Terminal 3 arrivals at Pearson: where your car meets you

Terminal 3 is the smaller walk, and it shows

Terminal 3 is the more compact of the two buildings, and the walk from most gates to the arrivals doors is shorter than at Terminal 1. On a domestic arrival with carry-on you can be outside about 15 to 25 minutes after the wheels touch down; an international arrival with checked bags is more often 35 to 55 at a busy hour.

The variable is never the walk, it is the border queue and the belt. Because we work from your real landing time rather than a booking time, neither of those costs you anything.

• Domestic with carry-on: often outside within 15 to 25 minutes.
• International with bags: 35 to 55 minutes at a busy hour.
• The border queue, not the terminal, is what decides.

Where the car actually is

Arrivals at Terminal 3 is on the ground level, below departures, and private cars collect there. As at Terminal 1, we do not print a post number: the airport renumbers its marked pickup areas periodically and a stale number sends you to the wrong side of a road.

What we do instead is tell you at the time. Your chauffeur texts the exact door and describes the vehicle once they are in position, and dispatch is on the phone around the clock if anything is unclear when you walk out.

• Go down to arrivals rather than up to the departures level.
• Expect a text naming the door and the car before you are outside.
• Call dispatch at any hour if you cannot see the car.

Late-night arrivals

A good share of Terminal 3's traffic lands late, and the last flights of the night are the ones where ground transport thins out. Dispatch is staffed 24 hours, and a two a.m. arrival is an ordinary booking for us rather than a special request.

The fare is the same at that hour as at any other. There is no night surcharge and no surge pricing, which is worth knowing if you have compared a late arrival against an app at the same time of night.

• Dispatch is staffed around the clock, every night of the year.
• No night premium and no surge, whatever time you land.
• The car is booked and waiting before you take off.

If you end up at the wrong terminal

Equipment swaps and rebookings move people between the two buildings regularly. The Terminal Link train joins Terminal 1 and Terminal 3, runs around the clock and is free, so moving is easy if you want to.

You do not have to. Tell the driver or dispatch where you actually are and the car repositions, at no change to the fare, because the airport tariff prices the trip by destination rather than by building.

• The free Terminal Link train connects both terminals at any hour.
• Or simply tell us, and the car comes to you.
• Either way the price does not move.

Leaving from Terminal 3

Departing, the useful number is how early to leave home. We work on two hours at the airport for a domestic flight and three for an international one, plus the drive, and the booking page suggests a pickup on that basis when you give it your flight number.

The suggestion is advice rather than a rule. You set the time you want and the car is there fifteen minutes ahead of it.

• Domestic: two hours at the airport. International: three. Plus the drive.
• The booking page proposes a time from your flight and the day's traffic.
• Your chauffeur arrives 15 minutes early, every time.