There is a gap in the market between an ordinary airport taxi and a chauffeur company, and most people in Tameside fall straight into it.
On one side you have a standard saloon. Perfectly good, gets you there, does the job. On the other you have the Manchester chauffeur firms, who will put you in a Mercedes and charge you by the hour, typically from around £45 an hour for an E-Class and considerably more for anything above it. Fine if you are billing it to a client. Hard to justify for a run to Terminal 2.
Our executive airport transfers sit in between. The car is a Mercedes E-Class, the same vehicle the chauffeur companies use as their entry-level executive option. The price is a fixed fare, the same way all our airport work is priced. No hourly meter, no waiting time on the clock, no quote that changes because your flight was late.
Call A Car has been running airport transfers out of Denton since 1970. This page explains what our executive service actually is, who it suits, and just as importantly who it does not.
What You Actually Get
A Mercedes E-Class. Not a “premium saloon” or an “executive-class vehicle,” which is what you tend to read when a firm does not want to name the car. It is an E-Class.
A fixed fare. Agreed before you travel and unchanged afterwards. If the M60 is crawling, if there are roadworks, if you sit in a queue on the terminal approach, the number does not move. This is the single biggest difference between us and a chauffeur company, because their model is hourly and hourly pricing punishes you for exactly the traffic you cannot control.
Flight tracking on arrivals. We watch your inbound flight and adjust your pickup automatically. You do not need to ring us when you land. Worth knowing that some local firms do require this. Lynx, for instance, hold your booking until you call them after collecting your luggage. We dispatch off the flight data instead, so the first thing you have to do when you land is nothing.
The same drivers. This is worth being straight about. We are not putting a different class of driver in the executive car. You get the same licensed, DBS-checked, local drivers who do all our airport work, in a better vehicle. After 56 years running this route, that experience is the part we would not want to change anyway.
The drop-off fee is separate. Manchester Airport charges every vehicle entering the terminal forecourt. It is set and collected by the airport, not by us, and it sits outside your fare. We would rather tell you that here than at the terminal.
Who the E-Class Actually Suits
Being specific about this saves everyone a wasted booking.
An E-Class comfortably seats three passengers, four at a push, and takes two medium check-in cases plus hand luggage. That is the honest capacity.
So it works well for:
A solo business traveller or a couple. This is the core of it. One or two people, normal luggage, wanting a considerably nicer hour than a standard saloon provides.
Client collections. If you are meeting someone off a flight and the car is the first thing they see of your company, an E-Class does a different job to a saloon. Pair it with our meet and greet service and your client walks out of arrivals to their name on a board and a Mercedes at the door.
Anyone who wants a better journey. You do not need a business reason. Plenty of our executive bookings are people heading off on a proper holiday who decided the trip starts at the front door rather than at the gate.
Longer runs. If you are going further than Manchester Airport, the difference between an E-Class and a saloon compounds with every mile. On a two or three hour journey it is a genuinely different experience.
It does not suit:
Families with a full holiday’s luggage. Two check-in cases is the realistic limit. If you have four people and four cases, an estate or a minibus will serve you far better and cost less. Our minibus hire takes up to eight.
Groups of four or more. Technically four fit. Comfortably, three do. If comfort is why you are booking executive in the first place, four in an E-Class defeats the point.
We would rather tell you that up front than take the booking and have you arrive at the airport with a case that will not fit.
Executive Versus Hourly Chauffeur Hire
Worth understanding what you are comparing against, because the two models are genuinely different rather than just differently priced.
Chauffeur firms bill by the hour. Around £45 an hour for an E-Class is typical in Manchester, more for a V-Class or S-Class. That model makes sense when you need a car and driver at your disposal for a day, for a series of meetings, or for an event. It makes less sense for a single airport run, where you are paying for the traffic as well as the journey.
We charge a fixed fare for the journey. Denton to Manchester Airport is Denton to Manchester Airport, whether it takes thirty-five minutes on a Tuesday afternoon or an hour on a Friday in August.
If you need a car for a full day of meetings across the North West, a chauffeur company is the right call and we would tell you so. If you need to get to or from Manchester Airport in a Mercedes without an hourly meter running, that is what we do.
Executive Corporate Travel
If your business moves people through Manchester Airport regularly, an ad-hoc booking each time is the slowest way to do it.
Our corporate travel service is built for repeat travel, and a business account lets you set the vehicle standard once, book against the account rather than paying trip by trip, and take consolidated invoicing rather than chasing individual receipts. If you want executive as the default for certain travellers or certain routes, we can set it that way so nobody has to remember to request it.
We already run account work for NHS contracts, council accounts and private sector clients across Greater Manchester. Executive is simply a vehicle tier within that rather than a separate service with separate rules.
Which Terminal, and Where the Car Will Be
Manchester Airport now has two passenger terminals. Terminal 1 closed permanently on 19 November 2025, and the old T1 entrance was rebranded as Terminal 3 Departures in March 2026. Plenty of booking confirmations still say Terminal 1, so it is worth a check.
Terminal 2 handles the large majority of flights including easyJet, Jet2, TUI, Emirates and Virgin Atlantic. See our Terminal 2 taxi service page.
Terminal 3 is primarily Ryanair plus short-haul and domestic routes. See our Terminal 3 taxi transfers page.
For departures, we take you to the terminal drop-off forecourt, which is where the airport’s drop-off charge applies.
For arrivals, vehicles are not permitted to wait outside the terminal. The forecourt is drop-off only and camera enforced, so collections happen inside the multi-storey car parks, signposted P3 at Terminal 2 and P14 at Terminal 3. On an executive booking this is exactly where meet and greet earns its money: rather than walking out to a car park after a flight, your driver walks in and meets you in arrivals with a name board.
Tell us your airline when you book alongside your flight number. The airline tells us the terminal, and given how much moved during the transition it is more reliable than what your paperwork says.
Executive Transfers to Other Airports
Manchester is our busiest route but not our only one. Executive vehicles are available on longer runs to Liverpool John Lennon, Leeds Bradford, Birmingham, Newcastle, Gatwick and Stansted.
The longer the journey, the more the vehicle matters. A saloon to Manchester Airport is a short enough run that most people would not think twice. A saloon to Gatwick is four hours. That is where an E-Class stops being a nice-to-have.
The full list is on our airport transfers page.
Areas We Cover
We run executive transfers from across Tameside and East Manchester, including Denton, Hyde, Audenshaw, Ashton-under-Lyne, Dukinfield, Droylsden, Stalybridge, Haughton Green, Gorton, Reddish and Bredbury, along with Manchester city centre, Stockport, Salford and Trafford.
For standard saloon and estate fares, our published Manchester Airport taxi prices start at £26 from Denton. Executive is priced separately, so call us for a fixed quote on the E-Class.
How to Book
Call 0161 320 7117 and ask for an executive vehicle. Our team is there 24 hours a day, every day. For executive bookings this is the best route, because we will confirm E-Class availability for your date and time and give you a fixed price on the spot.
Book through the app or online and add a note requesting an executive vehicle, and we will come back to you to confirm.
We have a limited number of executive vehicles rather than a whole fleet of them, so book further ahead than you would for a standard transfer. For early morning departures and during school holidays, as much notice as you can give is genuinely useful.
FAQs
What vehicle is your executive service?
A Mercedes E-Class. We name the car rather than describing it vaguely, so you know exactly what is turning up.
How many passengers and how much luggage?
Three passengers comfortably, four at a maximum, with two medium check-in cases plus hand luggage. If you have more than that, an estate or a minibus is the better booking and we will say so.
Is executive priced by the hour?
No. We charge a fixed fare for the journey, agreed before you travel. Hourly pricing is the chauffeur company model. Ours is the same fixed-fare basis as all our airport work.
Is the airport drop-off fee included?
No. Manchester Airport sets and collects that charge on every vehicle entering the forecourt, and it sits outside your fare. We tell you now rather than at the terminal.
Are your executive drivers different from your standard drivers?
No, and we would rather be straight about that. The same licensed, DBS-checked local drivers do our executive work. The vehicle is the upgrade.
Can I add meet and greet to an executive booking?
Yes, and for arrivals it is the natural pairing. Your driver waits in the arrivals hall with a name board rather than you walking out to the car park. See our meet and greet page for how it works.
Do you track flights on executive bookings?
Yes, on every airport booking. Your pickup moves automatically with your flight and there is no charge for delays outside your control. You do not need to call us when you land.
Can I set executive as the default on a business account?
Yes. Speak to us about a business account and we can set the vehicle standard for specific travellers or routes so it does not have to be requested each time.
Which terminal will you take me to?
Whichever your airline uses. Manchester now has two terminals, T2 and T3. Give us your airline when you book and we will sort it, particularly if your booking still says Terminal 1.
How far in advance should I book?
Further ahead than a standard transfer. We run a limited number of executive vehicles, so availability is tighter, especially at peak times.
Book Your Executive Transfer
A Mercedes E-Class, a fixed fare, flight tracking as standard, and drivers who have been doing this run out of Denton for over half a century.
Call 0161 320 7117 and ask for an executive vehicle. We will confirm availability and give you a fixed price before you commit.
