01One: the vehicle class

The largest single lever, by a distance. A sprinter van costs roughly twice what a sedan costs on the same run, because it is a bigger asset, it burns more, and there are far fewer of them available at any hour.

That is why the vehicles page spends so long on counting bags. Choosing a class you do not need is the most expensive mistake available on this desk, and choosing one too small is the most annoying.

02Two: the tolls

Bridges and tunnels are charged, they are passed through at cost, and they are not the same for every airport.

A Newark run crosses the Hudson and then approaches on a charged road, which is why the starting prices for Newark sit above the JFK ones despite a similar distance. A LaGuardia run may cross nothing at all. The distance did not change; the infrastructure did.

Where a road or zone charge applies on the day, that is passed through at cost too, and it is named on the quote rather than folded into a headline number.

03Three: the hour

Runs between ten at night and five in the morning carry a surcharge. A driver at four in the morning has given up a night, and that is the honest reason.

The hour also moves the price indirectly, through time. A run that takes 50 minutes at eleven in the morning and 90 minutes at six in the evening is not the same job even though it is the same map.

04Four: waiting

Free for the first 60 minutes on an arrival booked with a flight number, 15 minutes otherwise, then charged by the quarter hour.

Almost every waiting charge this desk has ever seen came from a booking made without a flight number. Add the number and this line usually disappears from the arithmetic entirely.

05Five: extra stops

A colleague collected in another borough, a case dropped at a hotel on the way, a set of keys. Each stop is quoted when the booking is made rather than improvised on the day, because a stop is time and sometimes it is also a different vehicle class.

An improvised stop asked for in the car is between you and the driver, and it will not be at the price a planned one would have been.

06Six: the meeting point

Kerbside pickup or meet at terminal. The second costs more because parking costs money and because the driver spends twenty minutes inside. The piece on meeting points argues about which to choose; here it is enough to say that it is a real line on the quote.

07What does not move it

• Time of year. There is no holiday tariff on this desk.
• How the booking arrived. The form and the telephone produce the same price.
• How far in advance you book. Booking early gets you availability, not a discount, and nobody here will pretend otherwise.
• Anything to do with who you are. There is no account, no tier and no membership, so there is nothing to price differently.

08Why we publish floors rather than totals

Because six variables cannot honestly be reduced to one number printed on a page, and a site that tries produces a figure that its own small print contradicts.

So the published numbers are starting prices, they say so everywhere, and the free quote you receive before booking carries the whole figure with the six items above named individually. Once you accept it, that figure is the figure, unless you change the ride.

09Get the real number

Send the run through the booking form and you will get a free quote with the parts named. Or call +1 (646) 559-3082 inside hours and somebody will go through it out loud, which for a complicated run is quicker. Monday to Friday 6:30 am to 8:30 pm, Saturday 8:00 am to 4:00 pm, Eastern Time.