Cheap car hire article discussion

eDicky

yrogerg wrote: »

Tried to book a car for Cape Town via "cardelmar". They found what I wanted at "KONTAKT".
Following Martin's advice I e-mailed KONTAKT to ask if they would accept my own world wide excess insurance policy.
Got an instant reply-"your contract is deleted". Beware!

Martin's advice? You had no need to ask for acceptance of your separate excess insurance from the rental company - it does not concern them. In the event of a claim your insurer will reimburse you, not the rental company, who will have already taken the excess amount from your credit card.

However, the cancellation of your contract indicates that this company derive most or all of their profit from the expected sale of their own excess insurance, so they would likely cause you problems if you decline it at the desk, and you are probably better off avoiding them.

boatman

robboman99 wrote: »

Why when booking a car hire with a full full fuel policy am I finding they have charged me 34 euros for something, no reason given, despite me returning the vehicle full.
Surely this is simply a money making scam ?

It may well be the cost of the fuel, you should then be refunded the €34 when you return it full.

marmite0

Hi everyone,

does anyone understand why looking at kayak.com vs kayak.co.uk for a car for the same destination/dates/time/class is apparently SO much cheaper on US site than UK site??

In particular looking for car hire from 26th December 2015 to 6th November 2016 in Geneva and cheapest economy class car is £390 from kayak.co.uk and $395 on the US website. So UK site is 50% more expensive!

Now.. maybe it's related to includes insurances or something, but it's not clear to me.

The US booking details (Europcar) says:
We give you the following for FREE:
Standard Package - Price Includes: Unlimited Mileage, Third Party Liability Insurance, Premium Location Surcharge and Winterisation Fee.
Cancellation
Amendments
PLUS your rental includes
Airport Surcharge
Local Taxes
Premium Location Surcharge
Road Fee / Road Licensing Fee
Unlimited kilometres.


Does anyone have any knowledge or experience?

trevjl

Just a quick note that may help someone. On this visit to florida we arrived at Fort Lauderdale from san diego but are dropping the car off at Miami to get the flight back.
I used all the MSE tools to get a good price for the car hire 6 months prior to the trip.
I ended up with Dollar through Auto Europe. BEWARE, if you are planning driving around the Miami area, tolls do not take cash anymore so the rental companies sell you the Sun Pass for these tolls. The cost of these varies with companies and apparently Alamo are one of the cheapest, Dollar are ridiculously expensive. they wanted to charge me $53 for the pass even though I told them I was only going to naples. he told me there was one cash toll on the way to naples, but 2 cashless tolls back to Miami. SO, he wanted to charge me $53 for less than $10 in toll charges. I told him to put it where the sun don't shine.
Google Sun Pass florida and they have a handy bit where they show the various charges each rental company charge so you can see whether your cheap rental is actually as cheap as the more expensive one. I wont be caught again

ASSJ

No query about Questor insurance . Said no just once to their insurance They do block a huge deposit on credit card ALL car hire companies do. Back from spain an Centauro Ok again

londoner100

cheap car rental in the us i searched and have come across usrentacar.co.uk they seem to be much cheaper then holiday autos etc, has anyone used them/heard of them as i havent and wanted to sort our before my trip ?

thanks for the help

richardw

londoner100 wrote: »

cheap car rental in the us i searched and have come across usrentacar.co.uk they seem to be much cheaper then holiday autos etc, has anyone used them/heard of them as i havent and wanted to sort our before my trip ?

thanks for the help

Yes, no problems.

Keith_&_Sue

Which ever car hire you go for I would avoid Argus who I used to hire from Budget (Alvis same company it appears, and both I will avoid in future) I have been charged for services not requested (roadside assistance) plus more than toll fee daily charge quoted (quoted 1.9 euros a day). I am trying to deal with this through Argus but to date not getting any joy. Their e mail responses are "No Reply" so you have to fill in a form on their website and you get a different person responding each time.
It appears Budget (Alvis desk) at best use sharp practices when you sign stuff or at worst may be have fraudulent operatives at their desk, or perhaps they just made a mistake with my over charge!!??. Will take this up with my credit card company but as no "single transaction" was over £100 I might have issues.

eDicky

Keith_&_Sue wrote: »

Which ever car hire you go for I would avoid Argus who I used to hire from Budget (Alvis same company it appears, and both I will avoid in future) I have been charged for services not requested (roadside assistance) plus more than toll fee daily charge quoted (quoted 1.9 euros a day). I am trying to deal with this through Argus but to date not getting any joy. Their e mail responses are "No Reply" so you have to fill in a form on their website and you get a different person responding each time.
It appears Budget (Alvis desk) at best use sharp practices when you sign stuff or at worst may be have fraudulent operatives at their desk, or perhaps they just made a mistake with my over charge!!??. Will take this up with my credit card company but as no "single transaction" was over £100 I might have issues.

It's unclear what you mean by 'Budget (Alvis desk)', but if your car was provided by Budget and they are the ones making these additional charges, have you called their UK number to raise the issue? 'Mistakes' can sometimes be made by local offices but they can often be investigated and resolved by the central organisation.

EssexExile

eDicky wrote: »

It's unclear what you mean by 'Budget (Alvis desk)'

It means Avis, not Alvis. Avis & Budget are the same company.