Company premises are the preferred location for fleets for vehicle charging, according to research from Arval.
The 2026 Arval Fleet and Mobility Observatory showed that 89% of businesses operating cars and vans have already adopted or plan to adopt policies to promote charging at work, compared to 69% for public chargers and 18% at home.
John Peters, head of Arval Mobility Observatory in the UK, said: “Accessing power at work provides a high degree of control over both the cost and availability of charging, notably for van fleets.
“It means businesses can be sure that vehicles start each day fully charged and ready for work, which has real operational value.
“Of course, for many businesses, it is necessary to top up workplace charging with use of public infrastructure, which accounts for its apparently high level of popularity, but it is surprising to see fewer than one in five of those surveyed opting for home charging.
“For car fleets especially, this is a cheap and effective means of operating electric vehicles, and we would expect more fleets to opt for this method as electrification increases.”
The research also found that businesses are backing these preferences with investment – 26% have already installed workplace charging, and 28% plan to do so within the next 12 months.
Peters said: “Installing large numbers of workplace chargers may seems quite expensive as well as complex and time consuming, depending on the site, but it does mean that fleets have a charging resource that should provide dependable, cheap power for decades into the future. It’s a worthwhile investment.”
There is also a feeling that charging availability generally is lacking, with 41% of fleets believing there are not enough public charging points and 41% insufficient numbers of home chargers.
Peters added: “The numbers of chargers of all types in the UK is actually rising quickly but, as the number of electric cars and vans grows equally rapidly, so is demand.
“It’s easy to feel as though infrastructure investment is not keeping pace with EV expansion.”
Arval noted that there is little variance in the results for any of these questions by either size of fleet or when UK results are compared internationally.
Peters said: “It appears that everyone is in the same boat. Electrification is a long-term project and charging is a key element that presents almost identical challenges to all fleets, wherever they are based.”
