Mention “chauffeur” and half the audience will think of a man in a peaked cap driving a celebrity from one red carpet to another – continue reading to see how the world has changed. That’s a vision that’s some two decades out of date and largely unhelpful. Norwich chauffeur hire today is not so glamorous. And much more useful.

The real customers are the key. It’s the operations manager of a food production facility outside of Norwich who flies to Frankfurt every three weeks and can’t take a chance that there will be transport at 4:45am. It’s the lawyer taking a client to a confidential meeting who needs to be able to talk privately. It’s the family who have flown in from Vancouver for a wedding in Norfolk and who need someone who knows where the wedding is.

These aren’t glamour bookings. They’re practical ones.

Reliability is the product. Full stop. All of the other things – the clean car, the neat appearance, the flight tracking – are in service of that promise. The car will be there. It will be on time. You will not waste the worst 12 minutes of your day dreading that today is the day it all goes wrong.

Norwich Airport is a regional airport with a big punch. Amsterdam, Brussels, Dublin – frequent connections to longer trips within Europe. One missed flight snowballs. Late pickup, missed flight, rescheduled connection, missed day. Chauffeur services break the chain at the beginning, where it makes sense.

Corporate accounts are worth considering for companies with frequent travel. One bill a month, one service, no expense claims to follow up. Finance departments appreciate predictability. So do executive assistants who prefer one bill to 12 receipts.

And the less visible. Prom nights. Driving to the city for the theatre from Norfolk. Shuttles to the hospital where someone needs to get there relaxed. Not all trips are business trips – and the good chauffeur companies cater for both, without making the leisure travellers feel like second-class citizens.

“Just give it a go for the airport,” a friend said recently. “You’ll never go back.”

Overstatement? Maybe slightly. But there’s something to this. Sometimes, it’s best when things just work.