I had called a couple weeks ago to let my Electric Distribution Company (Oncor in our area) know about my pending Volt delivery.

The first person I talked to was just a person in Customer Service. The next person to call didn't have a clue what I was talking about but he promised he would get someone in contact with me as he knew Electric Cars were a point of interest for their company.

A couple of days later I get a call from someone that was very excited about their first call concerning a pending electric car charging station installation. He told me he would have a team out to survey my area and my home to make sure they had everything in order. He also told me they had already set up a meeting two weeks from now to discuss their Electric Car Strategies and what help they could provide. He promised to keep in the loop.

Today they came out and did their survey and left me a card for the person I had talked to. That person had also left me a voice mail. He said it looked like everything was going to be fine. We had plenty of transformer in the neighborhood and that all the wiring from the transformer to my house was in great condition.

He did request some more information on the Charging Station we would be installing. His card had his email address on it so I emailed him a link to the recent story on this site about the charging station Chevy was recommending. That article also mentions the 3.3KW demand which was another one of his questions.

For all you future Volt owners I highly recommend you take advantage of this free service from your local electric utility so you don't run into any last minute installations problems of your charging stations. Your electrical contractor may have to pull a permit for the 240volt charging station installation and having this ground work done in advance will just save you time, especially if their are any issues they can take care of ahead of time for you.

Jerry

Thanks Jerry for the report! I hope to be buying a new house early next year (when it rains it pours) so I'm not bothering with the EVSE installation right away. I'll be on the cutting edge with the first wave of Volt deliveries (and perhaps first in my state) but I'll be farther back in line on EVSE installs. Hopefully someone else here in Atlanta will prime that process so I can just skate through next spring :)

But I'm probably going to go ahead and BUY the EVSE equipment before year-end just to get the tax credits. It'll just sit there boxed up until I can install it in the new house.

Thanks Jerry for this great tip! I'll call my utility tomorrow and see if they'll do a survey. I'll keep you posted!

Jerry buddy, thanks for the tip. I am planning to have another house and this will greatly help me.
I try study on this for my plan.

I'm also planning on buying a new house soon (once I can sell my current place), so I dont want to permanently install a new charger.
If I still havent sold my place, I'm planning on adding a 240v plug to the 240v charger, and plugging it in where my old MINI E charger was, until we move.
At the new house I'll install it permanently.

I just got a call from Sarah at GM letting me know my Volt is now scheduled for production. She was very polite and filled me in on their home charging system. The initial 240 VAC chargers are being made by SGX. Sarah tranferred me over to Jen at SGX customer service. She said that if I'm interested (I am!) that I should fill out their online survey. If I'm one of the 4000 Volt Owners accepted by their survey, I could be eligible for the free 240 volt charging station. Jen didn't mention it, but the SGX website recommends that Volt owners contact their local utility to see what incentives are available for the homeowner or commercial site. SGX web site: www.homecharging.spx.com\volt
How cool is that!!