EVEC VEC03 vs Andersen Quartz

£349 versus £672 — what the gap actually buys

The EVEC VEC03 is £349 of run-out stock with built-in electrical protection and a three-year warranty. The Andersen Quartz is £672, with eleven finishes, a seven-year warranty, and smart-tariff hooks the EVEC lacks entirely. The £323 between them is not a small number — it is roughly the cost of a standard installation. Whether it is well spent depends on two things: how long you intend to keep the charger, and whether your tariff can earn back the difference.

• EVEC VEC03 — the cheapest OZEV-approved option here, with Type A RCD and PEN fault protection inside the box. A budget buy on borrowed time: EVEC has replaced it with the vecGO 2.0, and remaining stock is finite.
• Andersen Quartz — the entry-level Andersen. No hidden cable drum (that is the A3), but seven years of warranty, IP65 weatherproofing, and direct integration with Intelligent Octopus Go and OVO Charge Anytime.

The EVEC VEC03's one genuine advantage — and its shelf life

Most chargers at this price expect you to add an external RCD and PEN fault device during installation. The VEC03 packs both inside the unit. That saves roughly £100 off the installer's bill, bringing total outlay — unit plus fitting — to around £700–£900. For a charger that meets BS 7671 and carries OZEV approval, that is about as low as the market goes.

The catch is printed on EVEC's own product page: this model is superseded. The vecGO 2.0 (VEC03-N) is the replacement, and once run-out stock clears, spare parts and firmware updates become a question mark. A three-year warranty covers you for a while. Seven years — what the Quartz offers — covers you for considerably longer, and on a product its manufacturer is still actively selling.

The other weakness is software. The VEC03 has no smart-tariff API. It is not on the Intelligent Octopus Go compatible list. It cannot talk to OVO Charge Anytime. You can set a manual schedule via the EVEC app to hit a fixed off-peak window — Octopus Go at 8.5p/kWh between 00:30 and 05:30, say — but the app's reliability is the recurring customer complaint. Scheduled sessions have been reported as intermittent, and with no 4G fallback, a dropped Wi-Fi connection means a missed charge.

Where the Quartz earns its premium — and where it does not

The Andersen Quartz integrates with Intelligent Octopus Go (since September 2025) and OVO Charge Anytime. On Intelligent Go, that means 8p/kWh across a six-hour off-peak window, with the charger and supplier coordinating session timing automatically. The VEC03 cannot do this at all. Over a year of typical UK mileage, the per-kWh saving from automated off-peak charging versus occasionally missed manual schedules is modest in isolation — a few tens of pounds — but it compounds, and the Quartz has seven years to do the compounding.

The Quartz also includes a CT clamp for solar diversion, something the VEC03 offers only as a separately purchased accessory. If you have panels, the Quartz handles surplus export without additional hardware.

One important caveat: the Andersen Quartz's OZEV approval is not confirmed on the current eligible-chargepoint list. If you rent or own a flat and are counting on the £500 grant, verify before ordering. The VEC03 is OZEV-approved, and at £349 the grant covers the unit outright and contributes to install costs too.

The Quartz does not, however, chase half-hourly rates. On Octopus Agile, where prices shift every 30 minutes, neither charger can optimise dynamically. For that, the Ohme Home Pro at £539 remains the better tool — and it sits almost exactly between these two on price.

Which to buy

Buy the EVEC VEC03 if:

• You want the lowest possible total cost — unit plus installation — and a flat-rate or simple off-peak tariff like Octopus Go means manual scheduling is enough.
• You qualify for the £500 OZEV grant and want confirmed eligibility without checking twice.
• You accept that this is end-of-line stock and a three-year warranty is sufficient for your plans.

Buy the Andersen Quartz if:

• You want a charger its manufacturer still actively supports, with a seven-year warranty behind it.
• You are on or moving to Intelligent Octopus Go or OVO Charge Anytime and want automated off-peak charging without relying on a flaky app schedule.
• Finish matters — eleven colours and optional Accoya or carbon inserts mean the Quartz sits on a front wall without looking like electrical infrastructure.

For most buyers, the honest middle ground is neither of these. The Ohme Home Pro at £539 offers smarter tariff integration than the Quartz and more reliable software than the VEC03, with OZEV approval confirmed. But if the decision is strictly between these two — and £323 is the question — the Quartz is the charger you will still be glad of in year five. The VEC03 is the charger you buy when the budget is fixed and the wall is round the back.