There was an interesting piece in one of the travel publications the other week, it gave examples of various holidaymakers who had actually paid more for their airport parking than they did for their flight. When I read this I couldn’t really believe it, but even more so I certainly could not believe the vast amounts some people were paying for parking especially at Gatwick and Heathrow airports. It made me think that these people must have been paying the “gate price” for their parking and not pre-booking !
Take the first example, a young man from Stevenage flying from Gatwick to Alicante in June, he has a flight with Ryanair and is paying £109 including taxes for his flight. Now here comes the astonishing bit.. he has been quoted £153 to park at a well known car park just off Gatwick airport, that’s an unbelievable £44 more than the cost of his flight !
The second example is even worse. Again a single person flying to Dublin Ireland from London Heathrow with Flybmi in April. They paid £91 including taxes and fees for a two week return economy flight. However to park their car at one of the car parks actually on the compound at Heathrow airport cost a staggering £238.50 !! This is of course an arrive on the day and pay price and not a pre-booking price. To get this into context the cheapest car parking at Heathrow I could find for a two week period in April was around £81, which was a pre-book price, so I guess parking generally at Heathrow is rather expensive.
The obvious lesson to be learnt here is to pre-book your airport parking. this is something I have done for the past six years, so I guess when I see rates quoted at well over £200 I am really shocked, I mean some people must actually pay those amounts !
To all those people out there who insist on paying these ridiculous amounts, take a look at UK Airport Car Parks, or here especially if you need Gatwick airport parking or Heathrow airport parking.
