Hourly Chauffeur or Point-to-Point Transfer in Dubai?

There are two ways to book a chauffeur in Dubai. A point-to-point transfer takes you from one place to another. Hourly hire keeps the car and chauffeur with you. Neither is always the cheaper option. It depends on the shape of your day.

How each is priced

A transfer is a fixed price for one journey. You know the cost before you book, and it does not change with traffic.

Hourly hire has a three-hour minimum and is then billed to the quarter hour. The car waits between stops, you can add stops without rebooking, and the plan can change as often as your day does. A full day works out cheaper per hour than booking the same hours individually.

Both include the chauffeur, fuel and Salik tolls, with no surge pricing.

When a transfer makes sense

• One journey with nothing after it, such as an airport pickup straight to your hotel.
• A dinner where you are happy to book the return separately.
• Two journeys hours apart, with nothing in between.

When hourly hire makes sense

• Three or more stops. Meetings in Business Bay, DIFC and Dubai Marina on the same afternoon, for example. Each separate transfer carries its own pickup and wait, and the gaps add up.
• Uncertain timings. If a meeting might overrun, a car that waits is simpler than rebooking.
• Shopping, viewings and events, where you cannot know in advance how long each stop will take.
• A travel day with a gap. Between a hotel checkout and a late flight, the car can hold your luggage while you get on with the day.

A simple way to decide

Count your stops, and the hours between your first pickup and your last drop-off.

If you have one or two journeys with long gaps between them, book transfers. If you have three or more stops within a few hours, or you cannot predict how long each will take, hourly hire is usually the better value, and it removes the waiting and rebooking in between.

Across the Emirates

Hourly hire is not limited to Dubai. A full day in another emirate is billed by the hour and includes the drive there and back. For a single one-way trip outside Dubai, a fixed transfer rate applies instead. We cover this in Dubai to Abu Dhabi by Private Chauffeur.

Not sure which fits?

Send us the plan for the day and a reservations manager will recommend the better option. See hourly chauffeur, or read how our pricing works.