Cheap car hire article discussion

MisterT

We're off to Menorca for a couple of weeks next July and have just had notification of a change in flight times for our departure - it's now 4 hours 45 earlier.

I have already booked a hire car (Europecar via Carhire3000) and thought I'd better amend the booking to reflect the new arrival time.

I received an email from CarHire3000 advising me that as a result of the change the cost would now be £637 instead of £225. Ouch!

At this point I called customer services and spoke to a helpful chap who reckoned I could cancel the amendment and just pitch up at the airport early and it wouldn't be a problem. Given that there's no way I'm paying the extra and I'd lose my deposit if I cancelled I'm tempted to do just that.

Does anyone have any experience of turning up a few hours early like this? What's the worst case scenario? Hanging around in the airport for a couple of hours i can live with, major grief from Europecar I'd rather avoid.

kryn2012

Just thought I would share this with you.

I was looking for a hire car place in Tenerife yesterday and wanted to go with someone who takes a low deposit (some charge up to £600 on a block on your card)

And mostly ALL only accept credit cards not debit cards after some hunting and speaking to a friend in Spain there is a place called..orcarcanarias based at most canary island airports who accept debit cards and only charge £100 deposit.

Hope this helps others like it helped me.

You can google for the website address.

Brumlad87

Hi All,

I'm a complete newbie to car hiring, i've read through the article and a few pages of the forum but would like it if someone could put a fewthings into context for me? here are a few details about me:

I am 25, and have been driving for 6 years. I am heading to Dublin on the 2nd Feb - 4th Feb to visit a few friends, and this time i thought i would hire a car to save relying on my friends for airport runs and to give them a break should we go driving anywhere.

So i've found a suitable car on arguscarhire (via travelsupermarket) and the rate includes:

collision damage waiver (cdw)
third party liability protection (tp)
theft waiver (tw)
tax
airport fee
unlimited mileage
breakdown assistance

And the following:

If you purchase the Excess Cover Insurance from a third party, the credit card holder will be required to present his/ her credit card at the rental desk in order for the car rental agent to authorize the deposit.

Could someone explain this please??

the fuel policy is "recieve with a quarter tank and return with quarter tank" which suits me better than the over-charging "get full tank return empty"

Now we come to my questions... i'm unsure as to what CDW/TP/TW is? can someone define these and give an example??

Secondly, i understand i need to arrange a seperate policy to cover the excess and damage to wheels and windows etc. I have seen one (via moneymaxim) which has a £4000 excess (presumably if i am in an accident, i am covered for upto £4000 worth of damage??) and it also includes lost keys and windscreen/tyres etc for £5.97. Good deal or not??

I know many of you have answered these sorts of questions before, but any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Matt

Fellwalker

Matt
You cannot do better than spending some time reading Martin's report and the comments on the many many pages above.
CDW - collision damage waiver. If you damage the car, they will pay for any damage above the excess that they quote. In recent years the excess that you have to pay has been going up and is up to £3000 in some cases.
TP - third party liability protection - Similar thing, but covers damage to others - people, cars, buildings, etc. Same problem re excess.
TW - Theft Waiver. Similar thing, similar issues as above. Covers theft OF the car, and possibly from it if there is damage. Many posters have said it did not cover theft from their hire car when the car itself was not stolen.
The vast majority of car hire companies also charge you without limit for any damage to windscreen, tyres, underbody. And some choose their repair shops which charge at ludicrous rates.
Read Martin's comments about what the likes of moneymaxim cover. They are brokers or introducers for insurance companies that cover these uninsured items. Each policy is different. For a single trip, you need to cover the difference between what the car hire covers and what you could afford in case of accident.
Often these third party policies work on the basis that you have to pay and they will reimburse you IF what you are claiming is covered by the policy. Hence the hire company want to know you can pay in the meantime.
Good luck. Over the years I have hired, this is becoming an increasing nightmare.

niftythrifty1

they say your twice as likey to crash near your home as thats where your often commuting maybe this is a reason why?

Hern

Wife and I are holidaying in the US in June with an inbound to Denver and an outbound from Phoenix. Car hire is inevitably expensive due to one-way drop-off viz: collect in Colorado, leave in Arizona.

I've done the usual site scraper thing with various specialist searchers and of all of 'em am most impressed with Rhinocarhire.

It didn't show up in the first page of Google's rankings -- likely an SEO thing -- but it has delivered the most detailed and best value-for-money quote (other car hire aggregators merely indicate the rental price exclusive of drop-off, saying they will "advise" after booking: yeah, right, we were all born yesterday.)

I'd be obliged if any MSEr has experience of using Rhinocarhire and can confirm whether using their service is a good or bad idea. Thanks.:)

Hevding

Anyone have any tips for renting an Automatic from Lisbon?

Automatic prices are so high in Europe!

niftythrifty1

Ive read up to find some of the best comparison websites to go to, on MSE and ones ive Google'd, but non of them compare the small independent car hire companies ! So am i best phoning around for car hire companies on the likes of yell.com or other directories to find what the small and medium size companies are offering?

the big comparison websites only give you a choice of the top 20 in most cases but these are massive companies with big over heads??

just a thought.

Maybe someone has some experience with both the smaller companies and the larger ones.

Cheers :-)

Goldielocks

Hern wrote: »

Wife and I are holidaying in the US in June with an inbound to Denver and an outbound from Phoenix. Car hire is inevitably expensive due to one-way drop-off viz: collect in Colorado, leave in Arizona.

I've done the usual site scraper thing with various specialist searchers and of all of 'em am most impressed with Rhinocarhire.

It didn't show up in the first page of Google's rankings -- likely an SEO thing -- but it has delivered the most detailed and best value-for-money quote (other car hire aggregators merely indicate the rental price exclusive of drop-off, saying they will "advise" after booking: yeah, right, we were all born yesterday.)

I'd be obliged if any MSEr has experience of using Rhinocarhire and can confirm whether using their service is a good or bad idea. Thanks.:)

Hi, I rented a car last week through them in Cyprus. I needed one really last minute and booked it the night before, for pick up the next day. All was fine, the agent I collected the car from was very friendly and helpful - the car was also fine. This is the 3rd rental I have had through using their website, the last 2 occasions went smoothly as well and I was upgraded to a better car each time. I got a 5% discount by Liking them on Facebook, I think this offer is still running? You might be able to save a bit of money.

mcc100

traveller23 wrote: »

In my experience car hire and excess insurance does not cover clutch and engine, if either of these items fail you bear the cost.

This would be mechanical failure and surely you would not be liable for the cost if either failed.