Al bit late to the party and fwiw...

I parked at SFO Long Term Parking Thursday, April 21-24

Booked an 8:30pm-8:30pm reservation in February for my travel dates and it was $36.00 all in
(it's less expensive the farther out you bok and you can cancel for free up to T-24 hours)

I ended up parking on the top (uncovered) floor as it was full* everywhere else in both buldings

Travel time from walking from my car to the Airtrain to the United Terminal (T3) was 20 minutes
(and the same for the reverse when I arrived)

My return flight was almost 3 hours late arriving at 10pm and I didn't get to the checkout gate until almost 10:30pm.
Not knowing how to handle the late arrival, I played dumb and drove directly to the check out gate
Scanned the QR Code on my phone
Machine said to try again
Tried again and the gate opened
No addtional chagres hit my credit card

Received a survey email upon return offering $10.00 off coupon for future use for completing the survey
(n.b. the coupon is a webpage vs an email so save the page)

*each floor has an overhead display showing either full or how many open spaces in each particular aisle/lane and each aisle/lane jas overhead green lights indicating where the spaces are but n.b.-many of the green lights are not valid for an available parking space as there are hitting on the empty striped off "no parking" spaces

There�s a grace period built in for online bookings. You can enter the garage 4 hours prior to your selected entry time and leave 2 hours after your exit time without penalty.

Learn something new every day

Thanks

Thanks for the replies everyone. I think after reading here, and some reviews elsewhere, I'm going to try Anza. While ideal, I'm not really that particular about covered, the price is decent, and the shuttles are apparently pretty frequent, which definitely helps.

Would love the price of Burlingame Airport Parking, but I'm seeing review after review about how bad, infrequent and off schedule the shuttles are. If it was just me traveling, maybe, but with young kids, and a long trip, not worth the potential of arriving back from SIN, and then having to wait 30 or 45+ minutes before getting a shuttle.

Yeah, I was noticing that. Even with the 4 days free coupon, taxes and fees bring the ParkSFO option to the same price (well...very slightly more) as the SFO long term lot. That's where I've been parking in general, but it was a great deal until they took away the park 1 day, get next day 50% (or whatever it was). That brings their prices from pretty much the lowest to the highest. If it was in the middle, I might take it. I get why the discounts ended - I bet the lots are completely full now, or pretty close. Was good while it lasted.

Did you get into the new lot? Last few times at long term, they coned off the entrance to the new garage, and forced us to the old (though didn't seem too full as you need to walk through the new lot to get to the air train.

SFO long term does have a good grace period, which is one of the things I appreciated (even if I never had to use it). Though it takes skill to get the QR codes just right...I definitely had trouble with it the first couple of times, and have noted others having lots of issues.

I haven't parked at SFO in a while so dunno if this is still the case, but for a while at both long term and short term (which also accepts prepaid via QR code) there was someone stationed at the entrances to help people hold their phones at just the right distance/angle to be read... IIRC there is sort of a plate/icon indicating where to hold your phone, and I found that actually holding it just beneath that was what usually worked for me.

No-I had the old lot as (just as you described) the entrance to the new lot was coned off and also like you experienced, it didn�t appear full on my walk to the air train

That's right. One can get up to a 6 hour grace period if they align their booking time and their anticipated parking garage arrival/departure times well enough.

Have also been there multiple times in past year when both old and new garages were coned off (ostensibly full), and having to park in the surface lot south of the new garage.

I've noticed someone usually roaming around the long-term gates to assist. I don't recall seeing anyone at short-term parking. Also, I found out the hard way a few months ago that only one of the entry gates at short-term is set up with a QR code reader. Had to take a ticket to enter the garage and immediately exit (no charge), then take the U-turn exit between the Intl Terminal and Hwy 101 to return to the proper entry gate. Relatively painless, although it set me back a few minutes.

Following up in case anyone else has the same question: there are multiple smarte cart rental stalls in LT parking--follow the signs to find them. As I recall, there's one stall in each half of the garage (i.e., one on each side of the skyway). I also found several laying about on the 1st floor of the garage near the elevator, so check there first if you want to snag one for free.

https://www.flysfo.com/about/media/p...-summer-demand

Curious if anyone has any experience/insight that might be useful for my situation:

Booked parking at the SFO Long Term Garages/Lot for this coming weekend back in February, when the rates were a lot cheaper. Unfortunately, the airline changed our flights multiple times, and so we need to arrive at the airportmore than four hours before the scheduled start of our reservation.

Does anyone happen to know whether we'll still be able to enter the gates, or if it won't let us in until four hours before the scheduled start time? Relatedly, any idea on how they would charge us for the extra hours upon our exit? For example, would they recalculate everything at the drive-up rate?

I suspect we're in a bit of a unique situation, but any thoughts would be appreciated. I know I could always amend the reservation, but the cost is almost 50% more since I can't keep the same rate that I booked under.

I haven't actually exceeded the grace period, but based on the terms and conditions it appears that you'll be charged at exit for time exceeded. The phrasing insinuates that one can enter early and leave late, you'll just be charged the walk-up rate which is $2 for each 15 minutes maxing out at $25 for 24 hours.

Thanks so much--I saw the FAQs but somehow missed the actual terms and conditions (silly me). Your reading seems correct to me.

To follow up on this—you CANNOT enter more than 4 hours before your scheduled start time. Found out the hard way today, but fortunately was able to cancel and rebook (albeit for the significantly higher rate).

Was just offered a discount again on the SFO official parking site. $16 off a booking for next week in Long Term Parking.

was this just on the website, or was it sent to you. Personally, have not seen any discounts since the half off for every paid day that was the �standard� during the pandemic (aside from the survey discount). Seem like it was for everyone, or targeted as like a pop-up or something? Have not parked at long-term since that pro ended and then price went up to $21.

this summer, I used Anza and while the price was great with the $12.99 coupon, I was not happy there - both the parking itself - we got an area that seemed sort of semi-paved - and with the shuttle, who skipped over T2 for us even through I clearly indicated that�s where we were going, so added an extra 20 mins or so. The return they told us the shuttle was on the way but had to call a second time since it never showed. I think we waited >20 minutes - not ok after such a long trip (had been flying back from SIN).

This week, I parked for first time at ParkSFO - while a PITA to have to walk to the shuttle stop (I know, I could have paid for valet) - shuttle was quick and efficient both ways, and drivers nice. Used a 2 day free coupon (off of min. 5) which brought the price down reasonably - might have gone back to SFO long-term if I had to pay full price at ParkSFO, since it would have been only marginally more, and walking to Airtrain basically the same as walking to bus. Bus a bit more convenient as it has less stops, so I feel like saves a bit of time. Would happily go back there.