Research carried out by Telegraph Travel has shown airport parking can end up costing you more than your flight. With the cost of leaving your vehicle for a week exceeding £120 at half of the airports we surveyed, it’s important to be sure that you not only get the best price, but make sure your car is left in safe hands. Here are four key points to consider when booking this summer.
Most airport parking booking sites splash huge savings – often 70 or 80 per cent – to tempt you to book with them. What they are really doing is highlighting the difference between the extortionate cost of turning up at the airport car park without booking and the price if you do reserve your space in advance. For example, the “turn-up” rate at London Gatwick long stay car parks is £38 for the first 24 hours and then £32 per day after that – a total of £675 for a 15-day holiday. Whereas I was quoted £152.80 for 15 days in August (long stay South Terminal) through the airport’s parking website (gatwickairport.com/passenger/parking). Note that rates change according to demand.
If you need to stay at an airport hotel to catch an early flight the next day, combining this with parking usually works out cheaper than booking each component separately. For example, for the same dates in August as above, holidayextras.com quoted me a huge range of options starting at less than £100 for a hotel and parking. I thought the best deal though was £282.92 for an overnight stay at the Hilton which is connected to the airport terminal, including 15 days parking at the nearby Cophall car park.
Park and fly packages are also available through other specialists (see contacts below) and often directly through individual hotels. Do check the cost and frequency of transfers – sometimes you have to book a taxi to and from the airport. Look also at how regularly the transfer runs and the time it takes to do the journey – some will stop at several hotels on route to the airport terminal.
If you want to park in an “official” car park, which is run in conjunction with the airport itself, then you will probably find the cheapest rate on the airport’s website. Useful links: Gawick (gatwickairport.com/parking), Heathrow (heathrow.com/booking/parking), Luton Airport (london-luton.co.uk/parking), Manchester Airport (manchesterairport.co.uk/parking).
If you are looking for the very cheapest deal then there are plenty of car park operators which will undercut the prices offered by their airport-sponsored rivals. The best way to track them down is through a specialist website. These include: APH (aph.com), BCP (parkbcp.co.uk), Go Simply (gosimply.com), Holiday Extras (holidayextras.co.uk), Money Supermarket (moneysupermarket.com), and Parking4Less (parking4less.com).
When you are comparing prices, be alert not just to the lowest headline costs but to useful bonuses such as free cancellation or low-price guarantees. Things like the frequency of the transfer between the car park and airport may also make a difference.
If you do opt to book a website other than the “official” airport website – and particularly if you are being offered a “meet and greet” arrangement where your car is collected and returned by a driver at the airport – be especially careful that you know where it is going to be parked while you are away. The Park Mark award scheme (parkmark.co.uk) is a useful indication of proper security and quality standards – if the car park is not accredited then ask for the address and maybe look at the Google maps satellite layer so you can get a better impression of the arrangements.
It’s also a good idea – in the sight of the collecting driver – to take a photograph of your car’s mileage when you drop it off. So you have a record of how far it has been driven in case there are any problems later.
2024-07-19T13:01:16Z dg43tfdfdgfd