G7 and G20 summits. The host city changes. The problems do not.

Most large events add traffic to a city. A summit subtracts a city. Whole districts go behind a fence, the hotels inside the ring accept only accredited guests, roads close with little notice and reopen just as suddenly, and motorcade movements freeze everything else several times a day. Airspace over the venue is usually restricted for the duration, and business aviation parking at the nearest airports is either allocated or unavailable.

The people we look after in a summit week are rarely the delegations themselves. They are advisers, bankers, executives, non governmental organisations, journalists and the companies whose meetings happen in the margins because everyone useful is in one place. Their problem is not protocol. It is that a twenty minute journey becomes ninety without warning, that the hotel they were promised is inside the perimeter, and that their car cannot get within half a mile of where they need to be.

In every recent summit host city, vehicles entering the controlled area have needed a pass issued by the host authorities, and drivers have needed to be registered and cleared in advance. Deadlines for that fall weeks before the summit and are not flexible. If a car has not been submitted by the cut off, it does not go in, whoever is sitting in the back.

So the first conversation is not about the vehicle. It is about where your meetings actually are, whether those addresses fall inside or outside the ring, what accreditation you hold, and what the host authority's process and deadline look like this time. We will tell you plainly when the honest answer is that a car cannot reach a particular door and you will be walking the last part, because knowing that in advance is worth more than a promise that falls apart on the day. Protected vehicles are occasionally specified for these weeks: ask us about availability rather than assuming.

Summits move between continents, which means most clients need the same service in a city they have never worked in. Our own cars and our own chauffeurs are in London and Manchester. Everywhere else, cars are arranged through operators we know, and the point of the arrangement is that you deal with one person here rather than with a different supplier in each host city. See our global network and travel management.

For organisations that attend these weeks year after year, an account is usually simpler than a quote each time: one contact, one set of standing instructions, one statement. See open an account or, for a larger programme, request a proposal.