AFIR for your public chargers.
The EU regulation sets rules for payment, prices and data at every charger the public can use. Plugchoice monitors and controls your chargers over OCPP, next to the back office that takes payment.
What AFIR asks of a public charger
AFIR has applied since 13 April 2024 to every charger the public can use, also on private ground such as the car park of a shop or a hotel.
| Rule | From | In Plugchoice |
|---|---|---|
| Pay without a contractNew chargers take a card reader or contactless payment, and below 50 kW a QR code may do. From 1 January 2027 this also holds for older chargers from 50 kW along the TEN-T road network or in a safe and secure parking area. | 13 April 2024 | Through your back office. Plugchoice Billing is planned for the fourth quarter of 2026. |
| The price before the sessionFrom 50 kW, new chargers show a price per kWh, plus any fee per minute for staying too long. Below 50 kW, new chargers make every part of the price available at the charger, per kWh first, then per minute, per session and any other. | 13 April 2024 | Through your back office. |
| Digitally connectedEvery public charger sends and receives data in real time and can be monitored and controlled from a distance, including starting and stopping a session and measuring the electricity. | 14 October 2024 | Live status, remote start and stop, and the energy of every session, over OCPP. |
| Capable of smart chargingChargers installed after 13 April 2024, and chargers renovated after 14 October 2024, can adjust their current in real time. | 13 April 2024 | The charger. Smart Charging then adjusts its current in real time. |
| Open dataData such as location, connectors and power, plus status, availability and the ad hoc price, through a free API registered with the national access point. | 14 April 2025 | Through your back office. |
| A fixed cable on DCEvery public DC charger has its charging cable attached. | 14 April 2025 | The charger. |
| ISO 15118 between car and chargerNew and renovated public chargers speak ISO 15118-2, and from 1 January 2027 also ISO 15118-20. | 8 January 2026 | The charger. |
Monitored and controlled from your desk
Plugchoice reads every charger over OCPP and sends its commands from the web portal.
- Live status per connectorAvailable, Charging or Faulted, translated from each brand's own codes.
- Start and stop remotelyEnd a session or release a cable without going to the charger.
- The energy of every sessionEach transaction with its start, end and kWh.
- Every OCPP message keptFilter and export the log of each charger.
Smart charging on new and renovated chargers
Smart Charging adjusts the current of each charger in real time over OCPP, on chargers that support it. How smart charging works
- A limit per groupGive each part of a site its own limit under the main fuse.
- Power for the cars that chargePlugchoice divides the power between the cars that are charging at that moment.
- What the building leavesWith a meter on the main connection, the chargers use the power the building does not.
Payment, prices and data through your back office
Plugchoice can pass the charger's connection on to the back office you already use. The back office that takes payment, sets prices and serves the open data can stay connected to every charger. How the connection is shared
- Your back office billsIt authorizes each session and takes the payment.
- Nothing lost when it is offlinePlugchoice holds its messages and sends them on when it is back.
- Switch without a visitAdd or drop a back office. The chargers stay online.
- Plugchoice Billing, plannedA payment terminal, a QR code and charge cards from other providers, from the fourth quarter of 2026 in the countries our payment partner covers. About Billing
AFIR in the news
Munich court bars EWE Go from charging roaming provider DCS more than its own app customers
The Landgericht München I ruled on 6 October 2026 (case 33 O 2062/25) that charge point operator EWE Go may not charge the roaming provider Digital Charging Solutions (DCS) more per kWh than it charges its own contract customers. DCS runs charging services for BMW and Mercedes-Benz and is a joint venture of BMW, Mercedes-Benz and BP.
At the same charge point in January 2025, EWE Go billed DCS 0.837 euros per kWh through its B2B Offer2All rate, ad-hoc payers 0.79 euros and registered app customers 0.52 euros, according to electrive. The court read Article 5(3) of the EU's AFIR regulation, which bars discrimination between end users and mobility service providers, as covering that gap, and did not accept EWE Go's reasons of administrative cost, customer service and business risk. EWE Go must also compensate DCS for losses since AFIR took effect on 13 April 2024; the amount is not yet set. Plugchoice has not seen the judgment itself; the figures here are as electrive reports them.
The ruling is first instance and not final. EWE Go told electrive it needs time to study the reasoning and cannot comment further while proceedings continue.
For operators, the ruling puts every price a roaming partner pays next to the price their own customers pay. Plugchoice tracks EWE Go and other charge point operators in its operator directory.
Easee trims its EU range to two chargers, and points at AFIR and ISO 15118 as the reason
Easee announced on 23 September 2026 that it is narrowing its EU charger range to two models: Charge Max for home use and Charge Pro for larger sites. Charge Core and Charge Up are being discontinued in EU markets, with a last-buy date of 31 October 2026 and full phase-out by 31 December 2026. The previously announced Charge Up2 will not launch at all. Norway and Switzerland sit outside the timeline and keep Charge Up; the UK range is unaffected.
Easee's own reasoning: Charge Core and Charge Up were designed before the EU's AFIR metering and V2X requirements existed and cannot be brought up to that standard, while Charge Max and Charge Pro ship with MID-certified metering, ISO 15118 support and V2X-ready hardware built in from the factory. Easee says the move gives installers and customers a clearer choice and one certification path to manage instead of two. Units already installed keep their existing warranty and service.
This is a single-source announcement, Easee's own, with no independent coverage yet; it is a valid primary source for the company's own product decision. It is also an early sign of a pattern worth watching: as AFIR's metering and V2X clauses phase in, they are starting to prune charger ranges, not just add a checkbox to a spec sheet. For anyone running Easee hardware in a mixed fleet, OCPP connectivity does not end with the sales stop: what backend it runs on stays a separate question.
Plug and Charge arrives on AC chargers, and it is a backend feature now
Chargecloud, a Cologne-based charge point management vendor, announced at the Intercharge Network Conference in Berlin on 1 September 2026 that it has integrated Hubject's Plug and Charge public key infrastructure into its own management system. Operators running on Chargecloud get the feature without doing an integration themselves. Until now Plug and Charge has largely been a DC fast-charging story; this puts it on AC points, which is where most charging actually happens.
Nothing changed in the charger: the prerequisites Hubject names are an ISO 15118-2 capable charging point, a correspondingly equipped vehicle and a valid contract certificate stored in the vehicle by a Plug and Charge capable e-mobility provider. Everything else is certificate handling between the backend and a PKI. That is the same layer an OCPP backend like Plugchoice occupies, and it is why the same capability is not tied to one vendor's hardware.
Two things follow for anyone with AC points on private terrain. First, ISO 15118-2 support in the charger is the hard prerequisite, and it is worth knowing which of your models actually have it before anyone promises driver-side convenience. Second, the gap between having it and using it is a PKI relationship and certificate handling, not a protocol rewrite. With AFIR obligations arriving on 1 January 2027, that distinction decides whether a site needs new hardware or new software.
Questions about AFIR
If the public can use it, yes, also on private ground such as the car park of a shop or a hotel. A charger at home or in a car park only your own staff can enter is not publicly accessible.
No. AFIR places its duties on the operator, and they cover the charger, the payment terminal and the back office. Plugchoice monitors and controls the charger over OCPP and, with Smart Charging, adjusts its current, next to the back office that takes payment.
Today through the back office you connect, if it offers it. Plugchoice Billing, with a payment terminal, a QR code and charge cards from other providers, is planned for the fourth quarter of 2026, in the countries our payment partner covers.
Plugchoice can pass the connection on to 300+ back offices on our integration list. See the back offices
Chargers of 348 brands work with Plugchoice, depending on model, software version and settings. The charger list shows which models support Smart Charging. See the charger list
The platform is free for every charger, location and user. Smart Charging is €29 a year per AC socket, €89 for five years or €199 once, and a DC socket counts three times. Prices include VAT. See pricing
Start in the web portal
Create a free account, point a charger at wss://ocpp.plugchoice.com and it appears in the portal.
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