Horrendous airport drop off charges

[Cardhey]

AIBU to be pleased that the UK consumer watchdog is investigation the ridiculous drop off fees at airports and the increases over the past few years. It’s just a con. Hope they get banned.

Most if the ones mentioned here are accessible by train

Our nearest airport is Glasgow . We dont use the drop off area. We drop off at the long stay car park and the person gets the bus to the airport. Free drop off service , bus is free and it drops ypu off at arrivals.

No cost for an hour

Glasgow, Belfast, east Midlands, Leeds, Liverpool, Aberdeen dont

Why not get a later flight or get a taxi

Rip-off .. like Hospital Parking Charges.

Never used to have charges, and it worked fine.

I think they need to bring in a new rule, you can only get “fined” by a Private Parking Company, if they can prove (and the onus should be on them), that you caused a Financial Loss, or, Significant Disruption (as in £100 for staying 10 minutes over being outlawed)

Taxis are charged the drop off fee....

It's as daft as London Luton. 🙄Luton airport is nearly 35 miles north of London/the centre of London. (Hour and a half drive/an hour on a train.)

Ours is £7 for 10 mins parking 1 minute walk away, or free for 3 minutes walk away. We always do the free but I’d probably stump up if it was tipping down.

Some do. My nearest one - Glasgow - does not. Edinburgh has trams, not trains.

Glasgow charges £7 for 15 minutes drop off/pick up but as others have said, there is the option to park for an hour, free of charge, in the long stay and use the shuttle bus, also free. You are paying for the convenience. If you don't want to pay, take the cheaper option.

Surely its just a small drop in the ocean as part and parcel of owning a car and going on holiday. Neither of which is cheap.

Or paying for being disabled. At drop off you can get mobility services to help. Few people with mobility issues can manage a suitcase as well as getting themselves off and on a shuttle bus and any walk involved.
But I am used to having to pay much more to get around due to disability in spite of not getting any pip for mobility. It gets expensive

So then don't book the 7 am flight, book one where you can reasonably get there via public transport.

We park nearby and wait for a phone call that they're at the pick-up point.

My guess is you are in London?
In many regional airports this is one flight a day, you have no choice about times. I flew to girona in Spain. One flight a day in and one out. It's not like London airports.

Still, its a very small part of over all holiday costs

Our one public transport option for getting someone to the airport would involve a 40-minute car journey into the city centre to drop off the person flying so they could pay £16 (the last time I checked) to catch the bus for a 45-minute journey out to the airport. Alternatively, we can do the 45-minute drive from home straight to the airport, bundle the passenger out as quickly as possible in the drop-off area, then join the queue and hope to make it to the barriers and pay the £8.50 charge before the permitted 10 minutes is up!

Yeah so fine to rip you off?

Or Teesside, Humberside, Liverpool, Doncaster (I know it’s currently closed).

We live close to Gatwick. Maple dump at least some cars in a muddy unmade up bit of unsecured land about 10 minutes from the airport. My car was also hit by someone moving a car between sites from Maple. They did a decent amount of damage, knew it, and didn't stop. They are a menace in the local area.

I think a lot of people don't understand that the charges are so high, not to make money, but because airports actively DON'T WANT people to use drop off.

If they just wanted to make as much money as possible out of people they would do as they do with airport parking overall, or the price of food and drink within the terminal - expensive enough that people moan, but just within the boundaries that enough people will still pay for it. Instead they price it as high as possible to encourage people to use the other options.

There are very good reasons why airports don't want loads of cars driving around - every single vehicle who gets close enough to the terminal is a security risk. A home made bomb or chemical attack in any of the car parks would have a limited range, whereas one that is set off so close to the terminal could impact tens of thousands of people in an enclosed space. Space is at a premium around airports so they want to reduce traffic around the immediate terminal area. The fewer cars around also reduces the safety risk when you've got children running around, people rushing to catch a flight etc. All it takes is one car breaking down or someone's card not working to pay at the barrier and you've quickly got a problem affecting the whole car park.

If airports wanted people to use drop off to make as much money as possible, they wouldn't go to the effort of building park and rides, etc.

@LittleMonks11 what airport allows drop off for free with a blue badge? Ours doesn't, you pay the full charge. We can't actually get the wheelchair, luggage etc out and sorted within the drop off time without a lot of stress. So we get a taxi.

There's certainly some truth in that.

Some airports don't allow drop off adjacent to the terminal at all because of security concerns and at some that do you, especially newer terminals, if you look carefully you can see the measures that have been taken to reduce risks.

That said a lot of this is about the airports getting the revenue they need to operate directly from the customer, rather than via the airlines....but I'm well aware it's not a popular opinion.

If it was about keeping cars away for security, taxis would not have to pay for drop off.

Using an airport is a choice

You get 2 hours free in the long stay car park at Gatwick.

My son went earlier this year. His dad chose to use the 30 min drop off and pay a fee but there is an option not to.