Situation
Q-Bay Center, a commercial office property in California, initially installed eight traditional chargers to support tenant EV charging needs. However, two chargers were damaged due to cable theft, costing $1,000 per cable to repair and replace, with multiple weeks of downtime waiting for an electrician to come out. More importantly, the property faced challenges with unmonitored charging sessions, no billing transparency, and vehicles overstaying after charging, creating frustration among tenants.
Additionally, Q-Bay Center’s monthly electricity costs for EV charging had risen to $4,000, highlighting the need for a more efficient and controlled charging solution.
Solution
As a commercial site, having tenants bring their own cable was not ideal due to the high turnover. Pando addressed the problem by installing two Pando+ chargers, which as a modular charger comes with a locked cable that can be easily removed and replaced, providing the perfect solution for shared-use, commercial environments.
All Pando outlets come with adaptive load management to optimize electricity use and prevent the property from exceeding its energy tier.
Through Pando’s centralized dashboard, Q-Bay Center’s management gained real-time visibility into energy consumption, billing, active users, and charger status, providing complete oversight and control.
Results
Installation was efficient due to Pando’s electrician team, with setup requiring just two modular components, reducing downtime and complexity.
The new system provided:
- Convenient billing and usage monitoring
- Real-time visibility into charger activity and user sessions
- FIFO charging control, automatically shutting off after a property-defined period to ensure equitable charger access or the car reaches 80% (whichever comes first)
- Easy, fast, and affordable cable swaps should cable theft occur
As a result, Q-Bay Center now enjoys a fair, efficient, and cost-controlled EV charging system that scales easily with tenant growth.
Watch what Vincent from Qbay has to say:
