Indra Smart PRO vs EVEC VEC03

A £46 gap — and a product lifecycle problem

Both of these chargers sit at the budget end of the UK smart-charger market, and both include protection hardware that shaves roughly £100 off a typical install bill. The Indra Smart PRO costs £395. The EVEC VEC03 costs £349. That £46 difference is real, but it is not the interesting part of this comparison.

The interesting part: the VEC03 is a discontinued product. EVEC has replaced it with the vecGO 2.0, and what remains of the VEC03 is run-out stock. The Indra, by contrast, is a current, supported unit with active tariff integrations and a CT clamp in the box. The question is not whether £46 matters — it is whether buying end-of-line hardware to save it makes sense.

• Indra Smart PRO — £395, current product, smart-tariff scheduling, solar mode with included CT clamp, 6-metre cable.
• EVEC VEC03 — £349, discontinued, OCPP 1.6J but no direct tariff API, built-in RCD and PEN protection, 5-metre cable.

The Indra's included kit changes the arithmetic

At £395, the Indra Smart PRO includes a surge protection device and a CT clamp for solar diversion. On a standard install, the SPD alone typically saves £100–£150 in parts and labour; the CT clamp saves another £50–£100 if you have panels. Add those up and the effective unit cost drops to somewhere around £150–£250 — well below the VEC03's £349, and among the cheapest all-in costs on the market.

The VEC03 has its own protection story: a Type A RCD with 6 mA DC leakage detection and PEN fault protection, built in. That saves a similar £100 or so on install. But solar integration requires a separate CT clamp purchase, and there is no SPD in the box. For a home without solar panels and no plans to add them, the VEC03's protection bundle is adequate. For anyone with panels — or thinking about them — the Indra includes the hardware the EVEC charges extra for.

Smart tariffs: one charger talks to your supplier, the other does not

This is where the £46 gap becomes a chasm. The Indra Smart PRO has direct scheduling integrations with Octopus Intelligent Go, Octopus Go, OVO Charge Anytime, and EDF GoElectric. Set it up once and the charger handles off-peak windows — 8p/kWh on Intelligent Go, 6.99p/kWh on GoElectric — without you touching the app again.

The VEC03 has no direct smart-tariff API. It is not on Octopus's Intelligent Go compatible list. It supports OCPP 1.6J, which means third-party back-ends like Monta can manage it — but that is an extra layer of software, an extra account, and an extra point of failure. The VEC03's own app has a scheduling function, but customer reports of intermittent Wi-Fi reliability make it a shaky foundation for off-peak charging. If your tariff has a fixed overnight window — say British Gas EV Power at 9p/kWh between midnight and 05:00 — you can set a timer and hope. On anything variable, the VEC03 is out of its depth.

For buyers on a flat-rate tariff with no off-peak window at all, none of this matters. But most EV owners switch to an EV tariff within six months. The Indra is ready for that day. The VEC03 is not.

The discontinued question

Buying run-out stock is not inherently foolish. The VEC03 still carries a three-year parts-and-labour warranty with a 48-hour engineer callout, and OCPP support means it is not entirely locked to EVEC's own cloud. But firmware updates, app improvements, and long-term parts availability all become uncertain once a manufacturer moves on. EVEC is already promoting the vecGO 2.0 on the VEC03's own product page — a signal that is hard to misread.

The Indra, for all its faults — the app is basic, the installer network is smaller than Ohme or myenergi — is a product its manufacturer is actively selling and supporting. That counts for something over a three-year warranty period and beyond.

If the VEC03's price is the draw, consider the Vorsprung Alpha Max at £265 or the techtron EV7 at £299 — both cheaper still and current products. And if you want the Indra's tariff smarts but with a better app and broader installer network, the Ohme Home Pro vs Indra Smart PRO comparison is the next page to read.

The verdict

Buy the Indra Smart PRO if:

• You want smart-tariff scheduling that works out of the box with Intelligent Go, Go, OVO Charge Anytime, or GoElectric
• You have solar panels or plan to install them — the CT clamp is included
• You want a current, supported product with a 6-metre cable

Buy the EVEC VEC03 if:

• You are on a flat-rate tariff and do not need tariff automation
• You want the lowest possible unit price for an OZEV-approved charger with built-in RCD and PEN protection
• You accept that this is discontinued stock and are comfortable with that trade-off

For most buyers, the Indra Smart PRO is the right choice. The £46 premium buys a product that is still being made, software that talks to UK energy suppliers, and solar hardware in the box. The VEC03 is cheap — but cheap and discontinued is a combination that ages poorly.