Rolls-Royce Phantom chauffeur hire

Airport runs with luggage, first of all. Three large cases is the ceiling in a car close to six metres long, which is a worse ratio than anything else here. A family coming home from a fortnight abroad will be better served by a V-Class costing a fifth as much.

Tight city work is the second. It needs room to turn, room to stop and a clear kerb to open the rear doors into, and central London supplies none of those reliably. A day of five meetings across the West End is a poor use of this car and a frustrating one for whoever is driving it.

Third, anything where you would rather not be looked at. A Phantom stops a street. Some bookings want exactly that, and for the ones that do not, the Ghost delivers the same badge and the same silence in a car people glance at rather than stare at.

It does happen, and it works in a specific set of circumstances: two passengers, light luggage, and a reason for the car to be a Phantom at the other end. Somebody flying in for a wedding the same afternoon, a guest being collected before an event, a milestone trip where the collection is the beginning of the occasion rather than a transfer.

What does not work is the ordinary version of that journey. A Phantom on a Heathrow run is a great deal of money for forty minutes on the M4, and if the passenger simply wants to be comfortable and quiet, the Maybach does that for less and the S-Class does most of it for a fraction.

When a Phantom is booked for a terminal, the collection is planned rather differently. The car does not use short-stay levels, it uses a designated pick-up point with space to open the coach doors, and the chauffeur meets the party inside the building and walks them out rather than describing where to find it.

The Signature class holds three vehicles quoted the same way, with the same longer minimum block, which is a slightly odd grouping until you look at what they have in common: all three are booked for whole days rather than transfers, and all three need their route planned in advance.

The Cullinan is the same idea as the Phantom in an SUV body. It takes four people rather than three, sits high, and reaches places the Phantom cannot, at the cost of some of the ceremony. If the venue involves a field, a farm drive or a Scottish winter, the Cullinan is the sensible one.

The Sprinter is here because a group of twelve to sixteen needs a single vehicle, and at that size no saloon is a comparison. Where a wedding party wants both, the usual booking is a Phantom for the couple and a Sprinter for everybody else, quoted together.