Martin Lewis has shared some tips about how to save on a hefty holiday cost. The consumer champion shared several tips on his BBC podcast around how to save on your holidays.
The financial expert shared practical tips including how to avoid costly conversion rates and roaming charges, as well as a “clever” way to save on the cost of your flight. One question came in from someone who asked about how to save on the cost of airport parking, given this can cost more than your flight.
Mr Lewis said in response that charges can vary widely – and used one example where someone could have saved more than £420 for one week. He said: “Booking direct with an airport is both the cheapest and the most expensive way to do it.”
‘Much cheaper price’
He said: “If you’re going to do it on a regular shift, then you will often find it’s incredibly expensive.” He said there are several parking comparison apps you can try which will often find you a “much cheaper price”.
Mr Lewis pointed to another way you can potentially cut your costs: “Occasionally for people who fly regularly, there are special routes if you’re booking on the last day, and you can get cheap parking.” He shared some figures to show how much prices can vary.
Huge savings
He said that on the week that he was speaking – the podcast episode was recorded on July 2 – if you had gone to Manchester Airport, it would have cost you £500 a week to park without a booking. But the cheapest available through a comparison site was just £76 a week, a saving of more than £420.
Mr Lewis said: “To put that in context, that is still a booking on the day price. That’s not an early booking discount.” He went on to explain how you could arrange this right at the last minute.
The expert said: “This could even be done on the way to driving to the airport. You could check and find yourself cheaper parking, as long as you are booking before you actually get there.”
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He clarified that only the passenger in your vehicle should be doing this while you are driving along and certainly not the driver. Another person wrote in with their experience of finding parking at Liverpool Airport.
The cheapest available they could find was £94, but they used a tool to check this comparison site with other comparison sites, and found a better deal for just £68, a saving of £16.
Mr Lewis said to cast the net wide when you are doing your comparison search. He said: “The key really is to make sure you are going right across the market and searching as many different places as you possibly can.”