Be careful falling for the up-sell when booking airport parking in Melbourne

[pauldab]

I haven't noticed it before, but the post-selection upgrades for Premium and valet parking worked out more expensive today for a booking next month.

Booking a single day I was presented T123 normal $59 with Premium and Valet at $79 and $84 respectively.



After selecting the normal parking, I see the up-sell pricing is now $89 for both Premium and Valet with no change in the timing or dates.

 

[whughes3]

Up until the start of this year, there were indeed some good deals to be had when booking online for MEL parking; if you booked for the Value park, they would offer upgrades (via email) to the T4 terminal park for as little as $5-6/day, which I availed of several times. Unfortunately that seems to have ceased, and while they still offer upgrades to online bookings, these offer little or no saving, or actually price increases over the advertised rate!

 

[theparkingguru]

Declaring my bias up front: I run a parking marketplace (Parksy), so I spend an unhealthy amount of time inside these booking funnels. What you have both spotted is mid-funnel repricing. The price on the comparison screen is the acquisition price, and once you have selected and invested effort in the booking, the upsell reprices against your commitment instead of the market. Two practical counters. Screenshot the first screen, and if the upsell moves, abandon the cart and start again, the first-screen price usually comes back. And treat any upgrade offered after selection as a brand new quote to be checked per day, never as a discount. Worth keeping the screenshots too. Advertised prices that cannot actually be obtained by the time you pay is exactly the drip pricing pattern the ACCC has gone after in travel before.