EV adoption in Korea is surging, but charging costs have become a major grievance as private operators hike slow-charger rates to levels once only seen at fast chargers. This post went viral because it visually exposes the cost gap between residents of old vs. new apartments, framing it as a class issue.
Electric vehicle charging costs in Korea have become a hot-button issue lately, and a viral post is showing just how unfair the system really is — depending on where you live, you could be paying wildly different rates for the exact same kilowatt of electricity.
Here's the situation: older apartment complexes (called 'gukcuk' apartments) weren't built with EV charging infrastructure in mind, so third-party charging companies come in, install their equipment, and run the service themselves. The catch? These private operators charge around ₩300 per kWh — a rate that used to be reserved for fast chargers but is now standard even for slow chargers. To put that in perspective, ₩300/kWh is equivalent to Korea's highest residential electricity tier (the top of the progressive billing system), and it means driving 20km costs you about ₩1,000. Not terrible compared to gas, but it adds up fast.
Now compare that to newer apartment complexes, where the construction company pre-installs chargers as part of the building cost. These buildings run their own time-of-use pricing, similar to what services like PowerCube offer, but without the profit markup. During spring afternoons (March–May, around 2PM), residents pay just ₩105/kWh. During renewable energy peak hours (11AM–1PM), it drops to an almost unbelievable ₩50/kWh. Even at the most expensive time — summer afternoons between 3PM and 8PM — the rate only hits ₩204/kWh. That's still a third cheaper than what older apartment residents pay.
The fee structure is also fairer. Instead of a flat monthly base fee (PowerCube charges around ₩10,000/month regardless of how much you charge), this apartment charges a base fee of just 10% of your actual usage. So if you charge 100kWh at ₩100/kWh, your base bill is ₩10,000, plus 10% VAT, 3.7% electricity industry fund surcharge, and 10% base fee — totaling about ₩12,300. For context, 100kWh gives most EVs 500–600km of range. A gas car covering the same distance would burn through over ₩70,000 in fuel (roughly 33–40 liters at ₩2,000/liter).
The apartment manages the chargers in-house using a basic maintenance manual, and insurance per charger runs only about ₩4,000 per year — meaning the whole complex pays just a few hundred thousand won annually in insurance. No middleman, no profit margin, no inflated rates.
The original poster, who lives in a 3-year-old apartment and pays ₩150/kWh, was shocked when third-party chargers started appearing in their complex at over ₩300/kWh. The conclusion the Korean internet is drawing? If you're in an older, more affordable apartment, you're subsidizing private charging companies' profits. If you're wealthy enough to live in a brand-new complex, you get cheap electricity too. It's a two-tier system that hits lower-income EV owners the hardest — and people are not happy about it.