Two discounts apply automatically at booking. No promo code. No customer-service negotiation. Just an arithmetic rule the engine runs on every quote.
The 15% volume discount
Any fare of £250 or more gets a 15% reduction at quote time.
The threshold is per booking, not per traveller or per leg. A return trip that hits £250+ on the outbound qualifies for the discount on the outbound leg; if the return leg is under £250 by itself, the return leg doesn't add an extra round.
The discount is computed after surcharges (airport drop-off charges, congestion charge if applicable, extra-stop fees), so what you see deducted is 15% of the pre-discount total including those add-ons.
In practice this means longer-distance trips and Executive-class bookings hit the discount most often. Heathrow to Manchester one-way at standard saloon is ~£280 — qualifies. A Southampton to Heathrow run at £99 fixed-fare doesn't.
The 5% return discount
Return-leg bookings get an additional 5% off. The mechanism: the system treats the return as a discrete leg priced on the per-mile rate, then applies 5% to that leg only.
Two notes:
- The return discount is leg-specific, not whole-booking. If your outbound is on a fixed-fare route and your return is not, you only get the 5% on the return.
- It stacks with the 15% volume discount when both apply. So if your fare hits £250+ AND it's a return, you get 15% on the qualifying part plus 5% on the return leg.
What doesn't discount
A few categories sit outside the auto-discount logic:
- Fixed-fare routes. The 16 published fixed fares are already discounted versus their per-mile equivalents. Volume discount doesn't stack on top of fixed-fare flat prices.
- Hourly chauffeur bookings. Hourly is priced per booked hour with included miles. Volume and return discounts don't apply to hourly mode.
- Flash offers. Time-limited promotional rates (currently Heathrow → Basingstoke at £75) are already below market — no further discount stacks.
Worked example
Southampton (return trip) → Manchester airport for a week-long holiday. Executive saloon, two passengers, no extra stops.
- One-way distance: ~210 miles
- Outbound: 210 mi × £2.20 = £462
- Return: 210 mi × £2.20 = £462
- Subtotal: £924
The system then applies:
- 15% off (whole booking ≥ £250): -£138.60
- 5% off the return leg specifically: -£23.10 (5% of £462)
Final billable: ~£762.30.
That's the number you'd see on the quote screen, with the discount lines shown so you know what's been deducted.
Why this is the model
Two-part answer.
First, it's transparent. Surge pricing hides itself in a multiplier you only notice on the receipt. A flat percent off, shown as a line item, is the inverse — you see the deduction before you commit.
Second, it's right-sized to demand. £250+ trips skew toward airport / long-distance / executive — the routes where we have the most margin to share. Return discounts skew toward customers who've made a planning effort (booking both legs in one go) and we'd rather reward that than try to convert each leg separately.
See it on a quote
Head to book.fare1.co.uk, enter your trip, and look at the breakdown panel. Both discount lines (when applicable) appear inline with the per-leg fares.
For the rate sheet that feeds these calculations, see /pricing. For an end-to-end view of how a quote becomes a captured charge, see how fixed fares work.