I agree with everything people here say: if you're willing to do your homework, and make sure you're getting a good electrician, you can save at least $1000, and in my case about $2000, in markups. I spent a fair amount of time asking around, and got my referral from a contractor who I know well. I was very happy with the electrican's work (he put in the circuits for what was supposed to be a Leviton L2 charger, but that's another story - see my other posts.) Aerovironment needs a markup to pay for a staff of program managers, monitors, estimators, etc.; Nissan got AV interested in the business by saying they'd force customers to go through them, and pay a markup, and that customers could get a lot of the money back through tax rebates. Nissan could eliminate horror stories of gullible customers being ripped off by unscrupulous electricians who don't know what they're doing through AV's careful organization. Obviously, it hasn't worked out the way Nissan and AV planned; at least one AV subcon I heard about had a quote acceptance rate as low as 15%, so a lot of customers are brave enough to "go it alone". The horror stories of people who've got their own electrician have not materialized.
Thanks to the outlandish Leviton Charger prices, I've been getting by with L1 charging so far, but agree SPX is probably the most attractive option available today; I'll probably choose an L2 charger in a couple of months, even though L1 is all I really need since I live 9 miles from work.
- Bob