Sunday night at Heathrow
Eighteen students arrive this weekend, and eleven booked an airport transfer. Four sent flight details with their booking. Three sent them to their agent, who forwarded them to reception on Friday afternoon. Two changed flights and told nobody. Two have not sent anything.
The weekend duty phone rings at 11pm. A student is standing in arrivals and no driver is there, because the transfer company was given the original flight. Another driver waited ninety minutes for a student who arrived the day before. The homestay host has been waiting up since 8pm.
Why flight details never settle
Transfers depend on information that belongs to the student and changes without warning.
- Flight details are sent to whoever the student or agent happens to email.
- Flights are booked after the course, so the details arrive late.
- Flights change, and the school is the last to hear.
- Terminals and arrival times are sometimes wrong in what the student sends.
- The transfer company, the host and the duty manager each need the same details, and each gets them separately.
The list sent to drivers on Friday is really a snapshot of whatever reception had found in the inbox by then.
A missed pick-up is expensive in every way
A student alone at the airport late at night, in a country where they do not speak the language well yet, is the worst possible start and a genuine welfare concern for under 18s. Wasted journeys are paid for anyway. The weekend duty manager spends their evening on the phone. Agents hear about it the next morning.
The transfer board we build
- Every booking with a transfer gets an automatic request for flight details, by email and, if you want, a text or WhatsApp message, with a simple form: flight number, date, airport.
- The flight number is checked against a flight data service, so the scheduled arrival time and terminal come from the airline rather than the student.
- Missing details trigger reminders to the student and agent at intervals you choose, and anyone still missing near the deadline is shown to reception in red.
- Arrivals are grouped by airport and time window, so you can see where one car can take two students.
- Confirmed jobs go to your transfer company as a list or through their booking system, or to your own drivers with the student's photo and contact number.
- Flight delays and changes are picked up from the flight data service, and the driver and host are told of the new time.
- The host gets a message when the student has been collected, and the duty manager sees a live view of who has arrived.
| Situation | What the board shows |
|---|---|
| Flight details received and verified | Ready to assign |
| No details within your deadline | Chase list for reception |
| Flight delayed | New time, driver and host told |
| Two students close together | Suggested shared journey |
| Student collected | Host notified, job closed |
We do not replace your transfer company's systems. We give them one clean, up to date list instead of a Friday email and phone calls.
A weekend that looks after itself
By Friday, reception knows exactly which arrivals are confirmed and who is still missing. Drivers get accurate jobs. When a flight is delayed, the host hears about it without the duty manager ringing round. On Monday the arrivals report shows every student collected, with times, which is also what an agent wants to see.
Is this your weekend?
- Flight details arrive in several inboxes.
- Drivers have been sent to the wrong flight or time.
- Hosts wait up without knowing when the student will arrive.
- The weekend duty phone is mostly transfer problems.
- You pay for journeys where nobody was collected.