The VIP Travel Treatment
29 January 2025
I’m a bit of an old school driver. I have always favoured a manual gearbox over an automatic, preferring to have complete control of the car and ‘feeling’ the drive as opposed to just driving. However, when I last changed my car, because of the distances I travel and generally hitting rush hour traffic at some point, my local dealership salesman convinced me that automatic was the way to go.
As much as I was excited to pick up the car when it was ready, I was still unconvinced that an automatic was for me, that was until I drove it on a 400 mile round trip. Of course the car had all the comfort you would expect from an executive level car and I had not an aching limb when I got home. But I also felt that the drive was far less stressful, in fact I had to admit it, the car was a dream to drive!
Was this my first step to accepting vehicle automation!?
What I didn’t realise at the time was that my car also had the ability to pre-sense danger. So when I’m driving along and a car suddenly pulls out in front of me, before I had a chance to hit the brake, my car had done it for me. Now that sensation was entirely different to simply having an automatic gearbox!
This odd sensation would surely be how it felt to be driven by the car, as opposed to me driving it.
I can honestly say that the thought of a driverless car simply scares the life out of me. I’m not a great passenger anyway but to actually be able to let the car take over – well it just seems alien!
I’m not alone with this fear either…
A recent survey of 2,000 UK adults found that three-quarters of us fear not being in control of our own vehicle and more than two-thirds had a lack of trust in the technology and feared for our safety in a driverless vehicle. This is despite the evidence that clearly indicates there is something seriously wrong with the way we drive.
According to the World Health Organisation, 1.35 million people, across the world die each year as a result of road traffic crashes. In Hampshire alone there are, on average, 3,000 reported road collisions each year, this figure doesn’t include motorway or trunk road accidents either.
And yet it seems we would prefer to continue placing our trust in complete strangers, and our own driving fallibility, rather than in a future where our recklessness ceases to be a factor.
We receive many testimonials from our travellers with regular comments about how interesting our drivers are to talk to, how relaxed they make our clients feel. Some regular travellers have built real friendships with our staff that drive them.
So how would you feel if one day you are waiting for your Chauffeur Group executive car to arrive to take you to the airport, it arrives exactly when it should but then you see there is no driver? Would you climb in?
If you aren’t ready to put your faith in driverless technology just yet, you can still put your trust in us. For now, we will keep to the good old fashioned way of providing our service, with real drivers providing a top notch, personal, luxury executive car service!
