Frequently Asked Questions

You can book online through our simple booking system. Select your dates, choose your service (Meet and Greet or Park and Ride), enter your vehicle details, and pay securely online.

We operate on a strict 30-minute time slot, we can always accept vehicles prior to you booking-in time but cannot accept vehicles any later than your booking slot.

We accept standard cars, but can accept larger vehicles at request. To request this please fill in our enquiries form or contact us on bookings@cruiseazureparking.com

Yes. We cater for fly-cruise one-way bookings. You can select Fly as your departure or arrival method during the booking process.

We recommend arriving at least 90 minutes before your cruise departure to ensure no disruption to your boarding. We operate on strict 30-minute time slots from 07:00 to 16:30.

You drive to the short-stay car park at your departure terminal. Our uniformed staff meet you, inspect your vehicle, and assist with luggage if required. We then drive your car to our secure CCTV-monitored facility. On your return, we bring your car back to the terminal.

You drive to our secure off-site parking facility. We then provide shuttle transport directly to your cruise terminal. On your return, we collect you from the terminal and transport you back to your vehicle.

Absolutely. Your vehicle is stored in a private, CCTV-monitored, gated facility with overnight lockdown. We carry £2 million public liability insurance and our staff are equipped with body cameras at terminals.

When your ship docks, simply head to the short-stay car park where our staff will meet you with your car ready and waiting.

Luggage assistance, electric car charging, and a full valet can all be added during the booking flow. Live prices are shown on the add-on step. Should you wish to add them afterward, please contact our team to ask for availability (Bookings@cruiseazureparking.com or 07767227739).

For security reasons, we can't provide the exact parking location of any vehicle. Your car is stored in our secure parking facility and handled only by authorised staff.

Cruise Azure Parking operates from all five Southampton cruise terminals. Vehicles are typically parked approximately 20-30 yards from the ship, allowing for a quick and convenient transfer to the terminal.

Yes. Cruise Azure Parking operates from all five Southampton cruise terminals, providing a convenient Meet & Greet service for cruise passengers.

For security and operational reasons, we do not disclose the exact location of customer vehicles. Your car is stored in a secure parking facility until your return. £2 million public liability insurance applies for the full duration of your booking.

Yes. The chat assistant on the bottom-right of every page can take you through a full booking. It pulls live availability and prices, asks you the same questions the booking form would, and produces a payment link you tap to pay. We never charge you without your final tap.

English, French, Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese, Dutch, and Arabic. The assistant detects your language automatically and remembers your choice for the session. You can also pick from the language menu at the top of the chat.

Audio never reaches our servers. On modern browsers it goes straight to your browser's built-in voice recogniser. On Firefox we fall back to Deepgram, where the audio is streamed directly from your device to Deepgram and not stored. We only ever see the resulting text.

Only if you're signed in, and only your own bookings. The assistant uses tools that refuse to return any record that doesn't belong to you. Cancellations, reschedules, and refunds are always staged as a draft for you to review and confirm before anything is changed.

Three layers. A pattern filter blocks common prompt-injection attempts before they reach the AI at all. Every message you type is wrapped in a tag that tells the AI to treat it as data, not instructions. And the AI's instructions explicitly forbid it from changing roles, revealing its prompt, or acting outside parking, terminals, and booking topics. Each blocked attempt is logged for our team to review.

For anonymous visitors: 24 hours of inactivity, then we archive the chat and after 30 days replace it with a short summary. For signed-in customers: 30 days of inactivity. The full transcript is deleted after 30 days of being archived. The summary is kept for up to 6 months and then deleted entirely.

Yes, but only when you're signed in and only after you confirm. The assistant prepares a draft showing the cancellation fee, your refund, and whether you're inside the cancellation cutoff. You tap Confirm to apply or Reject to walk away. Refund issuance is an extra step for you and our team.

Yes. Quotes come straight from the same pricing engine the booking form uses, with the same discounts and the same cap on busy days. The AI never makes prices up. If you give it dates, a service, and a ship, it will quote the exact total you'd see in the booking form.

Tell it. The assistant can correct itself within the same chat. If you're not getting where you need to go, tap the Contact link in the chat header or call us on 07767 227 739. Anything price-related, refund-related, or that needs human judgement is something you can route to us at any point.

Yes. The chat bubble lives at the bottom-right of every page, on phones and tablets. Voice dictation works wherever your browser supports it (Chrome and Safari on iOS / Android both work). The booking flow inside the chat is mobile-optimised.

Yes. Ask "what terminal does Britannia leave from on 12 May?" and the assistant pulls live sailing data and replies with the terminal, drop-off time, and any rules specific to that ship. It won't guess if it doesn't know.

Yes, signed-in customers can reschedule via the assistant. It checks availability for the new dates, re-quotes any price difference, and shows you a draft. You confirm, and the new dates apply with the original discount preserved if you had one. Outside the cancellation cutoff, the price recalculates fairly.

Yes. City, Horizon, Mayflower, Ocean, and QEII. It knows the postcode, drop-off layout, walking distance to the gangway, and which cruise lines typically use each terminal. It can compare two terminals side by side if you're unsure.

No. The AI can quote you a price and prepare a booking, but the final payment is always made through Stripe via a payment link. Your card never goes through the AI. We chose this on purpose for security and audit reasons.

The booking form at /book always works without the AI. The phone line and email are also always open. The AI is a faster route for most things, not the only route. If we're running maintenance on it, the chat bubble shows a message saying so.

On the same device with cookies enabled, yes, your previous chat threads stay accessible for the lifetime of the session. We do not link AI conversations across devices unless you sign in. Signed-in customers see their AI history under their account.

Yes. Tell the assistant about wheelchairs, oxygen tanks, large families, oversized vehicles, or any other consideration. It captures the request as part of your booking notes so the meet-and-greet driver knows before you arrive.

No. The assistant is scoped to Cruise Azure and Southampton cruise parking topics only. If you ask about something else it will politely say it can only help with parking and your booking. This is on purpose.

Only what is needed to make the booking: name, email, phone, vehicle registration, dates, and ship. It does not ask for payment card details (those go through Stripe), and it does not ask for irrelevant personal information.

Signed-in customers can. Visit your account area and the chat sidebar shows past sessions. Anonymous visitors see only the current session's messages.

It checks live operational notes from our team. If a terminal is closed, the assistant tells you which alternative terminals your cruise line uses, and offers to switch your booking. Weather delays are handled by our ops team and the assistant relays anything they've published.

Tap the contact link in the chat header, or call 07767 227 739 between 7am and 5pm any day. The AI is not a substitute for the team, just a faster route for the routine 80%.

Yes. It pulls the live add-ons list, shows you the price of each, and includes anything you select in the final quote. Add-ons appear on your booking confirmation and on the meet-and-greet driver's notes. Should they not appear please contact our team for assistance.

It is the fastest way to get a quote, ask a question, or start a booking. Most cruise parking visitors have a specific question (a date, a ship, a terminal). The chat answers it without making you read through every page.

Yes, completely free for customers. There is no subscription, no premium tier, no extra cost added to bookings made through the chat. The price you see is the same as the booking form.

Iona sails from Ocean Cruise Terminal at Southampton. Drive in through Dock Gate 4 on Platform Road and we meet you in the short-stay car park, 20 yards from the gangway. Hand us the keys, walk to check-in. Park & Ride from our compound 1.5 miles away is the lower-cost alternative for the same sailing.

Ventura usually sails from QEII Cruise Terminal on the Eastern Docks, accessed through Dock Gate 4. We meet you in the short-stay car park, 20 yards from the gangway. Park & Ride from our compound 1.5 miles away is the lower-cost alternative for the same sailing.

Britannia rotates between Ocean and Mayflower depending on the sailing. We cover both, plus the other three terminals. Check your cruise documents for the exact terminal, then book Meet & Greet (terminal-side drop-off) or Park & Ride (shuttle from our compound).

MSC Virtuosa sails from Horizon Cruise Terminal, the newest Southampton terminal at Berth 102 on the Western Docks, accessed through Dock Gate 10. We meet you 20 yards from the gangway with Meet & Greet, or shuttle you in from our compound with Park & Ride.

Cunard Queen Anne sails from Ocean Cruise Terminal on the Eastern Docks, accessed through Dock Gate 4. We meet you in the short-stay car park, 20 yards from the gangway. Park & Ride from our compound 1.5 miles away is the lower-cost alternative.

Queen Mary 2 sails her transatlantic crossings from Mayflower Cruise Terminal, the westernmost berth on the Western Docks. Access is through Dock Gate 10. We meet you at the short-stay car park 20 yards from the gangway with Meet & Greet, or run you in by shuttle with Park & Ride.

Fred Olsen Borealis typically sails from Mayflower Cruise Terminal on the Western Docks at Berth 106. Access is through Dock Gate 10. We cover Borealis with both Meet & Greet at the terminal and Park & Ride from our compound 1.5 miles away.

Park & Ride is the cheapest option from us, starting at £50 for a short cruise. Pricing scales by cruise length, not by ship. Cars are kept in our CCTV-monitored compound 1.5 miles from the port; the shuttle takes about 5 minutes to the terminal. Meet & Greet is faster but costs more, starting at £80.

Yes, with our Cruise & Stay packages. We bundle a pre-cruise hotel night with parking so you arrive the day before, sleep nearby, and head to the terminal fresh. Useful for cruisers driving from further afield or anyone who wants a less rushed embarkation day.

With Meet & Greet, no. We need the keys to move the car to and from our compound. The car is body-cam handed over and stored in the compound under CCTV. With Park & Ride, you hand the keys in at the compound and we hold them while you sail. Either way, we are Trading Standards approved and carry £2 million of public liability insurance.

Your car is ready whenever you walk off. We track each sailing's actual return time, so for Meet & Greet, the car is at the short-stay car park as you disembark. For Park & Ride, the shuttle runs from our compound on the actual return day. We do not charge for delays.

Yes. We cover every cruise line sailing from Southampton, across all five terminals, every day. P&O, Cunard, MSC, Fred Olsen, Princess, Celebrity, Royal Caribbean, Norwegian, Saga, Viking, Holland America, Disney, Virgin Voyages, Regent Seven Seas, Silversea and Ambassador all run with us regularly.

Yes. Meet & Greet means you drive to the terminal and your part is over in two minutes. Park & Ride adds a 5-minute shuttle leg from the compound to the terminal, plus the wait for the next shuttle if you arrive between runs. If your check-in window is tight or you have a lot of luggage, Meet & Greet is the safer choice.

Yes. Tell us the dimensions when you book and we allocate an oversize space. Vans, vehicles with roof boxes, and most lightly-modified cars are fine. Trailers and caravans need a phone call to confirm space and pricing before we accept the booking.

Pricing varies by trip length and is the same at every terminal. Live prices for both services are shown on the Services page and in the booking flow.

Yes. Returning customers receive a discount code after their first booking. The code is valid for bookings made within one year and must be used with the same email address.

Cancellation refunds are available within 14 days of booking only. A £25 administrative fee applies to all refunds. Refund requests must be made in writing to bookings@cruiseazureparking.com. For further information please refer to our cancellation policy.

We are a Southampton cruise parking operator covering all five terminals: City, Horizon, Mayflower, Ocean, and QEII. We offer Meet & Greet (we take your keys 20 yards from the ship) and Park & Ride (secure compound plus shuttle), both with CCTV, full insurance, and a family-run team that does cruise parking and nothing else.

Visit our Contact page or call us on 07767 227 739. You can also email bookings@cruiseazureparking.com or submit an enquiry on our enquiries page.