Website Of The Week: www.aferry.co.uk

By FRED MAWER
Updated:


Rating: 4 Star Rating

I've always believed that while there are numerous, excellent one-stop-shop websites for finding the best deals for flights and hotels, no single website exists for ferries.

exterior shot of ferry crossing the English Channel

Aferry.co.uk was voted world's leading ferry website at the World Travel Awards

So my interest was aroused by the announcement earlier this month that aferry.co.uk has been voted the world's leading ferry website at the (fairly) prestigious World Travel Awards.

Is it the ferry website I've been looking for?

Strengths

Its breadth of coverage. All the ferry operators I can think offering services from the UK are there, as well as many others with routes elsewhere in Europe.

Maps show which companies provide services where - not only can you establish your options out of Dover, but also, for example, from Spain to Morocco, or mainland France to Corsica. Likewise, click on 'destinations', and you can see at a glance (with maps) ferries to, say, Ireland, or Finland, or Croatia. Click on 'companies', and you can get useful summaries (and maps) of a particular ferry operator's services.

Aferry.co.uk also provides a price comparison service. I imagined I wanted to take the car to France in March. I first had to choose whether I wanted Dover or non-Dover routes. Having put in my dates and times, I was presented, neatly and succinctly, with the fares for all the relevant ex-Dover players, including, for good measure, Eurotunnel and LD Lines' Ramsgate-Ostend service. The response for non-Dover routes was equally useful and time saving. I could click through to book with aferry.co.uk. 

Weaknesses

Some maps - including, crucially, ones covering services to France - are not as clear as they could be.

Sometimes, aferry.co.uk applies mark ups. On my March dates, the website quoted me £127.64 return travelling with Eurotunnel. But on Eurotunnel's own website, for travel on exactly the same dates and times, the fare was £111.

And aferry.co.uk also applies credit and debit card charges to bookings, which is not always the case for bookings made directly with the operators themselves.

Ratings

Inspiring 1/5

Useful 4/5

Easy to use 4/5

Rating: 4 Star Rating

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