Sainsbury’s Grant Openreach Engineers Access to UK Smart Charge Network
National broadband and network access provider Openreach (BT), which has already put 6,000 Electric Vehicles (EV) on UK roads to support their broadband and phone engineers, have today signed an agreement with Smart Charge, Sainsbury’s nationwide EV charging network, to provide its engineers with access to their “ultra-rapid charging hubs” in 80 locations across the country.
The operator, which manages the second-largest commercial vehicle fleet in the UK (c.23,000 vehicles), is currently aiming to upgrade the “vast majority” of their diesel-powered vans and cars to EVs by the end of March 2031 (supporting their Net Zero target for the same date).
The latest move makes it easier for Openreach’s telecoms engineers to keep their electric vans on the road, giving them access to 150kW rapid chargers and simple tap‑to‑pay pricing, including Nectar points on every charge, and 24/7 support.
Advertisement
The network operator has also now installed more than 3,500 home chargers for its engineers throughout the country, but one in three of their engineers are unable to install these at home and around half of their EV drivers rely primarily on public charging. This is where the deal with Sainsbury’s could come in handy.
Openreach has also previously built a partnership with First Bus, so engineers can charge their vans at First Bus depots, taking pressure off public charging points and making life easier for those who live in flats.
Judy O’Keefe, Director of Fleet at Openreach, said:
“Partnerships like this make a real difference. Switching a fleet of our size to electric is a big job, and it only works if day-to-day charging is simple for our engineers – the people who are out on the road every day keeping the country connected. Reducing emissions across the fleet also brings real benefits for local communities, with cleaner air and less noise in the towns and villages we serve.”
With this agreement, our engineers – particularly those who can’t install a home charger – have access to fast, reliable public charging at Sainsbury’s stores nationwide. They get competitive rates and earn Nectar points every time they plug in. It’s a simple, practical benefit that helps keep them moving and supports the high-quality service our customers expect.”
Openreach’s fleet is currently expected to reach 7,000 EVs by the end of March 2026 and they’ve so far also made a £3 million investment into related charging infrastructure.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
« Broadband ISP Group TalkTalk Set for £115m UK Injection from Ares Management
Advertisement
Leave a Reply
Privacy Notice: Please note that news comments are anonymous, which means that we do NOT require you to enter any real personal details to post a message and display names can be almost anything you like (provided they do not contain offensive language or impersonate a real person's legal name). By clicking to submit a post you agree to storing your entries for comment content, display name, IP and email in our database, for as long as the post remains live.
Only the submitted name and comment will be displayed in public, while the rest will be kept private (we will never share this outside of ISPreview, regardless of whether the data is real or fake). This comment system uses submitted IP, email and website address data to spot abuse and spammers. All data is transferred via an encrypted (https secure) session.
price of a 6 pack of medium eggs in sainsbury = £2
price of a 12 pack of large eggs in amazon fresh = £3
maybe they should stop fleecing people instead rather than help openreach
I can never get on anywhere . if it’s not OR it’s Octopus or Sky vans taking up all the rapids. I only charge at home now.
I don’t think you have any idea how business works, what are Sainsbury’s costs (operating stores,staff costs ect) and compare that to Amazon. How much tax does Sainsbury’s pay within the UK and how much does Amazon. I’m happy to pay a little more to buy items in Sainsbury’s.
Too many people here are defending Sainsbury’s, but it’s Openreach taking the electricity and Sainsbury’s is neglecting its electricity retail arm! I signed up our house to that years ago, but now my lights are slowly going yellow, it turns out they don’t work during power cuts, and I get shocks from my cold tap where the water now comes out all twisty. But was anyone at the Sainsbury store customer service desk interested? No, they were not! They left me to buy my electricity from the end of aisle nine, and it all comes in ridiculously little tubes! Even when I bought the largest size I had to buy 150 of them at enormous expense to get anywhere near mains voltage, but I think my grandson got his calculation wrong and didn’t realise that the TV I bought to watch GBN in the spare room can run on lower voltage too. His mother encourages me to watch in there because i can put the important bits on Facebook and she says it’s so much quicker to read it on the way to work.
I’d write to head office to complain about the electricity, but a stamp costs over a quid now.
There’s so much wrong with that comparison. For a start, choose like things.
Price of 12 medium free-range eggs today in Sainsbury is £2.85 (6 = £2.10). And large eggs is £3.30 per dozen
“By Amazon” (UK) list Large Free Range Eggs, 12 Pack, as £3.30 at time of writing (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Amazon-Large-Free-Range-Eggs/dp/B0B5VBYRF7?pd_rd_w=EoNHT&content-id=amzn1.sym.a9815179-7e43-4034-848d-25fba0812bc0&pf_rd_p=a9815179-7e43-4034-848d-25fba0812bc0&pf_rd_r=RBS7D6MRE45N8JB1Y7J5&pd_rd_wg=wGX9w&pd_rd_r=77cad9ba-2fe5-428f-8f8d-a8ae2134184c&pd_rd_i=B0B5VBYRF7&fpw=alm&almBrandId=QW1hem9uIEZyZXNo&ref_=pd_alm_fs_dsk_cp_ai_rzg_1_1_i) and £2.10 for half a dozen
Woo, must be a price match.
Then add in delivery costs and whether you are a Prime member or not and minimum order value.
Also forgot to consider how many of the eggs delivered by Amazon will actually be usable as eggs by the time an Amazon driver has managed to get them to your home…
Either way, totally and completely pointless comment – agreed!
I’m sure I’ve already seen Openreach drivers charging at Sainsbury’s – maybe they have an Electroverse or other roaming agreement, but this is now a direct agreement with Sainsbury’s for a better rate. Would make sense.