On this page (4 sections)
Booking and prices
Stansted prices its car parks dynamically and per calendar day, so the rate rises as your date nears and the cheapest spaces sell first. Booking early is the single biggest saving, and the gate price for turning up is far higher. Some car parks, including Long Stay, JetParks and Meet & Greet, are pre-book only and have minimum stays, so they cannot be booked at the gate at all.
The number of days is worked out from the dates and times you select: a Monday to the following Monday counts as 8 days. The quote holds only at the moment of booking. For the cheapest route and how the products compare, see the cheap parking page and the parking hub. If your confirmation email does not arrive, the booking is still valid; check your spam folder.
Getting in and out
The car parks are barrierless in the sense that there is no ticket. For a pre-booked stay, you drive up and the ANPR cameras read your number plate, check it against your booking, and raise the barrier. Allow up to 30 seconds for it to read the plate before assuming anything is wrong.
If the plate is not recognised, do not take a ticket. Press the intercom assistance button on the entry column, have your booking reference ready, and a member of staff will let you in. It is worth bringing a printed copy of your confirmation email as a backup to scan at the barrier. On the way out, the cameras read your plate again and you drive away.
Changes, cancellations and overstays
Plans move, so the booking has some give. You can amend the dates up to 72 hours before your parking starts, and change the vehicle registration up to 24 hours before (the plate is what gets you in, so keep it correct). A standard booking cancels free up to 72 hours before arrival; inside that window it is non-refundable unless you bought Cancellation Protection, which extends cancellation to 1 hour before. Some special-offer products cannot be changed or cancelled, which is flagged when you book.
For small timing changes there is a 6-hour grace window: arrive up to 6 hours early and leave up to 6 hours late without a charge, with no need to contact anyone. Beyond that you pay an overstay charge, set per day, payable in full before you leave the car park and charged whatever the reason for the late return. If a flight delay will push you well past your booked return, it is cheaper to amend the booking than to overstay.
Drop-off, EV and special cases
A few questions sit outside the standard car park booking.
- Dropping off or picking up. The kerbside Express Set Down charges £10 for up to 15 minutes; the free alternative is the Mid Stay hour, covered on the drop-off and pick-up pages.
- Electric vehicles. There is a high-speed charging hub on Thremhall Avenue, the main road in, that can top a car up in about half an hour. The car parks themselves are not set up for charging during a stay, so charge on the way through.
- Motorcycles. A 50 percent discount applies at Short Stay and Long Stay; JetParks motorcycle spaces are booked by phoning the airport call centre.
- Blue Badge holders. Parking is charged at the standard rate, not free, with bays across the car parks. The Blue Badge parking page has the zones and the accessible shuttles.
- Taxis and minicabs. Any Express Set Down charge is the responsibility of the vehicle owner, so it is built into your fare rather than billed to you.
For anything not here, the airport keeps a full set of official parking FAQs, and the parking hub links every car park page.