My experience with Blacklane chauffeur cars – with 10% discount

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• Phillip says:

  11 Apr11 April 06:01

  Haven’t Etihad also dropped their Abu Dhabi – Ho Chi Minh City route too?

  • Tom C says:

    11 Apr11 April 06:11

    They’ll be dropping Abu Dhabi to anywhere at this rate

• Richard says:

  11 Apr11 April 06:33

  Any sign of BA relaunching Lima in April 19 too I wonder…?

• Rich says:

  11 Apr11 April 06:55

  Qantas Perth to LHR direct impacting Etihad load?

  • Rob says:

    11 Apr11 April 07:58

    Possibly, I imagine a disproportionate number of Perth visitors are from the UK.

    • JamesB says:

      11 Apr11 April 10:27

      But that will largely affect London. From the region’s it remains one stop and I would imagine Etihad or other options via ME will be much more popular than BA and QF via LHR.

    • John says:

      11 Apr11 April 10:28

      A disproportionate number of Perth visitors *who might choose EY to get there* are from the UK; I believe most international visitors are from South/East/Southeast Asia.

      • Chris A says:

        11 Apr11 April 11:15

        I arrived at Perth on an EY flight last year and had a few hours to kill overnight before a connecting flight. As did a few fellow passengers, who were all Czech. They worked on an oil rig in Oz, one month on/one month off. It still paid for them to go home each month, even though their travel expenses were not paid!

  • John says:

    11 Apr11 April 10:26

    The direct flight will always be expensive though

  • Tom says:

    11 Apr11 April 11:41

    In addition to the QF flight which has probably creamed off most of the high yield LON-PER J passengers, QR recently upgauged PER to an A380 which has probably hit EK fairly hard on the route.

    QR also got to EDI first and seems EY is conceding defeat there.

• Matt says:

  11 Apr11 April 07:53

  My only prospective look at Blacklane was was KUL to Putrajaya and the quoted rate with the discount was around £80 I recall. For comparison Uber was £8 and the hotel car was £30. I will try again in the future though because this may have been an anomaly based on your experience on Jo’burg.

  • Quark999 says:

    11 Apr11 April 07:56

    No, I think that’s correct and the anomaly must have been Johannesburg – whereever I’ve looked Blacklane was the most expensive option you could ever imagine, 10% discount and mileage or not. Pretty much useless, so I don’t even check anymore.

    • Genghis says:

      11 Apr11 April 07:58

      As a comparison, we paid c.£29 last month for a taxi from the rank from JNB to Melrose Arch

      • TGLoyalty says:

        11 Apr11 April 08:13

        This is the thing it’s not all like for like all that’s being compared here is price not service

        You might pay £10-15 more but you’re being met at arrivals by a vetted and trustworthy driver on a fixed rate in a nice car (hopefully)

        vs all the unknowns of a taxi or Uber Including the wait to get one where to meet them what state the car is in and what it will cost based on traffic or route they take etc

      • Genghis says:

        11 Apr11 April 08:16

        Completely agree, especially in Joburg, but our prebooked driver failed to turn up. Paid c.£43 going back with a car from the hotel

      • Matt says:

        11 Apr11 April 20:37

        I agree if we were taking £10-15 more. However my admittedly limited experience with the KUL to Putrajaya journey was that Blacklane was 10 time more expensive (£8 vs £80)!

  • h2d says:

    11 Apr11 April 08:43

    If using you should also be aware that the extended waiting periods are unbelievable extortionate. While you can cancel an hour beforehand (not much use on a flight), if your flight is delayed for whatever reason you will be liable for a huge additional fee calculated on a minute-by-minute basis.

• Mr(s) Entitled says:

  11 Apr11 April 07:54

  Used Sixt Mydriver to/from FCO to Rome at the weekend following an article here. Code MD10 got €10 off the ride.

  Big car, smart driver, on time. I was very impressed and would recommend.

  • Sandra says:

    11 Apr11 April 08:06

    Good to hear as I’ve booked using the special May offer, for a few weeks time. Thanks for the feedback.

  • MarkH says:

    11 Apr11 April 15:40

    Thanks for the code – got my TXL to Waldorf Astoria journey for €9.99

• Chris says:

  11 Apr11 April 08:32

  OT: Flying from Gatwick North on Saturday morning to Vienna. I’ve got a platinum AMEX charge card and so have the Priority Pass. I’m travelling with my sister and father, neither of which have a priority pass. However, I have my girlfriends plat supp card and her priority pass. Do we think that my sister can use my gf’s priority pass to get her into the lounge? Does the pp require the amex plat with it? If anyone knows a better way to work it please let me know 🙂

  Secondly, which lounge is best at North? I’m thinking of going to No1 Lounge?

  TIA

  • APK says:

    11 Apr11 April 08:43

    I don’t think that will work as the name on the Priority Pass will not correspond with the boarding pass/passport. My sister tried to use mine at Stansted a while back and she wasn’t allowed.

  • Alex says:

    11 Apr11 April 10:31

    Liked No1 Lounge on Friday (and they did not bother to check boarding pass when i gave my digital PP on smartphone). Worst case scenario you will need to pay 15£ for a 2nd guest on your PP.

  • Yuff says:

    11 Apr11 April 10:34

    They check boarding pass with lounge card.
    I thought the no1 lounge at Gatwick was very good but had to pay £15 to enter immediately or wait an hour, using lounge key.
    PP holders in front of me were told the same and didn’t enter. The lounge wasn’t busy so they were filtering guests. In future I would pre book for £5 to guarantee access 😉

• Tilly says:

  11 Apr11 April 08:37

  Just looked at Blacklane for car from YYZ to our downtown hotel. With 10% discount is working out at approx £72. Sounds steep to me.

  • Quark999 says:

    11 Apr11 April 08:39

    Yes, I appreciate Blacklane is not an Uber, but I’m comparing to Addison Lee/Tristar and similar services, and it’s still completely unreasonable.

    There might be places that are priced more reasonably, perhaps Johannesburg is one of them. But I haven’t found one yet.

    • Alex says:

      11 Apr11 April 10:35

      I agree, even looking at an executive car with Addison Lee was cheaper for me than Black Lane between east London and LHR. (Which isn’t really justifiable since their Ford Galaxy’s are perfectly acceptable).

      The only time it might be worth the service is if they actually monitor flight delays and don’t charge for the wait. But I somehow doubt that…

• Dev says:

  11 Apr11 April 08:45

  Rob, This is OT but a pressing matter….with Marriott making some sort of announcement next week, a quick guide to what to do with large amounts of SPG points would be handy. Personally, I’m looking to convert my 200K into at least 250K Krisflyer points.

  • Malibu Stacey says:

    11 Apr11 April 09:03

    So, convert them to Krisflyer points.

    I don’t think there is a any need to panic about existing points. Earning opportunities, such as the SPG Amex might be pulled without notice if the two schemes are to merge in August.

    • Genghis says:

      11 Apr11 April 10:20

      @Rob. What’s your current opinion on the merger re timings? Are we likely to see an announcement of what’s to come and then a formal transition come say 1 Jan?

      • Rob says:

        11 Apr11 April 12:10

        That’s my guess yes. Because of the status requirements it would be odd to switch mid year.

  • Rob says:

    11 Apr11 April 09:52

    Marriott is not totally stupid and won’t do anything without notice. Hopefully. However, you’re not going to get a better deal than that for moving to KrisFlyer so do it now if you are worried.

    My thinking is the other way, oddly. If there is a risk that the ‘Amex to Marriott’ route closes then I might want to top up my Marriott account because I can’t see any other route for earning Marriott points and, over the past year, I’ve enjoyed having a third redemption option alongside Hilton and IHG (SPG’s footprint meant it didn’t really count).

  • Kathy says:

    11 Apr11 April 10:37

    OT but Marriott:
    I have a small number of Marriott points – 13250 – and am not likely to earn more any time soon.
    I could transfer 10,000 Marriot points to 2000 Avios/Virgin FC miles, but am I right in thinking that I could get more by transferring them to SPG and then converting to miles?

    • Genghis says:

      11 Apr11 April 11:54

      Yes

      • Kathy says:

        11 Apr11 April 23:17

        Thanks. Done!

  • Ed Greenson says:

    11 Apr11 April 11:44

    Was thinking of applying for SPG Amex next month is it best not to wait then?

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