The cost and hassle of airport parking can often be prohibitive, says Dave Richardson, but there are deals and booking solutions that can help make a trip problem free
We've all done it - arrived late for a flight, left the car in the short-term park, and returned a few days later to find the parking cost more than the flight.
Airports are highly expensive pieces of real estate and everything is dear - except possibly the actual flights. Short-stay car parking at Heathrow costs an eye watering £45.20 per 24 hours, and business parking, even when pre-booked, costs about £20 per day. Driving to Ebbsfleet International station in Kent to join Eurostar might be a good idea, but don't forget to factor in the £11.50 daily parking charge.
At this time of austerity some companies may mandate the use of public transport for getting to and from airports, but a smarter and more long-term solution is to integrate it into the booking process and travel policy. That is almost guaranteed to bring costs down, and eliminate the paper trail when people book their own parking and put it on expenses.
There are only a few specialists in business parking, but a huge choice of booking agencies online trying to pick up leisure or business travellers.
The last few years have seen major growth in meet-and-greet parking services, where you are met outside the terminal and your car is driven away for secure storage. On your return, the car is handed back to you outside the terminal, having been cleaned, valeted or even serviced if that is what has been specified.
The alternative is park-and-ride, where you and your luggage are transferred from a remote car park by bus, with some companies offering a combination of meet-and-greet and park-and-ride. At some smaller airports you can walk to the terminal, even from the long-term park.
The new kid on the block as far as business is concerned is Business Travel Extras, set up in late 2008. It offers not only car parking but airport lounge access, airport hotels and business travel insurance, which could be particularly attractive to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) without a hotel or lounge programme.
This is a division of Holiday Extras, the largest provider of ancillary travel services in the UK which has been in business for over 25 years. It books 1.2 million parking spaces, 500,000 airport hotel nights and 200,000 airport lounge entries annually, and, to appeal to business, it has developed an online booking tool with in-depth management information (MI). Holiday Extras also owns Air Parks, off-airport sites at eight airports, including a meet-and-greet service for returning passengers only.
Business Travel Extras has signed up Carlson Wagonlit Travel, Hillgate Travel and Viaggio UK among leading travel management companies (TMCs), plus corporate clients including Airbus UK. All have welcomed integrating car parking into the general booking process, with Viaggio UK also opting to use it for airport hotels and lounges.
Nigel Turner, CWT director of public sector and industry affairs, says: "At a time when all companies are focusing hard on their costs, this service should help our customers to realise further savings in their travel programmes."
Geoff Allwright, head of travel and expenses at Airbus, adds: "This partnership will enable Airbus to track its bookings in an area which is typically difficult to track spend. With savings of up to 60 per cent off gate prices, we are keen for our business travellers to take advantage of exceptional value for money."
Leanne Flack, business development manager at Business Travel Extras, explains: "The difference between us and other suppliers of business parking is that they offer only meet-and-greet or parking off-site, whereas we also offer on-airport parking. We can save you up to 30 per cent for on-airport parking and 60 per cent for offairport. Airport parking is not seen as a sexy product and is probably the last thing to be mandated in travel policy. But it really should be mandated because of the savings available."
Some operators are seeing a fall-off in business parking in line with declining business travel generally, but this isn't the case across the board. As with airport lounge access, meet-and-greet might be offered as a sweetener to executives obliged to fly Economy due to the recession. Purple Parking is a major operator at Heathrow, where prices for a two-day trip are £16.58 for park-and-ride, £37.95 for park-and-ride premium, and £54.51 for meet-and-greet. The latter is the service most requested by business travellers, but the new park-and-ride premium service has seen strong growth.
Passengers drive to one of its car parks, taking the shuttle bus to the terminal, and then have their car brought to them at the terminal on return. "We are seeing more companies integrating airport parking within their self-booking tools and travel management programmes, so that they can keep an accurate check on their parking spend," says Purple Parking sales and marketing director, Ken Rayne. "American Express' new Axiom tool combines self-booking and expense management, and car parking, conferencing and event tickets have been included in the process alongside the more normal items such as flights. We get a lot of business through large TMCs, but much of it is still ad hoc. There is still a long way to go, but companies should take notice as the cost of car parking is a big issue in the UK where land costs are so high."
Meteor meet-and-greet operates at six UK airports - Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool - and may expand to others. It is an exclusively meet-and-greet operator, with a strong business travel base. General manager of business development, Kevan Godfrey, took part in a panel discussion at this year's Institute of Travel & Meetings (ITM) conference on booking extras, and says parking is now being integrated in the booking process.
"If you don't get the car parking right, the whole journey can be messed up," he says. "Many corporates have downgraded the class of travel to Economy but are offering benefits such as meet-and-greet to compensate. Meteor could be doing better at Heathrow where most airlines are struggling, but we are seeing strong growth at low-cost airports, including Stansted." Meteor has invested in a booking engine called Eparking, which makes it easy for TMCs and corporates to track bookings, with amendments and cancellations available 24/7. A useful extra offered by Meteor is transferring cars between Heathrow and Gatwick, when a traveller flies out from one airport and back to another.
There will always be room for niche operators, and one example is meet-and-greet specialist Help-mepark at Gatwick, which has a reciprocal arrangement with AAP at Heathrow. Help-me-park has built up a portfolio of about 20 business accounts, with competitive corporate rates and commission for TMCs. Sales director Sean McCarthy says: "We don't price check against operators on the internet, as we concentrate on service ,including a money-back guarantee if we are more than 15 minutes late to meet a customer. Corporate people run so close that they can't afford to be late, and if there are issues such as them arriving late because they are stuck in traffic, we will try to resolve them."
If you compare meet-and-greet costs with on-airport parking, the differential is not that great. And knowing their car will be waiting outside the terminal could be just enough to reassure stressed travellers that you still value them, after a long flight home in Economy.
