Charge Assist Beta Has Ended

[SONEWBE]

Per email from Ford, the Charge Assist beta program has ended. EA members with the app will retain that function. Ford plans to make the app public ”soon”. What did beta testers think of the app?

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[Jimrpa]

Well, THAT didn’t take long! ?
I guess it was useful if you used it ?‍

 

[DevSecOps]

So it went from beta to EAP? I don't think that changes your requirement for confidentiality.

Edit: it was clarified that it's free to discuss publicly. Ignore this ^^^

 

[machme]

From the email "We would also like you to know that the feature will soon become available to the public and you are no longer required to keep your participation in this beta test confidential."

It was useful. Glad they are going to make it public. I did find app launch and charger activation to be slow sometimes.

 

[hbirring01]

I think making it usable only in park or when you're stopped makes this and a lot of the sync interface useless...

 

[machme]

I think making it usable only in park or when you're stopped makes this and a lot of the sync interface useless...

Agreed, plus the slow load times did not help

 

[Deleted member 16048]

So it went from beta to EAP? I don't think that changes your requirement for confidentiality.

No, the E-mail we received stated we are free to discuss and no longer under NDA. It will be public soon, but those who were in beta, will keep it until launch. They didn't state it was being released to EA members so will see if non beta EA members will get it first.

I rarely used it. Maybe once to try it out and see if I liked that experience more than activating via the charger.

For me, I can see this useful on chargers that I don't have an account for, or NFC card in Apple Wallet for. Otherwise it didn't remove any friction in the experience. Right now, it was limited to EA, ChargePoint, EVgo and other "BlueOval" networked chargers. I have Plug & Charge for EA and EVgo, so didn't need to use it, and for ChargePoint I have my NFC pass on my Apple Watch. It's faster to activate with that, than using Charge Assist.

I hope they expand Pug & Charge compatibility as that would be perfect. However, if they can add more of the random chargers like Volta, Shell, Circle K, ect. that will help make it more useful.

 

[DevSecOps]

No, the E-mail we received stated we are free to discuss and no longer under NDA

Thanks, I didn't elect to participate because I only take the Rivian on longer trips and therefore didn't see the email.

Also, EA is normally used for Electricity America. EAP is the Ford Early Access Program acronym that they use so it would be helpful if forum members used it as well.

 

[Mach-Lee]

My biggest complaint is that it didn’t work while you were driving, otherwise it would have been a very convenient way of checking charger status ahead of time from the screen.

 

[kennethjk]

My biggest complaint is that it didn’t work while you were driving, otherwise it would have been a very convenient way of checking charger status ahead of time from the screen.

So after driving for 2 hours or whatever you need to pull off the road, put the car in park to see if there chargers available, and you need to be at least 30 minutes out so you can “get battery to optimum” temp. If none are available in 30 minutes you have to do that all over again at another potential stop?

 

[Jimrpa]

I should go back and read what it was. ?

 

[hack-e]

It could be better, but it helped me on a few trips. I am likely to continue to use it.

 

[Neil4Real]

My biggest complaint is that it didn’t work while you were driving, otherwise it would have been a very convenient way of checking charger status ahead of time from the screen.

I tried to use it when I first got it, realized I couldn't while driving so I just took a chance and went to a close charger and it wasn't supported by it.

I then tried again a couple of weeks later to help with feedback and ran into the same issue, forgetting I couldn't use it while driving. I went to a charger that had FORD ADS RUNNING and it wasn't supported. How lame is that, be Ford and pay to have your MME showing off on this huge screen but it doesn't even support charge assist!

Why can't cars just implement some stupid warning saying are you the passenger and let you do whatever you want. Or even just have a pop up whenever you turn the car on, saying you acknowledge it isn't safe to operate all functions of the screen while driving and only a passenger will or something legal like that. BETTER YET, put a setting where you can just permanently acknowledge. The future: being able to use all features of your screen when you want to. So ridiculous.

 

[Mach-Lee]

So after driving for 2 hours or whatever you need to pull off the road, put the car in park to see if there chargers available, and you need to be at least 30 minutes out so you can “get battery to optimum” temp. If none are available in 30 minutes you have to do that all over again at another potential stop?

More like you had a specific charging station in mind you're navigating too, but when you arrive you find the station is suddenly full or offline. The next closest open charger is 40 miles the other way. If you could access Charge Assist while driving, you could have maybe seen the station was full ahead of time and gone to the other option before you wasted your electrons.

In aviation you have a primary and alternate airport in your flight plan, and when you get close to the primary airport you check the weather. If the weather is bad at the primary airport, then you divert to the alternate before you run out of fuel. Road trip charging has to work the same way. Not having a way to check charger status while driving would be like if pilots were expected to navigate to an airport without a radio to receive weather broadcasts.

BTW I didn't check if they removed that limitation from the release version or if it's still in place today. Anybody check?

 

[Mach-Lee]

I tried to use it when I first got it, realized I couldn't while driving so I just took a chance and went to a close charger and it wasn't supported by it.

I then tried again a couple of weeks later to help with feedback and ran into the same issue, forgetting I couldn't use it while driving. I went to a charger that had FORD ADS RUNNING and it wasn't supported. How lame is that, be Ford and pay to have your MME showing off on this huge screen but it doesn't even support charge assist!

Why can't cars just implement some stupid warning saying are you the passenger and let you do whatever you want. Or even just have a pop up whenever you turn the car on, saying you acknowledge it isn't safe to operate all functions of the screen while driving and only a passenger will or something legal like that. BETTER YET, put a setting where you can just permanently acknowledge. The future: being able to use all features of your screen when you want to. So ridiculous.

It's possible you had a filter on so that specific charge station didn't show up. The filters had an option for AC (↯), slow DC (↯↯), and fast DC (↯↯↯) (denoted with lightning bolts). I forgot what the default filter was, I think ↯↯↯? so only fast stations may show up by default.

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