What to check before booking a private transfer in Slovenia

Transfer quotes look alike until something goes wrong. Then the differences between them turn out to have been in the small print all along, and the cheapest quote is frequently the one that was quietly missing four things.

These are the questions worth asking, whoever you book with. We answer each one for ourselves at the end of it, but the questions matter more than our answers: ask them of anybody and the quotes stop looking alike.

1. Is the price per car or per person?

The single biggest source of confusion. A shared shuttle charges each seat, so a quote of 30 EUR is 120 for a family of four. A private transfer charges the vehicle. Two quotes that look thirty euros apart can be three times apart once you count the passengers.

2. Does it include tolls, parking and the vignette?

Slovenia requires a motorway vignette, Austria requires its own plus a tunnel toll on the Karawanken, and Italy tolls by the kilometre. Some operators quote the drive and add the road afterwards. On a run to Venice or Salzburg that gap is real money.

3. What happens if my flight is late?

Ask two things: does the driver track the flight, and how long is the waiting before it is charged. The answers vary far more than people expect. Fifteen minutes free then a per-minute rate is common, and on a two-hour delay it turns a 40 EUR transfer into three figures.

4. What is the cancellation policy, and is there a deposit?

This is where the cheap quote usually recovers its margin. Cancellation ladders that begin five days before travel are normal in this market: cancel the day before and you pay half, cancel that morning and you pay all of it. If a deposit has been taken, that is the money at risk.

5. Is the operator licensed, and can they tell you the number?

Carrying passengers for money in Slovenia requires a licence, issued by the Chamber of Commerce, with a certified copy in each vehicle. A licensed carrier will give you the number without hesitating. The grey-market alternative is cheaper for a reason, and the reason is that nobody has checked their insurance.

6. Will the person who answers be the person who drives?

Many bookings are taken by an agency and passed to whichever car is free. That is not dishonest, but it means the person who promised you something is not the person who turns up, and the details travel badly between them. Ask directly.

7. Is there a night, holiday or short-notice surcharge?

Airport transfers happen at six in the morning and eleven at night, which is exactly when surcharges apply. Ten percent for a night run and twenty for booking inside 36 hours are both common. Ask what the quote becomes at the hour you actually need.

8. What car, and will the luggage fit?

A saloon takes four people or four large suitcases, not both. Ski bags and bicycles need saying out loud. Get the vehicle named in writing rather than a category: minivan can mean a leather-lined eight-seater or a commercial van with a bench in the back.

9. Where exactly will we meet?

At an airport, ask whether the driver comes into arrivals with a board or waits in a car park you have to find. At a hotel, ask whether the car can reach the door, because in the pedestrian centre of Ljubljana it cannot, and that is a conversation for the night before rather than the morning of.

Our answers, for the record

• Per car, never per person, and the figure is fixed before you travel.
• Tolls, vignettes, parking, bottled water and Wi-Fi are all in the price.
• We track the flight and wait two hours from landing at no charge.
• Free cancellation up to 24 hours before, and no deposit is ever taken.
• Licence G016879/10551, issued by the Chamber of Commerce of Slovenia, valid to 2031, with a certified copy in each car.
• The owner answers the message and the owner drives the car.
• No holiday or short-notice surcharge, ever. The only adjustment is a plain 10% night rate between 23:00 and 05:00, stated in the quote, never discovered after the trip.
• A Mercedes-Benz C-Class for four with two large cases, or a V-Class for five with five.
• A name board in arrivals at no extra cost, and the meeting point confirmed in writing before the day.

None of that is exotic. It is what a transfer should be, and the only reason the list is worth writing down is that quotes are compared on price alone, and price alone cannot tell you which of these nine a given operator has quietly left out.