Originally Posted by
pamann
You can park at mid stay for free for an hour if dropping or picking anyone up. It’s a 10 minute bus journey to/from the terminal that is also free. You’d be crazy to pay those prices when there’s a free option.
People will still pay it purely for the convenience. The Express Set-down is very much seen as a necessity for many passengers, whereas the airports can justify it as a premium service whilst offering free options in other car parks.
STN's free option is relatively generous since the mid-stay is only about a 7mins shuttle ride away running every 10mins. Worst case scenario on paper is therefore 17mins from drop-off to Terminal. Given the capacity constraints also with express Set-down, there is still enough passengers will pay £10 and it be well utilised. Now that LGW are also charging the same fee, it's inevitable for MAG to raise the price in line with them.
On a separate note, TUI have made a change to S27 with RHO dropped on Wednesdays and PMI moving to a morning rotation. That will likely result in a new route with I'd guess LCA or one of the Cape Verde Islands as probably most likely.