EV car-park grants & funding in 2026
The honest version: less capital grant than the marketing implies, but a genuinely valuable tax position — and the two are routinely confused. Here is exactly what applies to a car park.
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The Workplace Charging Scheme pays 75% up to £500 per socket (max 40 sockets, a £20,000 cap) on workplace and staff bays — not public parking — to 31 March 2027. Public and council car parks look to the £381m LEVI Fund via their local authority. The old staff-and-fleets infrastructure grant has closed. But the real prize on a serious owner-operated scheme is tax: new charge-point equipment qualifies for a 100% first-year allowance (to 31 March 2027 for companies), which usually outweighs the grant — take your own tax advice.
Live funding routes (as at July 2026)
Workplace Charging Scheme (WCS)
workplace/staff baysup to £500 per socket (raised from £350 on 1 April 2026), covering 75% of purchase-and-install cost, capped at 40 sockets across all your sites — a hard ceiling of £20,000. Open to businesses, charities and public-sector organisations for dedicated off-street WORKPLACE/staff/fleet bays. Confirmed until 31 March 2027. Crucially it does NOT cover public off-street or on-street parking, so a public car park cannot use it — a distinction most content gets wrong.
WCS for state-funded education institutions
educationa higher rate of up to £2,000 per socket (max 40 sockets) for schools, colleges and other state-funded education sites.
LEVI (Local Electric Vehicle Infrastructure) Fund
public sectorthe ~£381m England fund (roughly £343m capital + ~£38m capability) that replaced ORCS, routed through local authorities to roll out mainly on-street and residential/destination charging. A public or council car park accesses it by partnering with the council, not by applying directly. In active delivery through 2026-27.
EV chargepoint grant for residential landlords
mixed residential sitesup to £500 per socket, up to 200 sockets across all sites, for private landlords, social housing, property-management companies and the public sector — relevant where a car park serves residential units.
EV chargepoint grant for renters and flat-owner-occupiers
flatsup to £500 per socket (75% of cost) for the occupant of a rented or owned flat with off-street parking.
Strategic Charging Infrastructure (SCI) scheme
strategic/en-routethe successor to the scrapped £950m Rapid Charging Fund (which was never deployed); around £190m of a wider £400m 2026-2030 EV allocation, aimed at en-route and strategic charging. Consultation ran to 28 July 2026 — one to watch rather than a live application route for a typical car park.
The tax position — usually the bigger prize
100% First-Year Allowance
A 100% First-Year Allowance (FYA) applies to NEW, unused EV charge-point equipment — extended (policy paper 26 Nov 2025) to expenditure incurred up to 31 March 2027 for Corporation Tax and 5 April 2027 for Income Tax. Second-hand or mixed-use kit falls back to the Annual Investment Allowance / main pool. This first-year write-off usually dwarfs the Workplace Charging Scheme voucher on a serious car-park project. Take your own tax advice.
VAT
Electricity supplied at public EV charge points is treated by HMRC as standard-rated 20% (Revenue & Customs Brief 4 (2026)); a First-tier Tribunal decision (Charge My Street v HMRC) that a 5% reduced rate could apply to supplies of 1,000 kWh or less a month is under appeal, so 20% stands for now. VAT-registered businesses can generally recover input VAT on the installation. Take VAT advice.
Worked example: the grant and tax stack on a workplace car park
Take an employer fitting 10× 22kW AC bays in its staff car park at an indicative £45,000 of qualifying spend. Because these are dedicated staff bays, the Workplace Charging Scheme applies — and it stacks with the tax position:
| Step | Effect | Indicative value |
|---|---|---|
| Workplace Charging Scheme | 75% of cost, capped at £500/socket — 10 sockets = £5,000 cap reached well within the 40-socket limit | −£5,000 |
| Net capital spend | the figure the business actually funds | £40,000 |
| 100% First-Year Allowance | the whole £40,000 written off against taxable profit in year one; at 25% corporation tax that is a ~£10,000 tax saving | −£10,000 (tax) |
| Recoverable VAT | a VAT-registered business generally reclaims input VAT on the installation | reclaimed |
| Effective net cost | after grant and first-year tax relief (take your own tax advice) | ~£30,000 |
The tax relief here (~£10,000) is worth twice the grant (£5,000) — which is exactly why the tax position, not the voucher, is usually the bigger prize on a serious scheme. On a public car park the WCS line disappears (it does not cover public parking), and a fully-funded operator model becomes the more common route.
How the routes actually work
- Workplace Charging Scheme — an OZEV-authorised installer applies for the voucher on your behalf; you need dedicated off-street staff/fleet bays and the chargepoints installed and claimed within 180 days of the voucher issue.
- LEVI (public/council) — you don't apply directly; a public or council car park is delivered through the local authority's LEVI programme and procurement, so the route is a conversation with the council, not a form.
- 100% First-Year Allowance — claimed through your normal corporation-tax return on new, unused charge-point equipment; second-hand or mixed-use kit falls back to the Annual Investment Allowance.
What has closed — ignore content that still quotes these
- The EV infrastructure grant for staff and fleets (SMEs) — closed: customer applications ended 31 March 2026 and installer claims 26 May 2026. Its £350/socket + up to £500/parking-space infrastructure and £15,000 building cap are still quoted across the web but are gone; do not build a business case on it.
- The commercial landlord chargepoint grant — closed 31 March 2026.
- The On-Street Residential Chargepoint Scheme (ORCS) — closed to new applications (March 2025) and folded into the LEVI Fund. Avoid citing the secondary-source '~21,000 chargepoints / ~£83m'; the official DfT figure for completed ORCS projects (as at 1 April 2026) is 17,181 devices and £58.4m of grant, with the true total higher as partially-completed projects are excluded.
Which route fits which car park
The single biggest mistake is assuming one scheme covers everything. It doesn't — the route follows whether the bays are workplace, public or council.
| Car park | Primary funding route | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Workplace / office / fleet depot | Workplace Charging Scheme + 100% FYA | Dedicated staff/fleet bays — the WCS's exact eligibility. |
| Hotel (staff/guest, private) | WCS (private bays) + FYA | Guest and staff bays on a private site can qualify. |
| Retail / supermarket / shopping centre | Commercial CPO funding or owner-operated + FYA | Public off-street — no WCS; a fully-funded operator or the tax route. |
| Public / council | LEVI Fund via the local authority | Council-delivered; the operator you partner with matters more than a grant form. |
| Park & ride / transport hub | LEVI / transport-decarbonisation funding | Usually council or transport-authority owned. |
We tell you which of these applies to your specific site — rather than listing every scheme as if you qualify for all of them.
What is genuinely time-limited
The Workplace Charging Scheme’s £500/socket rate and the 100% first-year tax allowance both run to 31 March 2027. That is a real window, not a sales countdown — it simply means the numbers are at their best now, so it is worth getting the feasibility and any grant application under way rather than leaving it.
Grant & funding questions
What grants can a car park get in 2026?
It depends on the site. Workplace/staff bays can claim the Workplace Charging Scheme — up to £500 per socket (75% of cost, max 40 sockets, £20,000 cap), confirmed to 31 March 2027 — but it does NOT cover public off-street parking. Public and council car parks look to the LEVI Fund via their local authority. Schools get up to £2,000 per socket. The old staff-and-fleets infrastructure grant closed in 2026, so ignore content that still quotes it. On a serious owner-operated scheme the 100% First-Year Allowance on new charge-point equipment (to 31 March 2027 for companies) is usually worth more than the grant.
What happens at the end of a funded charging contract?
Read the lease. Funded deals typically run 15-25 years and cover who owns the kit at expiry, break clauses, make-good/removal, and whether the charging equipment constrains future redevelopment of the site. We review these terms so you don't sign away site value — the detail the operator's own sales page won't dwell on.