Where the charger goes on a Romford house comes down to three distances: from the parking space to the wall, from the wall to the consumer unit, and from the house to the street. Get those right and the rest of the job tends to follow. This guide works through each one, then the planning checks that apply in Havering’s conservation areas and on listed homes. For the wider picture, from fuses to grants, see our Romford EV charger installation page.
The question reaches more households each year. DVLA records about 6,642 privately kept plug-in vehicles across the London Borough of Havering at the end of June 2026, up from 4,948 a year earlier, a rise of about 34% on our arithmetic. Those are vehicles across the whole borough, not chargers.
Start from where the car sits
Havering is a borough of houses. At the 2021 Census, 41.2% of its 101,277 households lived in a semi-detached house, the second-highest share among London’s 33 local authorities after Bexley, 11.1% in a detached house and 24.3% in a terrace. On a semi with a side drive, the charger normally goes on the side wall level with the car’s charging port, where the cable reaches without crossing a door or a path. In an attached garage it can go inside, out of the weather. On a frontage drive, the front wall beside the bay is the usual spot.
Think about how you park, not just where: a car that reverses in presents its charging port in a different place from one that goes in nose first.
Wall or post
A wall is the simple case. The charger is fixed to the house and its cable runs inside or along the wall to the consumer unit. A post, a charger mounted on an upstand at the edge of the drive, suits a bay that sits away from the house. The cable then has to reach the post underground, which means a trench and ducting across the drive or lawn and turns a one-part job into two. Our guide to EV charger installation cost shows how groundworks and cable length appear on a quote.
Tethered or socketed
The EnSmart SmartBee-M, the charger we fit, comes in both forms. A tethered unit has its cable permanently attached: park, unhook it, plug in. A socketed unit takes your own cable, which looks tidier on a wall facing the street and suits a household that might change cars. Its published specification gives a Type 2 connection, the standard fitting on new electric cars sold in the UK, and an IP65 weatherproof rating, so an outside wall is no problem for the unit itself. There is no wrong answer, and the two versions are priced differently.
The cable run from the consumer unit
A 7 kW charger draws 32 A continuously and needs its own circuit from the consumer unit, with its own protective devices. Wherever your consumer unit is, a charger on the outside of that same wall is the shortest run. A charger at the far end of a side drive, or on a detached garage, means a longer cable, more containment and sometimes drilling through more than one wall. The survey also checks the earthing arrangement and whether the consumer unit has a spare way. Those three items, the run, the earthing and the board, are the usual reasons two quotes for the same charger differ.
If panels are on the cards, plan the wall space at the same time, because an inverter, a battery and a charger all want to sit near the consumer unit. Our page on solar panels in Romford covers the roof, and our earlier guide, charging an EV in Romford: where a battery fits in, covers how a battery works around the car.
Listed homes, conservation areas and Gidea Park
Planning for home chargepoints sits in Part 2 of Schedule 2 to the permitted development order: Class D for an outlet mounted on a wall and Class E for an upstand, each within an area lawfully used for off-street parking, as legislation.gov.uk showed the text on 19 October 2026. Neither class applies within the curtilage of a listed building or on a scheduled monument, and an upstand on a house’s parking area must not exceed 1.6 metres in height. If your house is listed, talk to Havering before anything is fixed to it.
Romford has local layers as well. The Romford Conservation Area around the Market Place was designated in 1968 and is one of 11 in the borough, alongside Gidea Park and Havering-atte-Bower. Gidea Park also has an Article 4 direction, Art 4/4/2015, confirmed on 24 June 2016, whose text refers to development in Parts 1 and 2 of the order at the addresses it lists. Part 2 is where Classes D and E sit, so if you live at one of those addresses, ask Havering whether the direction affects a charger before you book an installation. That answer should come from the council in writing, not from us.
The rule that changes on 21 October 2026
The Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2026, S.I. 2026/1056, comes into force on 21 October 2026. It extends Class D to a wall-mounted outlet elsewhere within the curtilage of a house, not only beside off-street parking, and it adds limits. No Class D outlet may sit more than 1.6 metres above ground level. On a wall that immediately adjoins a highway, the outlet must not protrude more than 0.2 metres, and at least 1.5 metres of footway must remain to the edge of the carriageway. The wider right does not apply in a conservation area, or where it would mean more than one outlet at the house. Where a footway lies between the outlet and the car, the cable must cross it in a channel installed or authorised by the highway authority. Work permitted under the old wording but not the new can still go ahead until the end of 20 October 2027.
For the 24.3% of Havering households in terraces, that matters, but the pavement remains Havering’s to decide. The government’s cross-pavement grant gives up to £500 towards a chargepoint installed with an approved channel, subject to the council’s rules, and our guide to who qualifies for the EV chargepoint grant sets out each case. Claims must be made through an OZEV-authorised installer; tell us your situation at the quote stage. The council’s own programme is public charging: on 28 August 2025 it said a further 48 charge points were going into residential streets for residents without driveways.
What to have ready for the survey
Before a Romford survey, note which way you park, where the consumer unit is, whether the house is listed or in a conservation area and, in Gidea Park, whether your address is on the Article 4 list. With those answers, one visit can settle the charger’s position, the cable route and the planning check.
Sources: DfT and DVLA, VEH0142 licensed plug-in vehicles by keepership and local authority, Havering, end of June 2025 and 2026 (published 23 September 2026); ONS Census 2021, TS044 Accommodation type via Nomis (Havering E09000016; all London local authorities); EnSmart Power, SmartBee-M published specification, as listed by its UK distributor; legislation.gov.uk, Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015, Schedule 2, Part 2, Classes D and E, read 19 October 2026; legislation.gov.uk, The Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) (Amendment) (No. 2) Order 2026, S.I. 2026/1056 (made 25 September 2026, in force 21 October 2026), read 19 October 2026; London Borough of Havering, Romford Conservation Area Appraisal and Management Plan (July 2025); London Borough of Havering, Article 4 Direction: Gidea Park and Article 4 Direction Notice; London Borough of Havering news, Where We Live: All plugged in for EV charging points (28 August 2025); GOV.UK, Changes to electric vehicle chargepoint grant schemes from 1 April 2026 (updated 7 July 2026). Changes and percentages are our arithmetic.