
Some initial checks you can do:
- Does your EV Charger have power? Check for a light on the front of the charger or with your charging cable to see if the cable locks in to your vehicle. If there seems to be no power, check the main supply switch for the fuse and confirm it is in the ‘on’ position. If not, turn this on, check for a light on the charger and wait for 5-10 minutes to see if the charger comes back online in the app.
- If your charger has power, what light is currently on the front of the charger? The lights can help to understand what the charger is doing. Please see What do the lights on my Alfen charger mean? or What do the lights on my EO charger mean?
- If your charger has power, are there any known issues with mobile data and signal in your area which might impact the connection? Or if your EO charger is connected to Wi-Fi, are there any issues with your Wi-Fi or the internet in your area? If you are experiencing Wi-Fi issues locally or in your area, you will need to resolve this first by talking to your Internet Service Provider, or if you’re already aware of the issue
- Have you noticed any power surges or flickering lights around your home/the property where the charger is installed? This could indicate that you may be having over or under voltage issues with your charger. When this occurs, the in built (if EO or external if Alfen) electrical load management will cut the charger off and it may drop offline. This is a safety feature to protect you, your home electrical set-up and your EV charger. If you have noticed this, then we would recommend you get in touch so we can review this with you.
We offer in-app troubleshooting steps for the chargers as well. You just need to go into your Hive app and tap on your EV charger (or Fix your charger on the dashboard) and this will prompt you to start troubleshooting.