Brought to you by
Volkswagen Group
Charging GmbH
Volkswagen Group
Charging GmbH
If you are already a Volkswagen Naturstrom customer and want to switch to a different tariff, you can do so quickly and easily via the customer portal. Go to your current contract in the customer portal, and click the “SWITCH TARIFF” button to request the switch. You can find more information in the customer portal.
You can unsubscribe by clicking “Unsubscribe” at the bottom of the footer in a newsletter. Alternatively, simply write an email to vw-naturstrom-kundenservice@elli.eco .
Yes, you can also use the product as the driver of a company car, and benefit from all the advantages the tariff offers.
No, you do not need a separate electricity meter or smart meter for our tariff.
Yes, you can use our tariff even if you have your own photovoltaic system. However, there is currently no function that aligns the charging process with the electricity generated by your own solar power system. There are plans to make this functionality available to you in the future.
Yes, you can interrupt Smart Charging at any time using the Boost button. When you tap Boost in the app, your vehicle will be charged directly, without interruption, to the target charge level. You will not receive a point for this type of charging.
Yes, Elli guarantees a supply of TÜV NORD certified green electricity, 100% CO2 free, for your entire household and vehicle.
The car does not have to be connected non-stop – however, the connection should be sufficient for regular updates to your charging schedule so we can ensure charging begins when it should. We would ask you to test whether your car can connect to the mobile network from your (underground) garage; if you encounter problems, please don’t use the Smart Charging function for the time being. For the future it is planned that a complete charging schedule will be sent to your vehicle before you arrive home. This means your car won’t need to connect to a cellular network in the garage.
In Germany, renewable electricity is generated primarily from wind and solar power. At certain times of day there is little sun or wind; at others, wind and sunshine are available in abundance. At particularly sunny or windy times, renewable energy plants may have to be closed off, or ‘curtailed’, so as not to overload the power grid.
With Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect, we charge your electric car precisely at times when there is a spike in production of renewable electricity. You’ll be helping to make better use of electricity from renewable sources.
You need a compatible Volkswagen electric vehicle or plug-in hybrid: ID.3, ID.4, e-up!, e-Golf, Golf GTE, Passat GTE (with a valid Car-Net or WeConnect license). Alternatively, you own a Skoda Enyaq iV or Skoda Enyaq Coupé iV.
Your electric vehicle or plug-in hybrid should have a battery capacity of at least 7 kWh and be able to connect to the internet when you are charging at home.
Yes, as soon as your vehicle is at home and connected to the power grid or wallbox, we will automatically start the Smart Charging process for you. If you do have to charge away from home – such as at work, at a public charging station or fast-charging station, Elli will not optimize your charging process. Away from home, your vehicle battery is charged directly, as usual.
Smart Charging means we optimize the process of charging your vehicle battery, ensuring you charge whenever there are particularly high volumes of electricity available from renewable sources. This way, the electricity you buy is not only 100% CO2-neutral – you are also helping others to consume more green energy, because climate protection is teamwork. You don’t have to take any special action to make this happen – just connect your vehicle to the grid or your wallbox as soon as you get home. To earn a point for Smart Charging, you must have charged at least 7 kWh at a time, without disconnecting your car from the grid. The charge will likewise not be counted as a Smart Charge if you use the Boost button in the app to charge your battery right away.
Simply go to the menu item with the gift icon in your app. You can then redeem your points and have your electricity bill discounted by the relevant amount.
You haven’t received your Connect Bonus? No problem, just send an email to vw-naturstrom-kundenervice@elli.eco.
You receive one point from us for every Smart Charging session. After every 10 points collected, you get a discount of €5 on your electricity bill. The more points you collect, the higher your discount, up to a maximum of €100 per contract year.
Each app can obtain your values from different databases. To calculate consumption, savings and costs, the Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app uses the data from your vehicle directly. However other apps use the data from your wallbox. These values include the power consumption of the wallbox as well as any charging losses, meaning the charging process consumes more power than we report in the app. Does this mean my Connect Bonus is lower than I am entitled to? No! We include charging in the bonus calculation after you have charged just 6.3 kWh into your vehicle.
An incorrect charging process can have various reasons. Make sure that the "Timer charging" function is deactivated on the wallbox and in the vehicle. In addition, your vehicle should be in a location where it can regularly establish an internet connection. Besides that, your vehicle must also be in online mode to be able to receive the Smart Charging control commands from the app.
The Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app only creates an entry for the last charging process and in the statistics when you disconnect the charging cable from the vehicle. After the interrupted connection between vehicle and wallbox, the app needs a few minutes to create the entries. Please note that no entries are created for charging quantities smaller than 0.5 kWh.
The Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app updates itself at regular intervals. Depending on the situation, it may take a few minutes before you can see your completed charging session in the app. We ask you to be patient and try to update the app at a later time. Please note that only charging sessions in which more than 0.5 kWh were charged into your vehicle are displayed.
Your vehicle is probably in offline mode. You can check this in the WeConnectID app or in your vehicle on the infotainment screen. You’ll see the message “Vehicle offline” if your vehicle is in offline mode. To take the vehicle back online and use Smart Charging, restart the infotainment in your vehicle. To do this, press and hold the on/off button for 15 seconds. Your system will then restart.
When you sign in through our app, we automatically set a charging schedule for 7 a.m. the following day. Simply plug in your vehicle, and we will charge it overnight, at times when plenty of renewable electricity is available.
This will show up on your app dashboard with the green circle: the words “Charging Scheduled” will appear as we wait for your vehicle to begin charging (your vehicle must be plugged in for this to happen).
You can change your schedule at any time:
Another way to access your Smart Charging settings is as follows:
You can also change your departure time directly in your app dashboard when your vehicle is connected to your wallbox. Simply tap the green text in the center of the screen. In the dialog box that opens, select a departure time. A message at the top of the screen confirms that we have scheduled your next charging session.
Access to our platform is via HTTPS, meaning the service uses the same level of encryption as banks for online banking, for example. Our servers are firewall-protected, and we have installed intrusion detection systems (IDS).
Our Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app is available for both iOS and Android devices. Just search for “Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect” in the App Store or Google Play Store.
We are always keen to improve our app, so we’d be interested in your feedback. If you have an idea for a new feature or suggestions for improvement, please email us at connect-support@elli.eco.
Just email to connect-support@elli.eco stating that you want to delete your account. We also need the email address you registered with. We will then delete your account and all the associated data from our system.
Please keep in mind that, without the app, you will not be able to take advantage of the Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect tariff, such as using a bonus (discount) for part-payment of your electricity bill. In addition, any bonus points you have collected that have not been used by you will be forfeited.
Once your account is created, you are automatically signed into the app each time it opens. If you wish, you can sign out via “Account” in the app. Scroll down and tap “Ausloggen.”
This will only sign you out of the app – your charging schedule is not affected, and your vehicle will still be charged based on the last departure time you set. To stop Smart Charging, click on "Ladezeitplan" in the "Dashboard" tab and then "Smart Charging deaktivieren" at the bottom.
To disconnect Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect from your vehicle or charging sessions, go to “Delete Account”
If your vehicle is set to Smart Charging, we will start charging sessions according to a set schedule based on the availability of electricity from renewable sources. If you ever need to charge your vehicle right away, you can do so with the “Boost” button. When you tap “Boost” in the app, Smart Charging is interrupted. Your vehicle will be charged directly, as quickly as your wallbox permits. You will not receive a point for this type of charging.
Please contact the service hotline of Volkswagen or your vehicle manufacturer.
If you have acquired a new vehicle since signing up for Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect, you can easily add it to the app. Here’s how:
Your vehicle will now be updated in our system.
Consumption
Total energy consumed during charging sessions (shown in kWh). This is represented in the graph as:
Energy cost
Total energy cost, based on your electricity tariff and the average price for the period during the charging session. Your energy consumption is determined using the charge level of your battery and the duration of charging sessions.
Points account
You earn one point for each Smart Charging session. To earn a point for Smart Charging, you must have charged at least 7 kWh at a time without disconnecting your car from the grid. The charge will not be counted as a Smart Charge if you use the Boost button in the app to charge your battery right away.
CO₂ savings
You charge 100% CO₂-free with Volkswagen Naturstrom, saving CO₂ compared to conventional electricity from sources such as coal and gas (based on Germany’s current electricity mix). An average electric vehicle charges with energy generated with an average 352g per kWh of CO₂ (BDEW: Bundesmix 2019) emissions. This equates to approximately 50g of CO₂ (based on ID.3 Pro) that you are saving with our electricity.
Additional CO₂ avoidance with Smart Charging
CO₂ avoidance: In addition, with the Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect tariff, you are promoting growth of CO₂-free electricity in Germany by enabling us all to use more green electricity that would otherwise go to waste.
How? Let’s take wind turbines as an example. At many times of the year, the turbines have to be taken off grid; at other times wind power is missing. Coal and natural gas then provide the energy. By smart rescheduling of your car’s charging times, we ensure you charge at times when an abundance of wind and solar energy is being generated.
We calculate how much CO₂ you could avoid with Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect charging, compared with non-smart charging. To calculate this, we assume you would have charged your vehicle immediately after arriving home, and determine the CO₂ emissions in grams per kWh. We evaluate this theoretical charging process using the ENTSO-E independent emissions database.
We need to know your address or the exact location of your private charging point to ensure the Smart Charging process is only ever started when you are at home. We use your vehicle’s location to ensure you charge green, sustainable energy at home.
We need to connect to your vehicle to start the Smart Charging process for you. This is why you need to register your vehicle with Volkswagen (one-time registration). If you drive a Volkswagen ID.3 or ID.4, simply download Volkswagen’s WeConnect ID app from your app store and connect your vehicle.
For all other Volkswagen vehicles, please use myVolkswagen (myvolkswagen.com). Skoda drivers: please use the MySkoda app for the registration.
To receive a point for your Smart Charging, you must have charged at least 7 kWh at a time without disconnecting your car from the grid. The charge will not be counted as a Smart Charge if you use the Boost button in the app to charge your battery right away.
When you authenticate your Volkswagen account by signing in, you are authorizing the Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app to do the following:
These permissions are used for Smart Charging of your vehicle. Your location enables us to Smart-Charge your vehicle at home whenever most renewable energy is available.
We do NOT store additional details such as your Volkswagen sign-in information on our servers.
When you sign in, Volkswagen provides us with an access and update token that is automatically renewed every 45 days. This standard process, called OAuth, is the same process that companies like Facebook or Google use to authenticate a customer on a third-party website. This access and update token is encrypted and stored securely.
You can revoke our access at any time simply by changing your Volkswagen account password.
We take your privacy and the protection of your data very seriously, and maintain a secure system with regular security testing. For detailed information on how we use your data, please see our Privacy Policy.
If you still have questions afterwards, please contact connect-support@elli.eco. We will be happy to help you.
Under the terms of your Volkswagen Naturstrom contract, you receive 100% green electricity from renewable sources. However, there is not really enough green power available every hour of the day for all the consumers in Germany. With Smart Charging, you can be certain you are charging precisely when electricity is being generated from renewable sources. You’ll be making an active contribution toward removing coal and gas from Germany’s electricity mix through Smart Charging, and ensuring that others also consume less CO₂.
Modern vehicles, especially electric cars and plug-in hybrids, usually have a SIM card. This connects the vehicle to a mobile network. The Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect Service uses the mobile network to connect to your vehicle for charging. The first time you use our Volkswagen Naturstrom Connect app, you enable the connection by entering your Volkswagen ID (identifier of your We Connect or myVolkswagen user account). You only have to do this once.
You can use the app to set the time by when you want your vehicle battery to be fully charged. For instance, if you enter 8 a.m. as your planned departure time, Elli will make certain your battery is fully charged by that time. The app also provides a function for tracking the charge level of your vehicle battery. Simply go to the Dashboard in the app. The circle tells you what the current charge level is.
If you drive a Volkswagen ID.3 or ID.4, you receive a message in your app whenever you connect your vehicle to a wallbox or the power grid. You can then confirm you wish to activate Smart Charging. For all other vehicles, Smart Charging takes place automatically whenever your vehicle is connected to the power grid at your home address. However, you can interrupt Smart Charging at any time using the Boost button in the app.
Elli supports the following Volkswagen electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids (ID.3, ID.4, e-up!, e-Golf, Golf GTE, Passat GTE, Multivan eHybrid). Furthermore, we support the following Skoda EVs: Enyaq iV, Enyaq Coupé iV
We are working on integrating more models.