Terms and Conditions

These are the terms you agree to when you book a transfer with Montivo Transfers. They are written to be read rather than skipped: what you are buying, what it costs, what happens when a flight is late, and what happens when a booking is cancelled.

1. Who these terms are between

Montivo Transfers, “we” and “us” mean the private transfer business trading as Montivo Transfers, reachable at info@montivotransfers.com and on +33 6 10 75 54 75.

You, or “the client”, means the person who makes the booking, whether for themselves or for other people. The party is everyone travelling on one booking and a passenger is any one of them. A partner operator is an independent transport company or driver whose vehicle we use to carry out your transfer.

You make the booking on behalf of everyone in your party and accept these terms for all of them. The terms that apply to a booking are the ones published on this page at the moment the booking is paid for, including a booking made over the telephone.

Our transfers are performed in France, Switzerland and Italy, and these terms are read under French law. If you are a consumer, nothing on this page removes the rights your own country gives you.

2. Making a booking

You are responsible for the details you give us. In particular:

• A full pick-up and drop-off address. “Chalet Marie, Meribel” is not an address. Where no usable address is given, we will take you to a central point in the resort – the tourist office or the station – and that counts as delivery.
• The flight number and the scheduled arrival time. Without the flight number we cannot monitor the flight, and a delay becomes your risk rather than something we absorb.
• The number of passengers. If more people present themselves than the booking shows, we may not be able to carry them. Anyone we cannot carry has to make their own way, and we are not responsible for the cost of that.
• Skis, snowboards and anything oversized, declared at the time of booking, so the vehicle that arrives has room for them. See section 5.

A booking exists once we have confirmed it. We confirm in writing, by email, to the address you give us. If a date, time or address in that confirmation is wrong, tell us straight away in writing – info@montivotransfers.com. A change we are told about before the booking is confirmed costs nothing.

Once a booking is confirmed, a change to the date or the time may have to be handled as a cancellation of the original booking and a new booking at the price then applicable, so section 4 can apply. In practice we would far rather move a booking than cancel it, so ask.

3. Prices, payment and VAT

The price is per vehicle, not per person, and it is fixed at the moment you book. It covers the driver, the vehicle, fuel, tolls, flight monitoring, meet and greet, and child seats requested at the time of booking. It does not change because the traffic was slow or the flight was late.

All prices shown include VAT. The figure you see in the booking form is the figure charged to your card. Nothing is added at the checkout.

Payment is taken when you book, by card, through our payment provider. We do not see or store your card number. Corporate clients who have agreed invoicing with us settle on the terms stated on the invoice.

If costs change dramatically before you travel

A price we have confirmed is a price we honour. The one exception is an extraordinary and unforeseeable rise in the cost of providing the transfer between the day you book and the day you travel – a sharp rise in fuel prices, a fuel shortage, or a new toll or tax imposed on the journey. In that situation we may write to you, explain the change and what it costs, and ask whether you accept it.

We cannot raise the price on our own. Any increase applies only if you agree to it in writing. If you do not agree, the booking is cancelled and you are refunded in full, with no fee of any kind retained.

4. Changing or cancelling a booking

Cancel in writing to info@montivotransfers.com, quoting your booking reference. A phone call on its own does not cancel a booking – we need it in writing so that both of us have a record.

When you cancel a confirmed booking, we keep 30 EUR and refund the rest. That applies whenever the cancellation reaches us before the transfer, whether that is three months ahead or the evening before. The 30 EUR is not a penalty: it covers the card processing fees charged to us on the original payment and on the refund, which the card company does not give back.

Refunds go back to the card used for the booking. They usually appear within a few working days, depending on your bank.

A return transfer is two services on one booking. If you cancel only one leg, the other stands and the 30 EUR is charged once.

On request we will issue a written statement of cancellation showing what was paid, which you can give to your travel insurer.

Where nothing is refunded

• A no-show. If the driver is at the agreed place at the agreed time and we cannot reach you, or you simply do not use a confirmed booking, the full cost remains payable and there is no refund.
• A missed transfer. If your flight is cancelled, missed or delayed so far that you cannot travel as booked, the transfer counts as missed rather than cancelled. See section 6.

We may also cancel a booking ourselves – very rarely, and for a reason such as a road being closed for the day. If we do, you are refunded in full and nothing is retained.

5. Luggage, skis and snowboards

The allowance included in the price is, per passenger: one suitcase, one item of hand luggage, and one ski or snowboard bag.

Anything beyond that must be declared when you book. A vehicle is booked to hold a stated number of people and a stated amount of luggage, and a boot that is full is full. Undeclared excess items may be charged at 15 EUR each, or refused if there is genuinely no room for them – and a driver refusing an item on the pavement is a bad start to a holiday, which is why we ask you to tell us in advance. Declared properly, oversized items are almost never a problem: we send a bigger vehicle.

We load and carry luggage with reasonable care, but we are not responsible for items lost or damaged in transit. This is what travel insurance is for. Do not pack passports, money, medication, keys or electronics where you cannot see them.

Luggage lost by the airline is dealt with in section 6.

6. Flight delays, waiting time and lost luggage

We monitor the flight you gave us. A late arrival moves the pick-up rather than losing it, and there is no charge for that.

The free waiting time is one hour, counted from the official landing time of the aircraft – the time the flight actually touches down, not the time it was scheduled to. After that hour, waiting is charged at 30 EUR for each additional 30 minutes or part of it, payable to the driver before the vehicle leaves.

That hour is generous enough for a normal arrival. It is also the whole of it: passport control, baggage reclaim and customs run inside the hour. We watch the aircraft, not the queue, and a slow border on a Saturday in February is not something we can see, predict or absorb. If you know you are going to be slow through the airport – a large party, a passport problem, a pushchair and three children – tell the driver, and tell the office.

Keep us informed. A message to the driver or the office costs you nothing and can save the waiting charge entirely.

If the airline loses your luggage

Tell us as soon as you know. Delivering lost luggage to you is the airline’s responsibility, not ours. Where waiting for it delays you by about two hours or more, we may have to cancel the original transfer and schedule a new one for the time you can actually leave: the new transfer is charged as a new transfer and the original is not refunded, because the vehicle and the driver were held for you. You are free to decline the new transfer and make your own arrangements instead.

If the flight is cancelled or missed

If you will not arrive in time to travel as booked, the transfer counts as missed and is not refunded. We will make every reasonable effort to fit you onto the next available transfer, though you may have to wait for it. Where we cannot cover the new arrival time at all, you will need to make other arrangements. Check what your travel insurance covers – this is exactly the situation it exists for.

7. Departures from the resort

For the journey back, we schedule pick-ups so that you reach the airport about two hours before your flight departs. In winter that means a pick-up time that can look early. It is deliberate: the roads down from the resorts on a changeover Saturday are the least predictable part of the whole journey.

We may have to change a departure time, and if we do we will tell the lead passenger by telephone or text, or tell your resort representative. Please be ready at the address given, at the time given, with everyone in the party and all the luggage. The driver will wait a reasonable time and will try to call. If we cannot reach you and cannot wait longer without missing the flight, the transfer is treated as a no-show under section 4.

8. Children and young passengers

• Every child needs a booking, whatever their age, including infants in arms. A child who is not on the booking may leave the vehicle over its legal capacity, and then nobody travels.
• Child seats are free when requested at the time of booking, subject to availability. Tell us the age and weight of the child, or the group of seat you need: rear-facing infant seat (group 0, up to 13 kg); forward-facing child seat (groups 1-3, 9-25 kg); booster (groups 2-3, 22-36 kg).
• Children under 135 cm must travel in an appropriate restraint, as French and EU law requires. Parents are welcome to bring their own seat and are responsible for fitting it correctly.
• Children under 12 do not travel in the front of any vehicle.
• Children under 16 do not travel unaccompanied. Passengers aged 16 to 18 are responsible for their own use of seat belts.
• Parents and accompanying adults are responsible for the behaviour of minors in the vehicle, and for any damage they cause.

We will always try to meet a special request, including a particular seat, but we cannot contractually guarantee one.

9. In the vehicle

Smoking, including e-cigarettes, is not permitted in any of our vehicles. Drinking alcohol in a vehicle is prohibited by law in France.

A driver may refuse to carry anyone who appears to be under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or whose behaviour is a threat or a nuisance to the driver, the vehicle or the other passengers. Where a transfer is refused or stopped for that reason, no refund is given.

Soiling the interior of a vehicle carries a cleaning charge of 100 EUR, payable to the driver at the time, which is what a valet clean costs us and the reason the vehicle cannot take its next job. Damage caused to a vehicle by a passenger is payable immediately. Where payment is not made, we may cancel any remaining transfers on the booking without refund and recover the cost, including our legal costs, through the courts.

10. If we cannot deliver the transfer

We use every reasonable means to have the vehicle at the right place at the right time, and to get you to your destination when we said we would.

We are not liable for delays outside our control, which in the Alps in winter is not a theoretical category. That includes, and is not limited to: snow, storms and avalanche closures; accidents and road closures; police or official instructions; vehicle breakdown; unforeseen traffic; industrial action by third parties; and force majeure. Build a margin into your travel plans, particularly on the way home.

If for a reason within our control we cannot get you to your confirmed destination, we will arrange suitable alternative transport – another vehicle, a taxi, a train. Where you arrange that transport yourself, we will reimburse it up to the cost of a single taxi of the size your party needs.

If we cannot deliver a confirmed transfer because we could not reach you, we are not responsible for the losses that follow. Give us a mobile number that is switched on, has roaming enabled and has some battery left in it.

11. Partner operators

Some transfers are driven by vetted partner operators rather than in our own vehicles. That is how we cover a peak Saturday across several valleys at once, and it does not change what you booked, what you pay, or who you talk to if something goes wrong: the booking is with us.

Where we book you onto a service run by another operator as their agent, that operator’s own conditions of carriage apply to the journey, and our liability is limited to travel on our own services. We will tell you when that is the case.

When a transfer is assigned to a partner, we give you the driver’s name, telephone number, company and vehicle registration, so that you know who is meeting you. The partner is given what they need to carry out the job and nothing more.

12. Your personal information

We collect what is needed to carry out the transfer: names, contact details, addresses, flight details and any special requirements. We share those details with the driver doing your job, and with our payment provider to take payment. We do not sell your details to anyone.

How long we keep it, what you can ask us to delete, and how to ask, are set out in the privacy policy, which forms part of these terms. Marketing email is sent only with your consent, and every message carries a one-click unsubscribe.

13. Complaints

If something goes wrong, tell us quickly – within 72 hours of the transfer, while the driver still remembers the day and the records still exist. Email info@montivotransfers.com with your booking reference and what happened. We aim to answer every complaint within 14 days.

We would much rather settle a disagreement directly. Where that fails, we will use mediation before anyone goes near a court.

14. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms from time to time. The version that governs your transfer is the one published here when your booking was paid for, so a later change cannot alter what you already agreed to.

A plain-language summary of the cancellation rules is on the cancellations and refunds page. Where the two differ, this page is the binding one.

Common questions